Restoration
One day, I came home from school to find Mom lying on the floor with an empty bottle of pills next to her. She was gone…
That day, I decided to become a psychiatrist. I didn’t want any other child to feel the same way I did. Fifteen years later, I started working at the same mental institute that Mom was sent to. That’s when things took a strange turn: four new patients not only exhibited the same symptoms that my mom did, they also started warning me about my future in the exact same way that she did. I was baffled. They were never erratic or loud, but rather whispered as if to be careful not to alarm the other doctors and nurses.
The women didn’t say this to anyone else there—it was always just me. I couldn’t help but wonder if there was something more to Mom’s story than just mental illness. But I had never seen these four women in my life, so why was it that they all approached me with my mom’s exact words? As I was passing by the cafeteria, one of them approached me with their head held down.
“What’s the matter, Roel?” I asked.
“I… We need to talk, the five of us.”
I led the four of them to a room so we could have some privacy. Once they were certain no one else was listening, Roel resumed: “We aren’t crazy, Steph. We can’t see the future, but our instincts are sharp, even though our abilities are gone. It was the same for your mom.”
Instincts? Abilities? I was unsure what they meant by that, but I was intrigued by what they said about Mom. “How do you know my mother?”
“We were part of the same coven once,” Selene said. “That was before we were all cursed by a demon.”
I was beginning to doubt their words once I heard that line, but they seemed to notice it in my eyes. Anne and Giselle stepped forward and knelt before me. “We’re telling the truth, Steph. You’re our only hope,” Anne said.
“Me? How?”
Giselle explained what had happened. According to her, a demon they fought and defeated, with his dying words, had cursed all of them and sealed their powers. However, none of them—not even my mom—had known at the time that she was going to have me. The demon’s curse had a lesser effect on me, making my powers dormant rather than completely sealing them away, but Mom had decided it was for the best that my powers remained that way until the time was right.
It all made sense now. That was why the constant warnings were only for me. It was to ensure that no dark entities would ever find me until I was strong enough to defend myself.
The cafeteria bell began to ring; we were running out of time. “Here, take this,” Roel said, handing me a pocketbook.
“What’s this?”
“Portable grimoire. Page 40 is for your powers and Page 66 is for ours; 120 and 165 are to help us get out of here.”
“Should take two to three weeks to master them,” Selene said.
We dispersed from the room and I went to my office. I started flipping through the pages and soon found just how much knowledge was before my eyes. I could master all this? I was overwhelmed with excitement for a moment, but then my mind raced back to memories of Mom. She was suffering all that time and couldn’t even defend her words and actions. I wished she had told me the truth back then without shouldering all that pain. I found my eyes welling with tears, but I didn’t want to remain stuck in that pit. I turned to Page 40 and started reading.
Two weeks passed, and I was ready. I restored my powers to their full potential one night and headed to the institution the next day, ready to help my mom’s friends. Page 120 had a spell to freeze time within a select space; I applied it to the entire building and helped the four of them escape. Page 165 was a memory wipe spell: I used it to erase the staff’s memories of their entire stay at the institution.
Once we were all safe at my home that evening, I restored Roel, Selene, Anne, and Giselle’s powers back to their former glory. They were thrilled and in tears to regain what they had lost over two decades ago, and I was happy to have found myself a family I never even knew existed.
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