Throw my weight around

Finley Cai Aies Hall: March 30th, 20XX

A symphony of tapping and beeping sounds pulled me out of my shallow sleep. As reluctant as I was to do so, I pried my eyes open and saw the keys on my laptop moving up and down on their own, and words typing themselves out on the screen.

I was extremely tired since I hadn’t slept until late last night, so it took me a minute to register the ridiculousness that was the scene in front of me. A stylus successfully caught my attention as it wiggled in the air as it signed my name onto one virtual document after the other.

Instead of wasting my time and mental energy trying to come up with an explanation, I extended my right arm and felt around for the diary.

The unnaturally softcover of the book finally made its way into my grasp, and I pulled it up to the table and flipped it open to a blank page.

“Hey, why is my technology doing my work for me?”

'Would you like them to stop?'

“I’d like to know how it’s happening before anything else.”

Aside from the obvious reality-defying implications of this, I was worried that it was all taking down gibberish, and I’d have double the work to do after.

'Last night I had you cast a spell to create low-tier ‘sprites’. They don’t last for too long, but they’re physical manifestations of your knowledge.'

It didn’t make too much sense, but that was as detailed of an explanation as I’d wanted. But looking at the animated objects brought another question to mind.

“Ah, then are you- is the diary, a sprite?”

'Correct. While I’m a much more sophisticated version of what you’ve done, I am a physical manifestation of your mother’s knowledge. She also imparted a bit of her will to me so I can actively advise you!'

It was a brief explanation, but this much was enough for something I wouldn’t have to explain to others or be tested on.

My back ached as I got up from the uncomfortable position I’d ended up falling asleep in, and I went to the kitchen to make a cup of coffee.

A pile of dishes called to me from the sink and the empty cupboards berated me, but I ignored them. They had a place on my priority list, but they scraped the bottom of it.

It was only after my second cup that the memories of yesterday flooded my brain and made me cringe.

What exactly was I thinking??

Or well.

I know what I was thinking.

I’d panicked, and hindsight showed me how much of a fool I’d made myself into.

The dust was supposed to make them think what they had seen was a dream. I knew that, so why had I done all of that other stuff?

Before the memory could torment me even more, I went back to the diary and asked a question that had bothered me for a while.

“Is it okay for someone to have seen me?”

I’d done my best but Cambridge had mentioned that the longer I waited the less likely the individual was to dismiss it as a dream.

'A single human seeing a Fairy makes no difference because humans cannot come to our world. There is also the fact that Fairies do occasionally travel to the human world and grant human wishes as a part of the graduation or coming of age ceremony; You will have to undergo it as well.

If you wish, you can add her as an ally to keep your life here sorted out when you have to make extended leaves, but otherwise, if she never sees you in your fairy form again she will eventually dismiss it as a delusion'

Well, it looked like I could only hope for the best.

She was one of the last people I wanted to know I had a pair of wings coming out of my back.

It was only five-thirty in the morning, so I didn’t have to get dressed or get to school yet. I lifted the collar of my t-shirt to make sure it didn’t stink but immediately had to pull it away from my nose.

I couldn’t say it was rancid, but I couldn’t call it clean either. Looks like I’ll have to do laundry later on in the week.

After my shower, I habitually checked the ever-growing bag of golden threads under the sink and ran a few strands through my fingers. They were a bit too soft and flexible to pass as metal, but if push came to shove, I could blame it on how thin each strand was.

I wondered what would happen if I took them to a metalworker and tried to meld them together. Would they become hard enough to sell? Or would they break and melt away? Were they even meltable?

The alarm clock broke through my train of thought and I quickly grabbed a shirt from the clean side of my closet.

Although I’d woken up so early, I was still running late. Classes didn’t start for another three hours, but I had something to do before that.

I threw my laptop and the few paper-based materials I would need into the back of my car’s seat and hurried around to the front seat.

It was a nice car, but I couldn’t help but linger beside the motorcycle. Will had insisted on my using a car so the employees could tell when I was in the building. Apparently, the employees got freaked out when I popped up out of nowhere.

I only lived a few minutes away from Will’s apartment, which was probably why the transporter had messed up like that, but it was an hour’s drive to school.

It was a high-class residential area, and the school was situated in the middle of the city, so traffic was pretty heavy. I used the extra time to fix my hair and arrange the mask on my face.

Before “I” got to school, I’d arranged a video meeting with the executives at my school.

I’d originally planned to graduate quietly and move on with my life after but Alice had sent out that ridiculous text yesternight.

My plan had failed, and now instead of being kicked from the group and fading back into obscurity as I had wanted; I would either have to get bullied until graduation or stand up against her and make her realize that messing with me wouldn’t be worth it.

At first, I’d planned on just firing her uncle and ignoring whatever she did, but the more I thought about it, the angrier I got. I had underestimated both her pride and the extent that her followers would go on her behalf.

On top of bullying the teachers at school to transfer her out of all the classes we shared, I wanted to have a bit of fun and make a different social force to preoccupy her.

There was Jake, who was a decently popular guy. He was her boyfriend but going off their interactions lately; I doubted they would last for long. He was the department representative for the athletics program There was also Sparrow, who was the department representative for the design program.

If I could get those two on the same side and pit them against Alice, then The last few months of school would be a lot more fun than it was currently planning itself out to be.

The only minor issue was that Sparrow was Will’s sister, and it would be somewhat embarrassing to get help from both siblings. But unlike Alice, I wasn’t half as prideful as to let that stop me.

I pulled into a parking lot a block away from the school and moved to the back of the seat. As the call connected, I quickly ripped off my school’s jacket and haphazardly brushed my hair into my face.

After a moment of hesitation, I dug through the seat pocket of the passenger seat and brought out the watch box. There was an exorbitant amount of jewellery in my car since Will liked to wear a lot. I usually ignored them but right now the tackier and richer I could look, the better.

I wanted to throw my weight around a bit, but not at the cost of revealing myself to my school.