Guarding Celestial Nymph

I sat there in my mustard yellow uniform. The lights above me were flickering with a bug stuck inside it and some laughs from two colleagues during their lunch break filled my void. 

There were few other people in the police station’s waiting room. One was a homeless man, one woman was wearing a mini skirt and a sweater from police storage, her makeup smudged and her eyes apathetically looking in the distance, must have been a long night.

And two underage kids. Probably their first time, they looked terrified not knowing what’s to come. But no matter their crime they would be let off with a warning even after the tenth time because the mayor did everything to keep the town’s good name, he didn’t hold accountable little vandalism. They just cleaned it up and let the culprits go with little to no punishment.

I knew these people.

They possibly didn’t know me, but I knew them. I knew a lot of things about other people. I tended to watch people. Even now I was so deep in my thoughts looking at that homeless man. His name was Creed, but I wasn’t so sure about his last name, apparently no one was. It was an understatement that he was old. Wrinkles on his forehead were now so deep that the skin folded over his eyebrows.

He was always wandering around the town, he liked to talk to people. I noticed how sometimes he would go up to random people and just sit down next to them and start talking. He never looked ashamed of his life. Most of the people called him names, but I had a feeling he wasn’t what he seemed. Yes, he smelled of alcohol but it never looked like he wasn’t aware of what he was doing. The thing was that, I wasn’t sure where his place to live was. I wasn’t completely sure that he was homeless, that was just what everyone called him, homeless Creed. He didn’t drink for the purpose of drinking. I noticed that he drank only for the purpose of getting warmer, not once when he had drank it looked like he was enjoying it.

Creed had a long beard that completely covered his short neck and his eyebrows were grown out in every direction. His eyes were narrowed down and he always wore gloves, no matter how warm it was, he was wearing gloves. They had holes in them but still he never got away from them. He looked up at me and I quickly changed my sight to the floor. I heard him mumble something under his breath.

I wasn’t popular in my town. The people here knew I existed but that was it. All through my school years I was the outcast, I was just there, I wasn’t even picked on much. Some managed to call me names, the most popular of them was orphan. At first it bothered me but by time I realized that I was indeed an orphan.

But I had a stepmother, Celeste Moore. She was living alone, an old lady that was filled with energy no matter her age. But she was one crazy lady.

I never understood why she wanted a foster kid at all. I never felt the motherly love from her that I read about. Never got hugs from her, or even saying that she loved me. I guess she liked talking to me, maybe that was the reason. She was lonely and needed someone in the house.

“Danica Moore,” someone called from the other side of the room. I looked over and it was one of the officers. I nodded and got up from my chair and entered the little office. “Please sit down,” Mr. Wilson said. “Few weeks ago you complained about public harassment,” he said and that made my eyes roll to the back of my head.

I completely ignored his statement. “Why is this such a big deal that you actually sent someone to pick me up?” I questioned him. I was pulled out of my work just to come here, and I hadn’t even done anything. “And you know that I didn’t make that complaint.”

He looked at me resting his arms on the table. “Your mother is a dear friend to me,” he explained very calmly.

“Foster mother,” I corrected him. I felt the need to add that because she didn’t feel like my mother. I had no idea what it was like to love a mother or to be loved by a mother. Never met my parents. All I knew was that they gave me up. I would like to know the reason why.

Did they have trouble taking care of me? Did something happen to them? Or maybe they just didn’t want me? Maybe that would be the hardest to know. That I wasn’t wanted.

“Anyways, she made a complaint that you were being harassed by your peers,” he said. Ms. Moore always made sure to be the most overprotective person I knew. She didn’t love me, I knew she didn’t but she was looking after me well and she made sure that nothing hurt me.

It wasn’t like I was always being made fun of, it was just the one time my old classmates got drunk and they felt the need to bug me for some time next to my house. Of course Ms. Moore noticed it and got overprotective of me. “I am a legal adult. I can decide whether to complain or not,” I said.

I was twenty five already and still living with my step mother. She was too invested in my life and I hated it but I didn’t have the guts to tell her anything. It wasn’t like I had anywhere else to go to. And I didn’t have any other family. Even Ms. Moore didn’t have anyone else.

“They didn’t even do anything, just said a few nasty things, nothing I can’t handle,” I said and Mr. Wilson leaned back in a sigh. I even saw them recently at a shop, they didn’t even care that I was there, they simply walked past me.

I noticed there were many files on his table scattered around, Mr. Wilson looked tired. “Is everything alright?” I questioned trying to read the labels on the files.

“It’s confidential,” he said. Mr. Wilson was somewhat of a friend to me. At least when we met somewhere outside the police station we chatted for some time. He knew enough about me and I knew enough about him. He was married to Coraline and had two sons, their life wasn’t perfect with a few cheatings occasionally but they somehow made it work.

“If you ask me about it, if I have seen anything around, it’s part of the investigation,” I said, smirking at him and leaned back in my chair. I also knew he liked to gossip and he wouldn’t miss a chance to tell anyone about the newest case he is working on. That was probably the worst quality of him in his profession but still I used it to feed my curiosity.

“Alright then,” he said, getting more comfortable in his chair. “Have you seen anything strange in the woods?” he questioned.

“I don’t go there, what about it?” I asked.

He shook his shoulders. “Not sure. Some people have noticed strange things happening there and they collected signatures for us to look into it. They have seen some weird looking people and wolves. Weirdly big wolves,” he said and I raised my eyebrows, laughing mockingly.

“What’s the big deal about it?” I asked. “Wolves live in these forests, howling has been reported. And people… they are just weird,” I said and there was no limit to how strange people could be.

“I don’t know. Something is bothering them and we are trying to figure it out. There are some people who complain that higher forces are living there,” he said tiredly, clearly not buying into those old people who still lived by superstitions.

“What higher force?” I laughed at the bizarreness.

“I don’t know, some mythical creatures,” he said and I burst out laughing.

Did those people not realize they were wasting their and the police time? If they really believe that something is there then just don’t go there. Some just couldn’t live without drama in their life.

I got up. “Well, good look on catching’s those dragons and vampires,” I said jokingly.

“Ms. Moore is a good woman,” he added before I could open the doors. “She just wants what’s best,” I forcefully nodded just to get out of this place. “Take care, Danica.”

I stepped outside and it was early evening and I needed to get home. It wasn’t like I had some kind of curfew but ever since I could remember it was like I had some kind of allergy to the dark, not actually. When it gets darker outside, I get nasty headaches and there is a ringing sound in my ears.

I wanted to go to the doctor and figure out why I was like this but Ms. Moore said that it wasn’t a big deal. She said that my mother also had the same problem. She said it was some kind of disease that had no cure and nothing I could do about it. But I got worried and still went to the doctor. The scans showed nothing. I was as healthy as a horse.

I went to multiple doctors. They all praised how healthy I was. But my mind couldn’t wrap around how that horrible pain could be normal.

I just had to live with it, with no cure to ease it.

I walked home at a fast pace. I needed to get home before the headache got worse, at home it wouldn’t ease but at least I will be in my own space suffering not with people around.

Entering the house I was greeted by Ms. Moore. She walked up to me. “You shouldn’t stay out that late,” she said to me, her hair was tied up in a bun and she was wearing an elegant black dress with some jewelry around her neck and wrists. She always looked like she was about to go to some glamorous dinner.

“I wouldn’t be out late if you hadn’t complained about my encounter with those boys,” I said in my defense.

“Well. I didn’t like them very much,” she said. “It’s not the first time they go around and talk nonsense. And last month they threw empty beer bottles in my front yard.”

There was just one bottle while they were walking around drunk, they didn’t even mean to drop it there, I was watching as it happened. But it was what Ms. Moore did. Her loneliness made her exaggerate everything in her life.

“If you don’t like them then just say so, don’t complicate my time with that.” I rolled my eyes, taking off my jacket and hanging it in the corridor closet.

“I am just making sure you are alright,” she pointed out in a sweet voice.

I turned towards her, rolling my eyes at her. “You don’t need to do that. I am an adult. If you would let me I would be out of this house in no time. Just let me live the way I am,” I said.

I wanted to leave since I turned eighteen, but Ms. Moore said that she needed my help because she is old. I knew that was just an excuse to make me stay. She was old but she didn’t need me around. She was probably the healthiest person in this town.

“Silly girl. Where would you go?” she questioned mockingly. She was never mean to me, it was just how she talked with people. With confidence and a feeling that she was better than anyone else.

“Anywhere. I make enough money to live on my own, I can actually take care of myself.” Of course my job didn’t pay me a lot but I could easily rent a one room apartment. I didn’t need luxury. Just needed to be warm and a bed to sleep in.

“Why do you even need to work?” She turned around and gestured around and walked deeper to the living room. I followed her inside and leaned by the closest vanity. “We live in a castle. What more do you need? We have all the money in the world,” she said proudly.

“You have all the money. I don’t.”

She looked at me with raised eyebrows. “My money is also your money. In my time I won’t be able to spend it all. When I die, you will get everything,” she said. “It is you who refuses to live with the income I have,” she sat down on her dark blue velvet couch.

To this day, I had no idea where her money came from. All I knew was that she just had it flowing in her account.

I smirked at her. “Your money won’t make me stay,” I said. “I am here because you asked me to, begged me to.” She actually begged me to stay but I always knew there was something more than just wanting me to stay with her.

Ms. Moore just chuckled at me and patted the seat next to her and I complied, slumping down next to her.

“There are far more important things than money,” she said and looked at me amused. “Stars are the ones that are worth more than anything to both of us,” she said but her expression was rock hard. She was trying to get my expression but I had no idea what she meant.

“Stars?” I questioned with a raised eyebrow. “Why always stars? And the sky? What’s your obsession with it?”

She smirked again. “You don’t get it yet but you will eventually, I hope you will,” she said in excitement and I had no idea what she was talking about and most of the time I didn’t understand her or her words she was saying.

I hoped I wouldn’t go crazy like her. Maybe it was given, living in this town and with her.

In sigh I crossed my arms in front of me, she was just so obsessed with stars and space and sky that it drove her crazy. She liked stars so much that everything in this house was covered with them. It looked pleasant but obsessive. All the rooms were in dark blue resembling the night sky and she had never explained why she liked it so much. “I know that you are too obsessed with all these celestial things…” I said but she cut me off standing up with an excited look on her face.

“You said it,” she said pointing at me.

I narrowed my eyes at her. “What?” I questioned.

“Celestial, you said it,” she said.

“Yea, I know that word,” I said. “I went to school and got some education. I know some smart words,” I said, annoyed by her childish act.

“I have never heard you say that word before!” She was far too excited over nothing.

I rolled my eyes at her and walked out the room. She was weird. The good kind of weird but still she was a bit too much for me.

“Good night, Ms. Moore,” I said to her, ignoring her statement.

“Sleep tight, Danica,” I heard her call behind me in half a laugh. I knew she wouldn’t go to bed for a couple more hours. Sometimes she even went out at night. I had no idea where.

Maybe off to meet her lover? Or her secret business?

I entered my bedroom. Four gray walls and for the satisfaction of Ms. Moore, one wall was painted dark blue with star constellations. I didn’t hate it, I would assume that by time these stars would get boring but they didn’t. If anything I grew to like them but I would never say it to her. She already thought that I was just as much in love with stars as she was. I didn’t want her to give any reason that I thought this was my home. It was my house but not my home and Ms. Moore was barely my friend.

It was weird to think that you could spend your whole life with someone and still look at them like a stranger.

She didn’t make this feel like home to me, she was friendly with me but even after all these years I still called her Ms. Moore. I would assume that by time I could call her by her name, Celeste.

If she would ask I guess I would. She never showed that she didn’t want me to call her Ms. Moore. I didn’t even get a ‘happy birthday’ from her. And when I was a kid I would ask about her life, she would always change the subject.

That woman was a mystery to me, a stranger.

I finally pulled off that scratchy uniform and let my raven black hair drop down from the bun that was too tight. I never liked to put my hair up, but my job required that if I have long hair it needs to be put up at all times.

It was very quiet in the house. It mostly was. Sometimes, if I let the window open, I could hear wolves in the far distance. But when the dark set in it always got very eerie.

My condition had worsened over the years. Now I couldn’t even leave the window open. I feared that there would be a day where the pain would be unbearable. I have tried many remedies but with no success.

I had a chronic headache that would surely be the death of me. Some nights it already made me want to end myself. And the idea was very close to me since I didn’t really have anyone to take into thought. There was only Ms. Moore but even she was just an acquaintance.

There wouldn’t really be much grief if those headaches decided to take me away. Not a single real friend even.

Maybe it was good that I didn’t have any friends. How could I ever make them understand why there were chains on my bed?

Those headaches, if they weren’t bad enough, came with side effects. I had a terrible case of sleepwalking. I once woke up five miles out of the town’s border. That was when I decided that chaining myself to the bed would be the only possible way to keep me inside.

At first Ms. Moore tried to tie me with silk fabric but I tore it and woke up in the forest with fabric around my wrists. Then she tried rope but even that didn’t work. Not only I woke up with ropes around my wrists but terrible rope burns. The only possible thing was actual chains and for many years now I have been waking up in my bed like a normal person, except this wasn’t normal.

Maybe the reason I didn’t fight enough to move out. She understood my condition. And she wasn’t weird about it.

Like every other night I locked my wrist in a chain and put the key in my bedside drawer. The sleep wasn’t always comfortable but it was better than to wake up in a random place because even locked doors couldn’t keep me inside, I always found a way where to get out.

But then there were also these dreams. Of someone. It was a man. I have seen him in my dreams for a couple years now. I couldn’t make out a single feature on him. Once I woke up it all jumbled up.

Never met this man before. I guess the time spent thinking about the mystery figure made me feel like I knew him. But I also read that pain makes people’s minds go crazy. Maybe that’s what he was. A side effect of my pain.

But at times he was what made me fall asleep. Thinking of something else but my headache. He intrigued me.

I was on my way home from work when I noticed him.

He was sitting on a park bench, blood dripping from his palm. I was scared to approach. I had never met him before. It was starting to get dark. And I knew my pain would soon start. I still went to him. “Hello...” I hesitantly said.

At first he didn’t react, but soon enough his head lifted up, he must have noticed that I was a little hesitant to approach him. “You look hurt,” I said and he himself dropped his gaze to his cut up hand. It was damaged badly. “Do you need some help?” I asked, trying to read out his every thought. Trying to figure out if it was dangerous for me to be near him.

“No,” he said in a low and raspy tone.

I got a little closer. He was well dressed, didn’t look like he was homeless. “I can call the ambulance.” There was a puddle of his blood forming underneath his feet.

“I am fine,” he said again. How could he be so calm?

I usually didn’t engage. But he was sitting there so broken, so done with everything. It felt familiar.

I cautiously sat down next to him. “At least let me have a look,” I asked but he didn’t react.

I slowly reached for his wrist, he didn’t push me away, and I was very careful to not alarm him. I pulled his hand up to me. My breath hitched at the horrible pouring of blood. It was deeply cut in many places.

I quickly removed my dark blue scarf and wrapped it around his hand. “You need to go to the hospital. You need stitches,” I told him.

He pulled his hand back from me. “Hospital is no place for me. This town is not a place for me, or this world.”

My heart clenched with the thought of someone thinking that. But it was not my place to question.

“They can stitch you up and you can leave.”

“I can’t,” he cut back.

“Have you done something?” I was hesitant. Was he a criminal? That’s why he couldn’t get help?

He quietly chuckled with spite in his tone. “You could say that.”

Maybe I shouldn’t have been alone with him in a park. “How bad?”

He looked at me. “So bad that you shouldn’t be sitting here.”

My mouth went dry. I slowly got up and continued my walk home. But I stopped at a distance. Looked back at him and he was again with his head hung low. Only now he had my scarf on his wounds.

There was a pharmacy around the corner. I quickly ran there and bought a bunch of things to care for his wounds. I just prayed he would still be there when I returned. And to my luck he was sitting there like he had before.

I felt my head starting to sting. But he was also in pain and I knew what pain felt like. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.

I again approached him and sat next to him. He looked at me. “Maybe I shouldn’t engage with strangers in the park. But just let me bandage you up and then I’ll leave you.”

I started getting out the bandages and some disinfectant spray. I was looking at a surgical sewing kit but I had no idea how to sew flesh. I would at least bandage it properly.

I gently took his hand in my lap and started to unwrap my stained scarf. I drenched his hand in sterile liquid and looked at his face to see him flinch but he didn’t. Not a hint that it stung. I carefully took the bandage roll and started to wrap his hand.

“You’re used to pain?” I chuckled to myself. “I get that. Well, my pain is a little different. I get bad headaches.”

He was watching me. I felt it. “Migraines?”

I shook my head. “Worse. Ever since I could remember. There has been jolting pain in my brain. Right when dark sets in. I have had it my whole life. It’s bad, but I am used to it.”

He was studying me for far too long. “Don’t feel bad. It’s not ideal but I can go through it. Nothing that will break me,” I joked, but that was a lie. Sometimes I thought it could break me.

“There must be a limit. For you humans to feel pain.”

“Humans? I suppose you are not one?” I smirked.

He didn’t answer my question. “What is your name?” he asked.

“You said I shouldn’t be sitting here, then I really shouldn’t be giving you my name. Don’t you agree?” He had a strange calming effect on me. It usually took time for me to get used to people. But with him it felt different.

“Do you live here?” he asked.

“I can’t really say those things without knowing what bad thing you did.”

“You wouldn’t understand,” he said. It was exactly what someone who did something horrible would say.

I finished up his bandage and got up. His eyes followed me. “I should go.”

“What’s your name?” he asked again.

It was just a name. I let out a heavy sigh. “Danica.”

He reached up his hand for me to shake. “Nice to meet you, Danica.”

I took his hand, oddly warm, oddly comforting. He didn’t let go right away. “What’s yours?” I asked.

To that he let go. “I don’t give my name to strangers,” he said and stood up. “Thank you for your help,” he said and pulled out shiny stones from his pocket. He took my palm and put them in my hand.

He just turned and left, leaving me with those stones. It was strange, but I didn’t pay attention to it. I walked back home while playing with those shiny stones in my pocket. When I got home and got under the covers I realized that my head was starting to hurt.

I had just realized I had been pain free till now. How? There has never been a painless night for me.

When I was wrapping his hand it still hurt… those stones. I walked over to my jacket and pulled them out. I took them in my hands and it helped. My head felt okay. What was it?

I took them to my bed and squeezed them in my fist. I chained my hand and laid to bed. I was okay. Painless.

For the first time in forever I laid to sleep with no pain. But in the middle of the night I was woken. By someone standing by my chained hand, inspecting it.

It was the man from the park. But his palm was healed. I was about to scream but his hand flew to my mouth and I fell unconscious.