Day 3 - a new character appears!

Four

Larissa sat in front of the computer, her hands at the keyboard, her eyes on the browser open in front of her.  What should she type?  Colors coming off people?  She wasn’t sure how to describe what she had just seen.

She looked around her, seeing if anyone was watching her.  She had chosen a computer in the farthest corner from everyone else in the library, but they were still out in the open, she felt conspicuous. 

Drawing in a deep breath, she moused over to the search bar and began typing.

“Colors coming off people” was what she decided on.  The third result said something about auras.  She had thought she had heard of auras before, but in the context of religion.  Shrugging, thinking, what the heck, Larissa went back to the search bar and typed in “Auras.”

The results were astounding.  She clicked on the images tab and watched her screen fill with depictions of what she had seen earlier in the day.  She looked at pictures of people surrounded by colors.  Of people’s who colors mixed and melded with others.  She started clicking on the pictures and reading short descriptions of what was happening.

Auras.  She was seeing people’s auras.  What exactly was that?  What did it mean?  What was she supposed to do with that information?

Curious, Larissa toggled over to the library’s site and searched for books about auras.  She was a bit surprised when several choices came up in the results.  She was even more surprised to see that a couple of the books had already been checked out.  She wrote down the information on the books and went in search of them.

She found herself in a section of the library she had never been in before.  She was surrounded by books on mysticism, the occult, fairies and healing.  She ran her fingers over the titles, curious about the contents of the many books, but not wanting to choose just one.  She finally found the book that she had written down, and plucked it from the shelf.  She looked around her, seeing if anyone had seen her take the book from the shelf, but there was no one near her.  She saw some chairs not far away and made her way to them.  She curled herself into the chair and started reading the book. 

Hours passed, Larissa didn’t notice the time until well into the afternoon.  Her stomach started grumbling at her.  She knew she had to make a choice, either check the book out or leave it on the shelf.  The thought of leaving the book behind made her sad and uneasy, so she pooled her courage and took the book to the front desk to check it out.

She had images in her head, while she waited in the short line, that the man behind the counter would stare at her.  That he would call her out as a freak, or ask her what she was doing with such a book.  But he never looked twice at the title, or her for that matter.  He simple swiped her card, scanned the book, handed it to her and she was on her way. 

She slipped the book into her bag and made her way to the meal hall.  She walked with her head up, but didn’t really see the people around her.  Her mind was fully on the information she had been reading for the last few hours.

Auras, the energies that surround people every day, all the time, that is what she had been seeing.  She wasn’t sure what to do with the information, she hoped that the book would tell her.  So far it had given her a lot to think about.  Starting with the Chakra system.  Who knew that the body was made of energy and that there were so many energy centers?  That each of these centers represented different aspects of the self, of what people were thinking?  That some people could see, or perceive these centers and could tell what people were feeling just by looking at them?

Larissa found herself at the door to the meal hall.  She looked around, seeing if anyone she knew was inside.  Relieved to see that she would be alone, she made her way through the food line and paid.  She sat to eat, only slightly paying attention to the food, her mind focused on what she had learned and what it meant.

Five

The alarm went off and music filled the room.  Ever so slowly, the music built in volume until Keith could no longer stand the noise of the shrill voice and driving beat.  He pulled himself out of bed and moved to the other side of the room to turn off the alarm. 

He had figured out long ago that he needed an excuse to get out of bed.  At one time he had an alarm clock that actually moved around the room, but he had stepped on the thing one too many times and it had been impossible to repair it.  He had taken to this new routine, having the alarm too far away for him to reach from any comfortable spot. 

After turning off the first alarm, he moved to the second and third alarms, disabling those as well.  His roommates would be pleased with him today.  He usually waited for all three to go off before getting out of bed. All three would be playing different songs with different beats, the discordance would finally drive him out of bed. 

Today was different.  He needed only one to get from bed today.  He was excited, he was ready to find her and speak with her.  To find out if something had changed yet.

Keith had been friends with Larissa for many years.  He had followed her around jr. high and high school, waiting and watching her.  He knew, from the first day that he met her, that she would be different.  That she would be more like him, but the change had not come.  He dropped little hints to her now and then, seeing how she reacted to this or that bit of information, but she never blinked.  He knew it wasn’t time yet. 

Yesterday though, yesterday had been different.  He had watched her from across the quad as she stared at a group of people, a look of shock on her face.  He had watched her in class, normally one of her favorites, and she hadn’t paid attention at all.  She didn’t answer a single question from the professor.  Others had noticed it too, but no one said anything to the reserved girl about her behavior.  He followed her after class, curious about her behavior, wondering if something had finally changed.  Then he saw it. 

He saw the group fighting, he saw the energy coming off the group, and he looked at Larissa and saw that she noticed it too.  She had turned white, her face falling at the sight.  She had seen more than she had ever seen before.

Finally, Keith knew that he had been right all along.  Now it was finally time to talk to her about what life was really about.

He pulled on clean clothes and made his way from his room.  He knew she was an early riser and he would have to catch her before her first class, hopefully at breakfast, to see what she was feeling.  He was wondering what the experience had been like for her.  What had she seen?  What had she felt?  Was she visual?  Did she hear tones with the energies?

Just as he had hoped, he found her sitting alone at breakfast.  Her nose was in a book, and she was eating without seeing the food in front of her.  He grabbed a plate of food and headed in her direction, trying to catch a glimpse of what she read.

“Hey Larissa, how’s it going?”

“Oh, hi Keith, I didn’t see you.” Larissa didn’t lift her head from the book. Interesting.

“What ya reading?”

“What?” Larissa raised her head, really noticing him for the first time that morning.  She slammed the book closed and tucked it into her book bag before he could see the title.

“Nothing, really.  I wasn’t reading anything.” She said.

“Ah.  Well, ok.” He had to figure out how to get her talking.  She was obviously trying to hide it from him. 

They sat in silence for a few moments.  Larissa fidgeting with her food, Keith trying to figure out how to get her talking about what she had seen yesterday.  Maybe he could be a little direct about it.

“So, um, Larissa,” He started and stopped, unsure of how to be even direct about the subject.

“What’s up Keith?”

“Have you seen that new show?” He had it, it popped into his head at just the right time, “That show with Morgan Freeman called ‘Through the Wormhole’?”

“I haven’t seen it.”

“It’s a really cool series he’s doing on the latest science, quantum physics and biology and stuff.  Cutting edge theories.” He watched her face light up.  He was on the right track.

“Really?  That sounds pretty cool.”

“Yeah, they talk about all kinds of different things on the show.  Some new age type stuff too, you know how people can perceive things that they might not realize they are perceiving.”

“Huh.” Larissa’s face closed down a bit.  Had he gone too far?  He had to get her talking about what ever had happened or…

“Larissa, what happened yesterday?” The question just popped from his mouth.

“What are you talking about?” The color drained from her face. Now he’d done it.

“Something happened to you yesterday.  I saw you, stopped in the quad, staring at a group of people like you were watching a show or something.  I’ve never seen you look like that.  Then in class you were all distracted, didn’t answer any of the questions.  And you didn’t show up to our other class later that afternoon.  What happened?”

“Keith, I don’t know that I should talk to anyone about it.  I’m not even sure it really happened…”

“Tell me Rissa.”

“Keith, I hate it when you call me Rissa.”

“Fine, Larissa.  Tell me what happened.”

“You are going to think I am crazy.  Heck I think I’m crazy.”

“Try me, you know I’ve heard and seen some crazy things.”

“Fine.  But you have to promise me that you will not tell a soul.”

“Easy.  I won’t tell a soul.”

“Yesterday, when I was walking to class, well… I stopped to look around the quad, to see the colors and enjoy the fresh air.  When I looked at a group of people talking, they had colors coming out of them!”

“Sweet! You saw their auras as colors?”

“How did you know that?” Larissa’s jaw dropped. It was Keith’s turn to look bashful.

“Larissa, I guess I’ve been hiding something from you.”

“You’ve been hiding something from me?”

“Well, kind of.  I mean, I’ve tried to talk to you about it before, when we were younger.  But you always looked at me like I was nuts, so I never went any further with it.  But, now that you can see auras, well, you should know that I can feel them.”

“You can feel them?  How does that work?”

“It’s how I perceive things.  Through feeling, often through touch.  But even from a distance I can feel what people are feeling.”

“Huh.” She looked incredulous.

“Ok, let’s do an experiment.  See that couple over there?  On the other side of the room?”

Larissa nodded affirmative.

“Ok.  So right off the bat you assume they are a couple because there are only two of them and they are sitting close to each other.  That’s basic body language and easy.  But then I go deeper.  I can feel that she’s angry.  Super angry at him.  And he’s totally indifferent to what she is feeling.  She’s putting off this anger vibe, but it’s only directed at him.  It isn’t coming across the room, so I don’t get the full force of it.  He does.  It’s going straight into him.  Or it would be going straight into him if he wasn’t completely indifferent to what she was feeling.  Her feelings, her energy, though it’s directed at him, it’s like it’s going into a black hole because he refuses to take any of it in.  He feels nothing.”

Larissa nodded and said, “I see it.  She’s putting out this deep green and red stuff, it’s pouring off of her in his direction.  Only it gets swallowed before it reaches him.  He’s got this black inky stuff on her side of him.  But, well that’s interesting…”

“What?  What do you see?”

“He seems to have some sort of cord coming off of him going off from the other side.  It’s all silvery and pink, like he’s connected to something or someone else.”

“That’s called an energetic cord.  It’s amazing that you can see it.” Keith nodded sagely at her startled face.

“I hadn’t meant to tell anyone what was happening.” She whispered.

“I know.  But I’ve been waiting for you for a long time Larissa.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve known about this stuff, this energy work, for a long time.  I’ve been waiting for something to happen to you so we could talk about it.”

Six

Larissa stared at her best friend.  The boy she had known since she was a small child.  She couldn’t believe what he had said to her, what she had said to him.  It was shocking enough to know that she could see people’s auras, that she could know what they were thinking and feeling by the colors that surrounded them.  Now Keith was telling her that he had been able to do it for years and had been waiting for her to figure it out.

She sat back in her chair and studied the couple across the room.  The girl was so in love with the boy and he was attached somewhere else.  Where was he attached?  As soon as she thought the question, Larissa seemed to have the answer.  It was his mother.  So typical. 

Larissa slashed her hand through the air and thought, ‘that connection should be broken!’ She felt Keith straighten next to her when she did it and she looked closely at the couple again.

“You cut the cord!” he hissed at her.

She had.  The cord that had been coming from the boy was no longer there.  The black hole in front of him had also faded slightly.  She watched as the girl’s energy penetrated the boy’s field for the first time.

“Was that bad?” She asked Keith. 

“Yes and no. You have a lot to learn Larissa.  You can’t just cut cords for people without them knowing.”

“Why? What are cords anyway? Oh, there’s one snaking from the girl into the boy now.  Weird.”

“We’ve got a lot to talk about.  Can you skip classes again today?”

“Yes.” Larissa didn’t even hesitate.  The classes she was taking didn’t mean anything to her at that moment.  She wanted to know what Keith knew.  She wanted to know what Keith saw.  The book she had been studying didn’t say anything about cords or connections.  It didn’t really explain to her what she was seeing, only what different colors meant and something about Chi, Ki and Kundilini. 

“Finish your breakfast, I’ll finish mine.  Then we’ll figure out where to go so we can talk without being noticed.  And stop staring at them Larissa.  You are making them super nervous.”

Larissa blinked, the couple coming into focus.  She smiled at the girl and shrugged apologetically.  She looked down at her breakfast and started eating as quickly as possible.  She had to find out what Keith knew.  She had to find out how he knew it.