THE ISLAND OF CHARON
a novel in the series
"PLAYING ANOTHER REALITY"
CHAPTER 6. BLOOD WITH MILK
6.2. MOM?!
I woke up in my hut closer to sunset. It was hard to adjust me to the local time. Getting out of bed, I tried to focus, there were too many events during the night! Or… during how many days of the nine I had planned to spend there, on the Island of Magicians? I could afford to rest for a whole month only in Greece.
“Hmmm… It’s the second strange dream in a row, because it was an exact copy of the reality. Meanwhile the dreams are always different from the reality, even in small things. Although… the first dream with Sofia talking about Charon ended with the appearance of the Beekeeper, what didn’t happen in fact… Well, thank God! The Confectioner was arrested, and the Beekeeper…”
Suddenly, my wandering gaze stopped on the empty bottle of the magic potion…
“Oh, my God! Michael was here last night! We didn’t touch the bottle, so everything happened by itself… But what would have happened if we had drunk the potion? And who, I wonder, sneaked into the hut, while I was away, and drank my blood with milk?!”
I put myself in order and decided to visit Yanis.
Going down to the already encroaching Ocean, I noticed the Girl, joyfully running back and forth along the snow-white sand shore, and the Boy, running after her no less joyfully.
“Oh, the first love!” I sighed.
Yanis waved hello from afar and even moved towards me, but we had no sooner reached each other, when the Girl ran up smiling and hugged me.
“MOM!” she exclaimed, glowing with happiness.
I froze in my tracks, even forgetting to say hello, and Yanis came up to us.
“Did you hear it? What’s it all about?” I asked him.
“She seems to have finally found what she has been looking for,” Yanis answered with a barely noticeable kind smile, which instantly made me lose my temper.
“I’m not her mother!”
The Girl tilted her head to the side and was watching us attentively.
“How could this happen?!” I exclaimed, simultaneously shifting my gaze to the grubby Boy, who had run up to us. “She must be confusing me with her mother!”
“La-a-nte-e-rn!” the Boy said melodically and pointed his finger first at the Girl, then at me.
“What’s?!” I recoiled from them in horror, remembering the Boy’s drawing by the Wish Tree. “Did you need a lantern so that your princess could find her mom?!”
The boy smiled slyly and ran away.
I looked at Yanis, who was watching me silently and completely calmly, without any emotions.
“Listen, Yanis! Perhaps the mistake occurred, because I had visualized someone else’s light bulb! However, the Girl is not my daughter!!!”
Yanis shrugged.
“Why?! Don’t you believe me?!” I exclaimed. “What am I supposed to do now? It’s necessary to return the Girl to her lawful mother or father!”
The Girl was obviously offended by my words. Taking a step to the side, she sat down on the snow-white sand, keeping her eyes on me.
“Okay,” Yanis nodded. “She can stay with me for a while.”
“You’re crazy! Where to stay with you? In a boat???”
“We are all in the same boat here,” Yanis grinned.
“Oh, I see, you’re a philosopher! Of course, you can say that on any island! But don’t shirk, Yanis! What does your ‘for a while’ mean? Who are you to her? You’re taking on too much!” I was outraged. “The accusation of stealing a child is not the same as of stealing one’s blood with milk!”
My last words clearly made Yanis tense.
“I told you not to…”
“Not to go to the magicians?” I said for him poisonously. “And why did YOU go to them?”
Yanis stopped, apparently wondering the way I knew that, because I had discovered the magic bottle in his cafe, when he had been snoozing peacefully in the overturned boat on the shore.
“Okay,” Yanis nodded in agreement. “You’re right. I went to the magicians. About five days ago. But I found the strength not to use their potion, pouring it into the sink at the last moment. And I don’t want you to turn into a vampire.”
“What else vampire?! How old are you to still believe in fairy-tales?! Yes, you’re just an ordinary crazy man! Crazy like everyone and everything on this damned Island!” I shouted.
“Alice…” Yanis tried to take my hand to calm me down, but I defiantly crossed my arms over my chest.
“If my memory serves me right, someone told me that five days ago you stayed with monks on the Holy Mountain in Greece! And now you claim that on the same day you dropped in to the magicians on Camotes?! What’s the purpose of your need of their potion?! I wonder!”
Yanis sighed heavily and looked at me again with that strange look, reminding me of someone else I couldn’t remember.
“You may think whatever you want, but…” Yanis said quietly, looking away, “I’m telling you the truth, Alice. And, mind you, I’m not asking… why YOU needed this potion.”
Suddenly, I realized all the nonsense of the situation. Yanis was a complete stranger to me, and I brazenly invaded his territory and made claims about the magic potion with a distinctly love flavor.
“Okay, I’m sorry,” I squeezed out of myself softly and offered Yanis to drink coffee as a reconciliation.
The Girl, who had been watching Yanis and me all this time, followed us.