Damien

Alice tapped her pen against her notebook, eyes flitting to the clock for the hundredth time in the last five minutes. The slim black hands ticked loudly as they made their journey around the white frame, encased behind a metal cage.

She'd asked why every clock in the school was sealed away in a tiny prison and had been told students had a habit of fiddling with them. The children in her school year would never have dared commit such an act of rebellion.

Her hometown, located only a postcode away, was distinct from Greenacre High School in this and several other ways. Perhaps the most distinct difference was that they had gone five years without employing a school counsellor. 

Alice, as a newly qualified counsellor, was unsure she was the best choice for the job. Yet somehow, she’d made her way through the interview, and here she was.

She breathed shakily, nervous about her first meeting with a real-life patient. The skirt she had painstakingly chosen for her first day was proving to be a mistake. The silky fabric lining stuck to her thighs, causing it to ride up and reveal her legs.

The lad sitting opposite looked at her, eyes lingering on her exposed flesh.

"You look delicious," he said. "I can't wait to sink my teeth into you."

The shock of his words left Alice speechless. She stared at him, mouth open as she tried to summon a response.

"What did you say?" was all she could think to reply with.

"Oh." The boy held up a shiny red apple. "I was talking to my food."

Alice let out a gasp of relief, feeling stupid for jumping to such a lewd conclusion. 

"You always talk to food?" she asked, attempting to shift the blame.

"I do," he said, smiling proudly. "Well, I'm not here to see the counsellor about all my inherent normalness."

'My first customer,' Alice thought, taking another deep breath. She was starting to feel light-headed.

He was one of those stereotypical emo kids with long dark hair, fingerless gloves and tight black trousers that did not look comfortable. He even had little lines of kohl beneath his blue eyes.

She was about to introduce herself when the head teacher, Mr. Vindasius, appeared from the room that was to become her office. 

"Sorry, just had a few final adjustments. Health and safety and all that." He smiled—a smile that said he thought it was a load of rubbish. "Go ahead."

Alice entered as he held the door, ducking beneath his arm. She took her seat and placed her meagre supplies on the desk, waiting for Mr. Vindasius to send the boy in.

He rolled his eyes before taking the other seat and looking up with expectant eyes.

"You thought I was talking to you out there?" he asked.

"E-erm, well, I, uh," Alice stammered.

"I'm guessing that isn't an okay thing to say to a girl, even if you might think it," he said. "I'll file it under, ‘Okay to think but not to say.’"

Alice laughed. "It might be better to file it under 'don't think or say.'"

"Okay." He sighed. "I can put in a request to transfer the file, but there's no guarantee it'll be done this year... the administration in my brain is almost as incompetent as the school’s."

Alice frowned as she laughed. 'What a strange boy you are.'

"So, what's your name? I wasn't expecting a visitor so soon. I haven't even set up my own filing system."

"Oh, yeah, Nigel said I was making him lose the will to live so he sent me to you instead," the kid said. "My name's Damien."

"Nigel?"

"Mr. Vindasius," Damien confirmed.

After the interview, Alice's memory had retained a record number of one name—Deb the friendly blonde at the reception desk. Name recall wasn't her strong suit, so a decent filing system and good notes were going to be essential.

"So, Damien, what did they send you here for?"

"I told the English teacher that if she stopped overusing the world ‘amalgamation,’ I'd cure her daughter's heroin addiction.” Damien leaned forward, lowering his voice to add, “I think she thought nobody knew."

Damien fell silent for a moment, staring down at the empty notebook and poised pen in Alice's hand.

"I mean… just say the word mixture. Am I right?" Damien shrugged.

"You know a cure for heroin addiction?" Alice asked.

"No," Damien said.

"Then do you not think it was a cruel and thoughtless thing to say?" Alice pressed.

"I can't cure her addiction, but I can make her not an addict," Damien said.

Alice took a second to centre herself before continuing the conversation. The topic hit close to home; her mother had been a long-term addict before dying of lung disease. She reminded herself to distance her personal life and feelings.

"How is that?" she asked.

"Well, just by willing it," Damien said.

'This kid might need more than a school counsellor,' Alice thought. 'I am not prepared for this.'

It occurred to her that he might be playing her, acting up deliberately to mess with her head in the same way they messed with the time on the clocks.

"If you can will anything into being, why not create a utopia?" she asked, playing to his fantasy.

"I will," he said. "One day, when I'm strong enough, I'm going to wipe out humanity."

That was not the answer she expected.

"You're going to bring on the Apocalypse?" She let out a stifled laugh. "Is that why your parents called you Damien?"

He laughed at this question.

"They named me after some singer they used to like. I think I put them off him," Damien said.

"You think your parents dislike you?" she asked, finally getting somewhere.

Damien shrugged. "Mum spends all her efforts on her new family and Dad sees me once every two weeks for an uncomfortable night with his new perfect family."

Now it made sense. The boy was engaging in fantasies of power to offset a miserable homelife he had no control over. She couldn't help but feel bad for him.

"I think you need to apologise to the English teacher," Alice said.

Damien shook his head. "Nah, but I will cure her daughter."

As Alice tried to summon a response, Damien stared at her, eyebrows raised.

"If you don't believe me, ask me for something and I'll prove it," he challenged.

Alice scoffed and shook her head.

"Go on, what do you have to lose? If it doesn't work you can use that as proof that I'm crazy, and if it does work, you get your wish," he said.

Closing her eyes, Alice thought about it. If she could ask for anything, what would it be?

"I wish my little sister would stop dating a thirty-year-old drug dealer," Alice blurted without thinking. It was the first thing to come to mind since it was the current and most prominent issue in her life.

She sighed. "I'm sorry. I'm supposed to listen to your problems, not share mine."

Damien clicked his fingers, ignoring her apology. "Done."

'I wish life were that simple,' Alice thought.

"I also wish you would apologise to the English teacher." Alice smiled encouragingly at him. "Please?"

"Yeah, yeah, you don't have to beg," Damien said, rolling his eyes. "I'll go tell her I'm sorry."

Morgan walked hand in hand with Toby, idling and kicking up the moss between the paving slabs with the heels of her battered converse hi-tops.

The pair slowed to a stop, pulling each other in for a sneaky kiss before math.

"Eww, get a room!" a familiar voice shouted from the steps.

"Get a life, Damien," Morgan shot back. She turned away from her gorgeous boyfriend to scowl at Damien and his crew of misfits.

Toby tugged at her hand, whispering, "Just leave it."

'Why?' Morgan wondered, frowning.

"Aww, Mr. Popular traded in his baggy trousers. Look at him trying to pull off the same skinny jeans he used to rag on me for wearing," Damien said, inspecting Toby's outfit. His mates looked over, snickering in agreement.

He had a point…sort of. Morgan and her friends had ragged on the 'scene kids' style until it became the mainstream fashion. Still, she hated seeing her boyfriend flush with shame and shift about on the spot like he wanted to disappear.

'How dare you make him feel that way?' she thought, preparing to string off a barrage of insults.

"Y-your right," Toby stammered, looking down. "Look, I don't wanna be a dick to you anymore. I'm trying to, erm, be a better person and stuff."

'Since when?' Morgan wondered, throwing him a questioning look. She saw the way Toby flinched when Damien let out an over-the-top burst of laughter.

"Good luck with that," Damien said, patting Toby on the back. "Honestly."

Feeling her heart race, Morgan made a conscious effort to calm herself. She had a habit of stumbling over her words when she got this mad, and the smarter kids would pick up on it, not that many of them dared laugh in her face. Damien was one of the rare few who wasn't intimidated by her popularity. This was one of the numerous reasons she hated him.

Everything about him made her sick, from his goofy looking face to his straw-like hair and his annoying fake American accent. 

"Yeah, unlike you, Toby wants to grow as a person. You're just jealous," Morgan said.

"Jealous? Why would I be jealous? He doesn't have anything I couldn't get," Damien said, curling up his lip as he looked down his nose at Morgan. 

'Do you even realise you look like a hamster when you pull that face?' Morgan wondered but didn't say out loud. The insult sounded childish in her head.

“Are you implying that you could get with me?" It was Morgan's turn to bellow out an over-the-top laugh. She looked Damien up and down, turning up her nose in disgust as he made that annoyingly smug face she hated.

"I'd rather eat shit than be with you," she told him.

As Damien circled her, Toby tried to pull her away. She felt him yanking at the sleeve of her hoodie.

"Let's just go. I don't want to argue with these guys anymore," Toby whispered.

'And let him make a fool of you?' Morgan thought. 'No way.'

"That's a bit harsh, but I'll give you a chance to apologise," Damien said. "Because I'm a kind and gracious God. I'll give you until the end of school."

Morgan laughed. She turned to Toby, expecting him to join in, but his gaze was fixed on the floor.

"You're a fucking idiot," she spat before stomping away.

Like a storm cloud, she blew through the building, punching the door to the math class open. She let it ricochet and hit the girl behind her, one of Damien's few female friends. The girl didn't say anything, of course. Nobody ever said anything about Morgan's bitchy behaviour.

When she took her seat between her two besties, Cara and Rheya, she gave them a brief recount of the drama. Their faces contorted with second-hand rage as they flashed Damien and his gang dirty looks.

"What a next-level turd," Cara said.

"Absolute loser," Rheya agreed.

Toby had the chair directly in front of Morgan. He sat without saying a word, not even looking in her direction.

"Oi," Morgan cried, kicking the back of his chair. "What's your problem?"

He turned to look at her but didn't make eye contact for long. "I told you, I don't wanna pick on those guys anymore. Why don't you ever listen to me?"

"What?" Morgan tutted. "He was taking the piss out of you. Are you just going to take it?"

Toby bit his lip, muttered something she couldn't make out and shook his head. When he turned to face the front, he pulled his chair out of her reach, indicating he was mad at her.

'Damien makes you look a fool and I get punished for it?' she thought, grinding her teeth.

He didn't speak to her for the entirety of math and the final lesson of the day they were split up; he had Woodwork while Morgan had Art.

She sat with her friends, slopping paint angrily onto the canvas. She was ruining her coursework but couldn't bring herself to care.

Both Cara and Rheya fawned over her, neglecting their own work. Neither girl had any artistic talent—they had picked art purely to be in the same class as Morgan. To be fair, they probably wouldn't have fared better in textiles or woodwork. 

She glared over at Damien for the umpteenth time. This time he stared back, wide-eyed and tapping an imaginary watch on his wrist.

"Fuck you," she mouthed back.

As the lesson ended, she took her paintbrushes over to the sink for rinsing. Damien's friend took the adjacent sink—the ones she'd hit with the door earlier. The girl flashed her an odd look as she washed red paint from her equipment, a look of concern.

"You should apologise to Damien," the girl said.

Morgan sighed heavily. "Erin, is it?"

Erin nodded.

"Well, Erin, you should mind your own damn business," Morgan said, flashing her most sarcastic smile.

The girl's face flushed as she looked down. 

"I'm just trying to help you," Erin muttered before walking off. She returned to her spot next to Damien, looking down and pulling away when he questioned her.

He gave Morgan one of his 'killing' looks—when people said 'if looks could kill' they were surely referring to a look such as this. Other kids feared this look, and feared Damien in general, but not Morgan. Still, as the bell rang, Morgan tried to escape the school gates without bumping into him. As she neared the exit, it became apparent there was no avoiding him. 

'Might as well face him,' she thought. As she hugged herself, she noticed the little hairs on her arms were standing to attention, despite the fact that it was so warm she'd wrapped her hoodie around her waist. 

'Am I scared of Damien?' she wondered. It seemed unlikely. His presence had never been anything but a minor annoyance.

"Well, are you ready to apologise?" he asked, jumping away from his friends, and matching her stride. His legs were longer, so there was no outpacing him.

"Go away," she said, unable to think of anything smart to say. 

"One last chance," he said. "When I click my fingers, you'll fall madly in love with me."

"Oh whatever, Damien." Morgan sighed, slowing as she turned to face him. "Nobody believes in your—"

Click!

The sound of his fingers clicking rang in her ears, making her wince.

She closed her eyes, the sun suddenly appearing too bright. They stung as she opened them.

'What on Earth...?'

...

Everything shimmered and shifted, like a glitter snow globe being shaken in the hands of an excited child.

'Am I going crazy?' she wondered, spinning around to get a better look at her surroundings. Eventually, as she continually blinked and rubbed her eyes, the world returned to normal.

Morgan stopped spinning and stood frowning at the back of Damien's head. 

Something was...different.

His hair, usually dry and matted with too much product, looked shiny. Every one of his ebony hairs was perfectly placed.

When Damien turned, he took her breath away. She couldn't move, couldn't speak.

His face was the same as before, but it wasn’t—a concept that made zero sense however she worded it or tried to rationalise it.

The curl of his top lip that had once showed too much teeth and made him look hamster was now the most beautiful part of his face. Looking at the heavy layer of dark lashes atop his blue eyes, she felt her stomach tighten.

"Oh my God," she uttered, taking a step backwards without looking. Her ankle screamed out in pain as she tripped over a tree stump and fell into the unkempt roadside underbrush.

Leaves and mud stuck to the front of her uniform as she got up and hobbled away, desperate to get home. 

"It's a trick," she muttered to herself. "It has to be some kind of trick."

How though?

Morgan racked her brain for anything that might have such an effect.

'Did he drop a drug in my drink?' she wondered.

Thinking back through the day, her last drink had been a can of soda at lunch break. 

'It has to be a hallucinogen of some kind,' she decided. 

Finding the remote after a brief search of the living room, Morgan loaded up Netflix while making herself a cup of tea. She checked her phone, finding messages from her friends but nothing from Toby.

'Is he still angry at me?'

Her friends were asking where she ran off to since they usually gathered in town after school. 

"Not feeling well," she replied with a sad face emoji followed by the green puking face. It wasn't a straight-up lie—there was definitely something wrong with her.

The more she thought about Toby, the more she realised she wasn't bothered if he was angry at her or not. This epiphany made her panic. She'd adored Toby ever since he'd moved to Castleborough. He was the perfect guy. Even though she'd see him all day at school, Morgan would spend her nights facetiming him or pouring over photographs on his social media.

Now, as she looked at his profile, at the same cheeky smile and soft brown eyes, she felt nothing. 

"This is insane," she muttered, shaking her head.

She stopped, hands hovering over her keyboard as a strange compulsion formed. She slowly unfurled her knuckles and letter by letter, she typed the name Damien into the search bar. 

His profile was easy to locate since they had friends in common—random people from school.

She didn't want to click the link but found it impossible not to. 

All of his pictures were random cartoons and drawings, aside from his profile picture. When she clicked on 'tagged' she found some images Erin had uploaded. In one he was wearing a daisy chain around his head and laughing. In another, he was leaning into the camera and making a silly face. 

None of the pictures were high quality—most were blurry and out of focus.

"Geez, learn to take a photograph, Erin," Morgan hissed under her breath. As she pictured Erin's face the familiar feeling of jealousy crept into her belly. She was often envious of girls who spent time with Toby. After too many petty arguments she had learned to keep those emotions to herself.

Now, as Morgan pictured Erin playing with Damien and placing daisy chains on him like a crown, she wanted to scratch the girl's eyeballs out.

It was a sick, desperate feeling deep inside her chest and it refused to budge with the usual reasonings because Damien was not hers and he didn't love her unconditionally.

'He doesn’t just dislike me,' Morgan realised with a growing sense of dread. ‘He hates me.’