Life never stays the same. With all of the boys now in school, Delia found herself with
more free time on her hands during the days and the draw of the basement reared its head. After everyone was off to school and work she crept down into the basement once more.
She practiced making potions and even learned a how to make a few new ones. One was supposed to be a
powerful cure potion meant to ‘cure’ people of supernatural afflictions. But they really are just powerful medicines -
right? Not supernatural potions. People
take medicine all the time to cure their illnesses. That thought made her feel better. These are just 'natural' medicines. Then Delia thought maybe, if she could find
the vampire woman, she could fix what she had done if the cure potion really
worked; but, if it didn’t work, what then? And what if she didn’t want to be cured? That thought had been lingering in the back
of Delia’s mind every since her encounter at the Festival. The lady never seemed to want to hurt her and in fact seemed a bit afraid of her.
It was a full moon and Delia knew that strange things went
bump in the night when the moon was full. She has heard them. Or maybe it was an overactive imagination
instilled in her by her mom. Her mom had
always told Delia to be sure to stay indoors on full moons even before she became ill. That had stayed with her and she passed it
down to her family. But this night, when
Delia heard noises, she decided to venture outside and investigate. She would not be afraid, it was probably just the wind. She had heard legends of ‘Zombies’ that roamed
on the full moon. The legend said that Zombies were supposedly
looking for plants and human brains to eat and if they attack you, you will become
a zombie. Her mom must have
believed this because her garden was enclosed by a fence with a locked
gate. If the noise really was a ‘zombie’ then Delia
wanted to ‘test’ her cure potion. So she
armed herself with her potion and bravely walked outside.
She quickly found the source of
the noise. A woman was trying to get
through her fence to the garden. Delia
called out to her and when she turned around, Delia was shocked. She DID appear to be a real live – or dead –
Zombie. Delia rushed to unscrew the
potion lid and threw it on her much as she did with the Vampire Lady.
She saw Duncan out of the corner of her eye and prayed it would work before he could see the true nature of the zombie woman.
Well, it worked instantly! The woman became normal then turned around and ran away from them. Thankfully
Duncan didn’t get close enough to see the transformation. He was more worried
about the broken TV than who the woman was. Thank goodness for mechanical failures. He would have
been forever changed and Delia would have never forgiven herself.
The zombie incident only served to make Delia more of a
believer in the potions. Then she thought about the youth potion. She looked at
herself in the mirror and the evidence was undeniable. And, it was also obvious when she looked at
older photos of her and Francisco compared to more recent ones. She could see him slowly aging, but she
still looked - and felt - the same.
 |
| Francisco today |
 |
| Francisco 20 years ago |
The zombie was cured, so good medicine or powerful potions
indeed? Maybe she would try the
‘fountain of youth’ potion on Francisco – hmmm – certainly a thought. Older or not, she loved him dearly and would
never hurt him or the boys.
People would
figure out something was wrong with them and begin to spread rumors and they
would have to move to a new town. No, Delia
wouldn’t subject her family to things that could very well be evil as her mom’s
words rang in her head: “the
supernatural could hurt you”. But why
would anyone want to hurt her, well except for maybe the Vampire Woman. That thought scared her again. No, Delia made up her mind again. No one, not even Francisco would know about
the basement or the mysterious things going on until she sorted it out.
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