Chapter 3:

Friends

After 400 years I finally met you


There is an Irish proverb that says “A best friend is like a four leaf clover, hard to find and lucky to have” even if sometimes that four leaf clover plays pranks on you and makes you go really mad at them, it’s still luck in a peculiar way.

“WHAT DID YOU DO!?” Hana yells at Valentine.

“Goodness, oh my. You mean little old me?” The vampire covers her mouth with the right hand trying to cover a smile but failing at it “Didn’t I tell you that it was just a mistake?”

“DON’T PLAY DUMB WITH ME! WHAT IF THE POTION ENDED UP IN ANOTHER WAY? ONE THAT COULD HURT ME? YOU DON'T KNOW A THING ABOUT POTIONS AND STILL MESSED UP WITH MINE!”

“Hey, Hana. Relax, hear me for a moment please.” She talks in a soft voice trying to calm down her friend “Many decades have passed, I tried almost everything in your grimoires to wake you up. I learned a lot about potions but without the magic from a witch, creating one on my own is useless. I mixed the exact ingredients that change your physical age, from 52 to 25 years. I wouldn’t have done it if I weren’t totally sure about it”

“Really? You just act so childish sometimes” Hana sits rubbing her forehead but finally calming down “Well, nothing that I can’t fix, I just need the…” she looks in the stove’s direction and sees that the book is missing “Where is my Grimoire!?”

“Who knows”

“Valentine! You had your laugh, give me the book”

“NO! DON’T WANNA! I TOLD YOU THAT I WON’T ACT AS YOUR CHILD ANYMORE!”

“Who needs to relax now? Don’t make me curse you!”

“GO AHEAD, CURSE ME! I’LL DESTROY THE GRIMOIRE IF YOU DO! HELL, I’LL DESTROY ALL YOUR BOOKS IF YOU JUST TRY IT. SHOOT ME!”

Hana gets up from her chair and points to Valentine with the index finger of her right hand, small sparkles star appearing in her honey-colored eyes. Valentine also gets up, she imitates the pose of a bear that its about to roar and attack, she opens the mouth and her fangs are clearly shown, she hisses loudly, her scarlet eyes shine like a ruby.

None of them makes a move, both waiting for the other one to start. Each one concentrates on the eyes of their opponent so much that they can see the reflection in the cornea.

Knock, knock, knock

They are both caught off guard by the sound of the door, changing their postures they decide to go and take a look. At the entrance of the house there is one policewoman of average height and one tall policeman. Valentine makes a sign at Hana to be silent, but her expression is still a little angry, and then opens the door.

“Good night officers, can I help you?”

“Yes, um.” Says the policewoman “We have received some complaints that since yesterday around this same time there have been some screams coming from this ‘usually silent’ house. We want to make sure that isn’t a case of domestic violence”

“Umm, ah” Valentine stutters. “Of course not, officer. Everything is alright. It's just that I usually live alone and my friend here, arrived yesterday, maybe we are being too noisy” Valentine turns around to make eye contact with Hana and moves her eyes, indicating her friend to follow the story.

“Yes, yes, nothing to worry about. I’m sorry, I haven’t been in japan in a while and forgot you are usually more quiet” Hana Lies.

“Understood, can we come in for a quick look? Is not that I don’t trust you, but we have to make sure there aren’t any signs of a fight” The policewoman responds.

“Uh, yeah. Step right in, you’ll see that everything is in order”

They both enter the house, the policewoman goes to the living room where the gramophone is and the policeman to the dining room and since the kitchen is close that is going to be his route.

“This is your fault, now humans are involved” Hana whispers to Valentine.

“My fault? You are the one that doesn’t stop screaming” Valentine replies also in the form of whispers.

“Maybe I wouldn’t have screamed if SOMEONE didn’t mess up my potion”

“Maybe that someone wouldn’t have changed the potion if SOMEONE would have cared about how I feel”

They both stay silent for a moment and Hana erases the frown on her face “Sorry” she whispers, Valentine also erases her frown and smiles.

“Well, nothing there. And you seem to not have any visual marks on your faces, can you please roll up your sleeves so I can see if there is something on your arms” The policewoman says as she comes back from the living room, they obey, she turns a flashlight on an examines both arms “Everything seems ok, so as soon as my partner finishes we will be on our w…”

“Uh, Officer Omori. You should come and see this” The policeman’s voice comes from the kitchen.

The tree women walk to the kitchen and see the man wearing gloves and examining the contents of the box with potion ingredients. The police woman uses the light from her flashlight and points the cauldron on the stove and some of the leftover cat hairs.

“What is this?” Officer Omori looks at the two other women as she moves the light from the cauldron to the box.

“We.. were just cooking a little bit, those are some exotic ingredients and spices so be careful” Hana says as she gets a little scared of how the policeman is manipulating the jars inside the box.

“Doesn’t look anything familiar, and these jars are clearly filled by hand since there isn’t any brand on them. The jars have various shapes and sizes, suggesting that the moment of selection of them wasn’t planned” The man says.

“What do you think they are? Officer Minobe” Officer Omori asks.

“I think that most likely these are some kind of psychoactive substance, the color and texture of some of those jars just doesn’t look right. We should take them to the lab for further investigation”

“Ok, we are going to ask you two a couple of questions, but first we need to take each one’s pulse to make sure you aren’t under the influence of any drug, please show me your wrists”

“But I don’t… I mean, we haven’t done anything wrong” Valentine nervously moves her hand but then is grabbed by the big hand of Officer Minobe almost at the same time as Officer Omori starts checking Hana’s pulse.

The room gets silent for a couple of seconds, Valentine gives Hana a confused and nervous smile.

“Seems fine on my side” Says Officer Omori “What about you?”
“Uh… I’m not having a pulse” Officer Minobe says with a confused expression.

“What do you mean there’s no pulse?”

“Well I mean exactly that, like a corpse. In fact she’s also oddly cold”

“Oddly cold?... Oh, for the love of… Here, let me check” Officer Omori releases Hana and now grabs Valentine’s left hand.

The room gets silent again as she checks. Hana looks at Valentine worried, she only shrugs in response.

“Well, you are right, there is no pulse”

“I told you, really spooky if you ask me. Usually the heartbeat increases under the influence of a drug, but this doesn’t seem to be the case. Miss I will have to ask you to come with us”

“Alright, I had enough. I tried to follow your rules, but this is just too much” Valentine releases herself as the officers look confused of how easy she did it “You won’t remember any of this, will leave immediately and won’t notice anything out of the ordinary inside this house” She moves her arm in a circular motion in front of the officers eyes.

“Ah so you are using hypnosis on them?” Hana Says “I mean, it’s fine, I was thinking on what spell I should use but your way is much more effective”

The officers blink a couple of times and move like feeling dizzy, then officer Omori says “Well, everything seems alright, have a good night”

“Wait, look at that” Officer Minobe points at the jars and the cauldron, Hana sweats a bit “Those are some fine looking spices you have there, making some good indian dishes I suppose”

“Yeah, we get really excited cooking and maybe make a lot of noise” Hana quickly lies.

“Understood, please be careful with that, this is a residential area. So try to keep it down” Officer Omori says and moves to the entrance followed by officer Minobe who waves his hand before leaving.

Once again they are alive, they both sigh loudly and drop to the floor. Then look at each other and start giggling.

“That was interesting… Hey, sorry about all that. I’ll give you your grimoire back, I shouldn’t try to force my point of view” Valentine says in a relaxing tone.

“No, I’m the one who is sorry. I should try to listen to you more, I had no idea you hated our act back in the day” Hana smiles.

“Yes, it's awful. Well, at first it wasn’t but then I stopped seeing you as a mother figure and more as a friend. But somehow I just kept feeling that my value was less, I wanted for you to look around my physical age and talk as equals”

“Oh… sorry about that, I just came back a day ago and I’m trying to make everything just the way it was. But everything has changed and I have to deal with it, I should change too. I want my book back but I’ll stay looking like this, at least for a while, until I age again. Sounds good?”

“Yes, sounds good to me. I love to see you age, I feel jealous about it”

“I don’t see what’s the big deal about it”

“Only someone that ages would say that” Valentine smiles and then gets serious “Hey, yesterday I was also rude, you wanted to know why you have been asleep for so long. I know the reason but… it kinda hurts me and maybe, will hurt you, so I was kinda happy for you to have a clean start… but it’s not fair, it should be your decision, so if you want me to tell you… I will”

“Oh” Hana wasn’t expecting her friend to say that. She takes a look at Valentine’s eyes, ponders the proposition and says “Ok, I trust you. I won’t ask more about it. I’ll deal with it if I remember it by my own”

“Hey, wanna go out and have fun? I’m up now, a commercial area has appeared near since last time you were awake, and there are so many things I want to show you”

“Ok, let me see what I can wear and by all means, lead the way”