The Amulet

I was walking down the street coming from the shop where I buy my food. You see, I just bought a new house last week on the 2nd of October. I passed a couple of friends hanging out, as they always do, on the corner.

“Hey!” I said although I wasn’t in the mood for a chat because I had lots on my mind.

“Hello Yana, how are you doing this fine evening?” Enna, my friend, said jokingly.

“Probably OK,” I replied.

“You sound tired my 24 year old friend. Lots on your mind?” Enna said still using her, what she thinks is an English accent.

“Yeah I do.”

“Oh, well you probably want to go home and rest or whatever,” she said.

“Yeah, well I might see you later,” I said

relieved that she understood or acted like she understood, you can never tell with Enna.
I walked on; my other friends didn’t even notice me, luckily.

“Ah shit!” I tripped on a stone that was on the pavement. My high-heel cracked and the heel came right off.

“Oh, that’s just great,” I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm. I put the broken heel in my bag and continued down the road, but now I was limping.

I snapped my head around! What was that sound? Nothing. Still. Quiet. I shivered in the cold and pulled my coat tighter around me, not that it did anything, but it comforted me. I checked the gun I carry in my bag that I got from my brother, good still there. I walked on reassured that I had it. I could shoot. I learned how to shoot from my late brother when he given me the gun. I turned a corner and kept walking. Why is my house so far away?

I heard a shout; I whipped around, securing my hand on my gun. There was a guy waving at me. Who is that? Do I know him? He ran to catch up with me.

“Oh my God, how have you been? I haven’t seen you in yonks, I mean ages.” He said breathlessly.

“Uh… who are you?” I finally managed to get out past my confusion.

“I’m the one who will now take our bag.” He whispered in my ear and grabbed my bag, but I was too quick I took the gun out and before I knew what I was doing and I shot at him blindly. He yelled and collapsed to the ground. Dead. I had killed someone; I’d never done it before. I was so scared I ran away down the road toward my house.

When I got home I locked and bolted the door shut, sat down on a chair and stared blankly at the wall. What had I just done? Killed? That was not like me at all. What am I going to do? Go to the police? I didn’t think so.

As I stared at nothing and thought about what to do, something, I don’t know what, caught my eye. I got up, or rather down, from my chair to take a closer look. It sparkled on the floor. I bent down and picked it up. It was a necklace and it had an amulet type of thing hanging on it. It was beautiful. I had never seen it before and so wondered where it had come from. I put it around my neck and looked in the bathroom mirror. It seemed to almost glow. It complimented my dark dyed hair and my green eyes, as the amulet was green itself. After I found the necklace I forgot about the guy I had killed and went to bed and fell into a nice deep sleep.

I woke the next morning at the sound of a car going by window, although loads of cars had gone by before it was this one that woke me up because it was old and it banged down the road, reminding me of last night. I checked see if I still had my amulet necklace, I did. I noticed something else about the amulet, it had a dragon carved, like, on the inside of the stone and as the sun hit it, it looked as if the dragon was moving. That made me like it even more.
It was Saturday and always go to my Chinese dance lessons. I love them.

When I got there I signed in and everything like I usually do and I started walking up the stairs, but stopped because I saw my teacher, who is very knowledgeable and older than she looks, so I waited and I fell into step with her.

“ How are you?” I said, trying to sound cheerful, but she wasn’t listening, she was staring at my amulet necklace, a look of shock and awe mixed themselves on her face.

“ Oh, do you like it?” I queried.

“ Where did you get it?” she asked, not taking her eyes off, like it would just disappear.

“ I found it at my house on the floor,” I said with confusion creeping into my voice.

“ Do you know what it does?”

“ No. It’s just an amulet necklace,” I said.

“ That is no necklace,” she said.

“ What does it do?” I asked perplexed.

“ I’ll tell you if you tell me what you did before you found it,” she said.

Oh my god! How does she know, I thought.

“ I found it last night,” I started. I trust her, I thought, but why is it so important?
“ I found it last night after I accidentally shot a guy who tried to steal my bag.”

“ OK now I tell you all I know about it. It comes from The Ancients of China, notice the dragon. The Ancients were a people very powerful in the way of magic and sorcery. Some good, some evil. This ‘amulet necklace’, as you call it, is their only one and it borders good and evil, it is not good, it is not evil. It’s called, I think, Nasagash. ‘Nasa’ is dragon in The Ancients language and ‘gash’ is amulet. Dragon-amulet. For them, the dragon was the beast for time and beast of travel and voyage. Nasagash is a time-travel amulet necklace. You can travel to any time period you want to. All you have to do is say ‘Quay Pa Lao Nasagash. Qui So Fei Nasagash’ and think where you want to go.

The thing puzzles me is it travels itself and only to the ones it thinks is in need of its services, be it good or evil. It comes on its own and it will go on its own. No one controls that. You must need its services otherwise it would not have come to you. That is all I know. Remember you say ‘Quay Pa Lao Nasagash. Qui So Fei Nasagash’ and think where you want to be. Remember that. Now, I’m letting you skip dancing class for today and letting you do what you need to do. In other words ‘don’t shoot that guy’. Bye, go now and don’t ask any questions. Nasagash knows when what you need to do is done. Bye, see you next week.”

I was literally standing there mouth open, wide-eyed and stupid looking. Nasagash?…time-travel?…Qui So what?…China? I was confused.

I walked home in a daze.

When I got home I decided to do it. OK, so I want to go back to last night. Now, those words. All of a sudden they snapped at me.

“ Quay Pa Lao Nasagash. Qui So Fei Nasagash.”
I thought of the road where I was last night. The surroundings melted into purple-blue then the purple separated into red and blue and melted into blue and silver and then red and gold. It felt like I was in a plastic bag and the air was getting sucked out of it and then blown in again. My feet hit the pavement; I just maintained my balance. That was an experience. Definitely one I’ll never forget.

I was walking down the street coming from the shop where I buy my food. You see, I just bought a new house last week on the 2nd of October. I passed a couple of friends hanging out, as they always do, on the corner.

“Hey!” I said although I wasn’t in the mood for a chat, but I did fell I could stay for a while and somewhere at the back of my brain something told me to stay.

“Hello Yana, how are you doing this fine evening?” Enna, my friend, said jokingly.

“Probably OK,” I replied.

“You sound tired my 24 year old friend. Lots on your mind?” Enna said still using her, what she thinks is an English accent.

“Yeah I do.”

“Oh, well you probably want to go home and rest or whatever,” she said.

“ nah I’ll stay for a bit. Do me good.” I said surprising myself.

“ cool. So what ya been doing?” she asked, glad I had stayed. I think.

“ Well you know stuff like university and I have Chinese dancing tomorrow. That is gonna be fun.” I said.

Just then a weird, but vaguely familiar guy walked past, looking at my bag. I stared, where had I seen him?

“ Someone you know?” Enna asked.

“ No don’t think so.” I said.

I talked for a bit and then continued back to my house.

When I went to bed I took off my necklace. Necklace? I never wear necklaces. Oh well. I went to sleep and dreamed one of the most colorful and somewhere familiar dream. Wait a minute, that wasn’t me shooting that guy, was it?