Melissa Crumpton is a ruined remnant of the once-angelic girl. Contrariwise, Kevin Archer decamps the drudging slavery to grow into a small rate successful artist.
When the artist lays his eyes on a ruined redolent young woman, he thinks of bringing...
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Author's PoV:
Kevin looks around the room. It is definitely messy apart from being artistic. Melissa has no notion of maintaining it tidy. The way he examined is so obvious and Melissa feels embarrassed. "That's the only thing that hadn't changed in years," she says still with a face flushed with embarrassment.
Kevin smiles at her puppy face. She returns a beautiful smile as well. Not in years, she has smiled with her heart. She never has to. She never has one to. The one who always adored her smile had left and while leaving he took her smile with him. She still blames herself for that irreparable mistake she has made in the past. Rejecting what she always wanted to have.
Kevin says, "I wonder where the Soul Ex-changer is now."
She stares at the empty cups in front of them and says, "Unfortunately, the Soul Ex-changer exists no more. It was destroyed accidentally."
"Accidentally?"
She exhales nodding and stands up. She gestures Kevin for another cup of tea but he refuses. She pours herself another cup and walks towards the balcony. Unaware of her mental thoughts, Kevin follows her to the balcony. She sits on one of the two chairs they have in the balcony and says slowly, "Austin's pursuit for the Philosopher's Stone demanded a lot of sacrifices from him." His eyes lit strangely at the mention of the Philosopher's stone. "Too much of sacrifices." As she presses on the number of sacrifices, Kevin feels there were indeed a lot of sacrifices.
She looks at nothing and gets lost in thoughts. Kevin waits but when he felt she will never return, he initiates, "Ahem, Liz, Tell me about it. The Philosopher's stone."
Melissa is surprised. That Philosopher's stone has its ways to impress boys of an artistic life as well. "Precaution Mister. You might be stuffed and over-stuffed with that topic from now."
"I would love to."
"Whoa! Whoa! Mr Super excited artist. What's there in that topic?"
"Just this common curiosity to know things that are legendary."
"Actually the main story begins from here," she tells him and takes a sip of her tea. Indeed, legends are great to hear. But to live one? Melissa doubts, it will be the same.
She looks straight into Kevin's eyes and continues, "From the very next day, my interest in the legendary stone started growing. Besides, I still had Austin's memory in my brain. I had dreams from his perspective. His thoughts hadn't faded away from my brain. To be precise, I didn't let them go. He told if not triggered, they would. So I kept his thoughts. I would imagine myself as Austin and think over stuff in his way. I felt it was like having Austin too close. Having him inside me," Melissa hasn't told Kevin about why she gets too fascinated for his dreams. One is stone. But there's another reason. She saw herself in some of his dreams. She felt special about it.
'It doesn't mean he would have the same dreams now when I am dreaming. But still, it does mean he had thoughts about me at times in the past,' she thinks.
She bites her lower lip now and smiles knowing how that made her feel then. But when Kevin smirks a little at her reaction, she knows how stupid she appeared.
She refrains herself from the captivating past and continues, "I saw more in my dreams than I've known already about the stone. This forced me to read a lot on this subject- to understand Austin's thoughts better. Ashford Library fed me a little on this topic. Austin told that there wasn't much recorded. According to him no alchemist ever wrote everything he had known in a book. He believed the information must be tumbled down, generation after generation, personally. Alchemists to alchemists."
"I guess no one ever created a Philosopher's stone."
"Nicolas Flamel and his wife were supposed to have created one. But they didn't live for eternity. Again, it's a speculation that came after their death and no one knows if it was the actual truth."
"Ridiculous."
"It is. The more I started learning, the greater the interest I grew for it. I started initiating conversations about the process, about the great work, about the Master Lord and everything related to the stone with Austin. Austin proved to be a true genius in that field. Austin and I discussed a lot about the creation of the stone." Melissa paused a little and smiled. "Josh used to curse us every time we jump into that conversation. But his curses held no effect on our conversation. Those talks had brought Austin close to me."
Kevin just smiles at this point.
"No. Our relationship had short-lived. I guess I had ruined it. Ruined everything," says Melissa. Her smile has long gone and she now has a guilt-stricken face. "He gave me everything. But to him, I did the exact opposite of what he had done for me."
"Hey, you wouldn't have. At least, he never thought that way. Till the end, he loved you," Kevin is sure about it.
"How do you know?"
"Because..." he shrugs. I knew it, Melissa, he thinks and continues, "That's the type of guy I could presume from your narration. He could be angry or upset but hatred could never be his choice of emotion for you."
Melissa smiles as that made her feel a little good.
"You know Kevin, once Austin gave me the best of all gifts," she says in a silly excitement. She thinks about it. It was something she had lost previously. No one ever thought of restoring it for her. But Austin did. Now, it is the only comfort she will go for when things don't work fine which is almost all day.
"Whoa! I know he would've. What's that?" Kevin matches her childish excited tone. He wonders how much she loved Austin. A little piece of appreciation about him can turn her mood all along. They would've been completely happy together. What grudge does that Fate hold for them? He feels that she should've been together with Austin. He feels sorry for her.
The narration continues, "Let's resume the story of how an average girl's life had taken a turn..."
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Nicolas Flamel isn't a made-up character in Harry Potter. He was a real man in history. He was a French scribe and manuscript seller who got reputed of being an alchemist and owning a Philosopher's stone after his death.
I wonder how much of J.K.Rowlings characters are true!! She is a prodigy!
