From: noahidebooksforever@gmail.com   
      
   Lucy Potter and the Flickering Flame   
      
   by   
   Daniel Thomas Andrew Daly   
   Copyright 6177 SC (Adjusted HNF Calendar)   
      
      
      
   Some times in life, thought Lucy Potter to herself. Some times in life, when   
   you think, finally, after all is said and done, and you have had every last   
   one of your adventures, and you have settled down, and worked it all out, and   
   everything is running    
   smoothly, and life is, really, beautiful - the dream ends. And for this Autumn   
   in Cooma and Chakola and, in particular, Bunyan, when a more regular life of   
   Lucy Potter had finally returned, a flickering flame did indeed end, and life   
   turned one more    
   corner for the life of the daughter of David Potter.   
      
   'Jenny Rosalina Potter. Whatever in heaven and earth am I ever going to do   
   with a child like you?'   
   The question appeared quite lost on the face of the mischievous 10 year old   
   bearing that particular moniker, because as she stamped out the 3 cigarettes   
   she had lit beneath her feet, not 1 or 2 mind you, but the 3 she had been   
   smoking, she just smiled    
   that 'Whatever' smile Lucy Potter had gotten to know oh too well. The cheek of   
   Enrique, through and through, she thought to herself.   
      
   'Go on. Get, child. Go play in the back yard.'   
   Jenny scrammed, and Lucy stared down at the mess on the carpet. The cigarettes   
   had burned a little of the carpets and Lucy, almost instinctively was about to   
   go for her wand, but rebuked herself. Bewitched had gotten to her. Darren,   
   Samantha's doting    
   dullard, had gotten to her. She would call the carpet man in the morning.   
      
   She took the cigarettes, and looked at them for a moment. She'd quit recently   
   for the sake of Jenny, but she still had dozens of packs all over the house.   
   'Fuck it,' she swore to herself, sat down, and picked out a lighter from the   
   glass holder on the    
   table, and lit one of the unsmoked cigarettes. 'Jesus, that tastes good,' she   
   said to herself, as she took in the smoke into her lungs and relaxed. Tension   
   left her. And suddenly she felt a bit amorous. Was Daniel back from Sydney?   
   Perhaps she could ring    
   him? She rebuked herself for the second time that evening.   
      
   She looked out the back window. Jenny and the neighbours kid, Josh, were   
   playing madly chasing each other around the back yard, their new dog Rex   
   barking madly all the time. Josh Cavanagh was 9 years old, just a little   
   younger than Lucy, but his bigger    
   build compensated quite adequately. Jenny never stopped talking about Josh -   
   for a 10 year old she was practically smitten. But that was life, wasn't it.   
   It moved on. Chose its romances, even from a young age, and heaven itself   
   couldn't prevent what the    
   common sense of mother nature insisted on in the end. They were the facts of   
   life after all. She smoked her cigarette, and rebuked herself for the 3rd time   
   that evening, as she smoked the other two and decided not to give the   
   slightest damn anyway. She    
   had earned it. Well, she liked to tell herself that anyway.   
      
   And God they tasted good.   
      
   * * * * *   
      
   'Heaven's above, Lucy Potter. If I wanted you to help I would have asked.'   
   Shelandragh stood there, in the front of Minoxxia, staring at her pupil. Lucy   
   had innocently opened the back of the car to bring in the new electric heater,   
   but Shelandragh seemed stubbornly to think she should be doing it herself.   
   'I was only trying to help, Shellie.'   
   Shelandragh softened, and looked at Lucy. 'It's my age, Lucy. I'm starting to   
   feel it. Of course, bring in the heater.'   
   Lucy picked up the box and closed the car, wandering inside after Shelandragh.   
   She found her in the front living room, seated on the couch, panting heavily.   
   She had been doing that all day.   
   'Shelandragh. Are you having issues with your health?'   
   'Leave me alone, Lucy,' said Shelandragh softly. But Shelandragh looked weakly   
   up at Lucy. She looked at her, and her eyes said it all.   
   'I'll plug in the heater,' said Lucy.   
      
   When Lucy had brought in tea and bikkies into the lounge, and decided to get   
   the fireplace going anyway, despite it only being early autumn, Shelandragh   
   was curled up in a woolen blanket, even shivvering a little, and whose gaze   
   seemed to be off in the    
   distance. In a distant world.   
   Lucy served her the tea and sat down opposite, drinking her own.   
      
   She looked at her teacher. There she was - was she a thousand years old now?   
   Something like that, wasn't it? She had been around forever, and now, feeling   
   something of an age also, Lucy realized she had also been around for a fair   
   bit of that life also.    
   They'd had so many adventures together. Fought so much of the dark side, and   
   come out victorious. In a way, they were heroes. Witches, yes - but heroes to.   
   And Lucy felt some pride, occasionally, at the things she had accomplished and   
   the things she had    
   done in her craft. She hadn't been an incompetent ninny, and had shown her   
   worth as a witch and a Potter. Something to be proud of.   
      
   Shelandragh had dozed off, and Lucy sat there looking at her. The lines in her   
   face were weathered - well weathered. She was an old maiden - supposedly - who   
   had served this world and this community for so long now that time, it seemed,   
   was finally    
   catching up on her. Time was finally catching up on Shelandragh May. She was a   
   good old soul, was Shelandragh. Lucy's very best friend in the world, and she   
   would be lost without her. But, looking at her, still shivering, still wrapped   
   carefully in the    
   woolen blanket, perhaps now, at the end of all her adventures, perhaps now she   
   should start preparing to face something Shelandragh had been hinting at for a   
   while now. The end of the road.   
      
   'Where is that tea?' asked Shelandragh suddenly, and blundered out a hand,   
   knocking the tea cup over. 'Oh, bugger,' she said.   
   'Don't worry about that,' said Lucy. 'I will get you another one.'   
   'Oh, don't bother,' said Shelandragh. She smiled at Lucy. 'It's not the end of   
   the world Lucy Potter.'   
   'No. Your highness,' she said, slightly mockingly. 'It's not.' And did a face.   
   Shelandragh humphed, and sat there. 'You know, Lucy Potter. I'm feeling it. In   
   my bones. In my waters.'   
   Lucy Said nothing. She didn't really want to comment on what Shelandragh was   
   going to say, because she knew anyway.   
   'But with an old soul as mine is, in the many long years of life I have   
   travelled down,' continued Shelandragh. 'If not now, I never will be,' she   
   finished.   
   Lucy looked at her for a while. 'Never will be what?' There. She said it.   
   Deliberately. To draw the answer.   
   Shelandragh just stared at her, and tilted her head.   
      
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)