“Can I eat that one?”
“No, that’s a dog.”
“Can I eat that one?”
“No, that’s a child.
“How about that one.”
“That’s your reflection”
“Oh right! Mirrors.”
If you are like most people in this world you would only be able to hear half of this conversation. You would be riding on the subway like so many others in the city did for their early morning commute to work and think you were listening to a crazy woman having a one-sided conversation with herself, not that that would be a unique occurrence by any metric. If you were special though, you would see she was talking to an almost cartoonishly proportioned small shark swimming lazily through the air locking eyes suspiciously with his reflection.
“Still don’t believe mirrors are real?”
In a flash, the shark disengaged from the window and flopped into the woman’s lap.
“What do you think elephants taste like? He asked”
“Elephants?” she chuckled.
“Yeah, I want to try one.”
“Why?”
“Because I’ve never tasted one before. There are so many things on land I want to taste. Ooo can we go to that moo place?”
“You mean a zoo?”
“Yeah, that place with all the cows!”
Her eyes narrowed. “You mean a farm?”
“So what do you think elephants taste like?”
The woman laughed again, both in amusement and exasperation. She had only met this shark spirit two months ago and in that time, they had not gotten through a single complete conversation on any one topic without starting another or randomly circling back to one they had had as long as days before. She didn’t blame the little guy though. Land was so much more chaotic than the sea and he wanted to learn everything about everything. His head had almost exploded trying to fathom a car let alone a subway system. Plus it was very cute
“Chicken,” she responded as the subway rolled to a stop.
“Oh come on Joan,” he said as he floated into the air in front of her. “You always say that.”
“Sorry Buddy, that’s just what everyone says when they eat an exotic animal…speaking of,” she said as she looked towards the people filing into the car.
As people rushed out of the train car, many of whom weren’t even at their stop and just wanted to get away from the crazy lady, new people got on, one of which was a man who had a strange bulbous creature wrapped around his neck, not that anyone but Joan and Buddy could see it.
Buddy gasped and excitedly asked, “Can I eat that one.”
“Of course, just let me double-check something,” she said as she pulled a book from her bag, one that was very old and seemed to be held together purely by luck.
She suddenly raised her head back up “You mean the spirit right?”
“Is that what that is,” buddy asked genuinely, “I thought it was a cow.”
Joan shook her head as she opened the book to the table of contents and said “Identify”.
The pages flipped on their own and stopped on a page which showed a realistic illustration of a creature that looked similar to the spirit attached to the man.
“Okay,” she said. “It looks like we’re dealing with a Dream Eater.”
Buddy gasped again. “I haven’t eaten one of those yet!”
“Well let’s see what it tastes like, Joan said as she put the book back into the bag and took out an armored glove that had sharp talons on the fingers and a rune on the back of the hand.
“Yeahyeahyeah,” Buddy said as he “swam” forward. Joan grabbed him by the tail and yanked him back, wincing as she did.
“Wait till we get off at the next stop,” she said calmly, “you’re gonna need more space if you want to chow down.”
Buddy nodded enthusiastically, before noticing Joan’s hand had a bunch of new scratches on it.
“Oh no, I’m sorry,” he said frantically.
This was not a rare occurrence for Joan, since the two of them had teamed up Joan had had to reign in Buddy often when he got too excited. Even as a spirit, Buddy had all the traits of a shark, including the dermal denticles their skin was covered in. These tiny V-shaped scales helped reduce drag in the water, but also made their skin pretty sharp. Though, thanks to his current form, it was more like sandpaper than teeth, a blessing to anything he accidentally brushed past in his frantic dashes.
“Hey it’s fine,” Joan said unperturbed. “It’s just a little scuffed.”
Joan gave him a big smile and put on the glove.
“Are you just being nice?” Buddy said.
Joan was surprised at this. As you have probably noticed from just the brief interaction you have read, Buddy is not the most observant and introspective being in the world. Since Joan had formed a contract with Buddy, he had taken bites out of several things including street signs, cars, buildings, trees, etc. Basically, anything that was new to him, Buddy felt a need to taste. She was worried that he might not be able to learn from his mistakes and that she would have to eventually exorcise him. This question showed that her little friend was learning and seeing that his actions had consequences, even if he was still a little too excitable.
Joan put on the glove and scratched Buddy’s head, which Buddy enjoyed like a dog.
“Come on am I ever mad?” she asked.
“No,” Buddy said. “But you never get mad at anything. Remember when Mathew got mad at you because you wouldn’t be mad at anyone.”
“Yes I do, I just don’t think getting mad solves anything. I know you don’t mean to get overexcited and I know you will get better at it as time goes on. Until then,” she moved he hand away before suddenly grabbing Buddy’s tail and pulling him back into her lap where she started to give him a fierce belly rub.
“I’ll be here to reign you in .” She laughed as Buddy thrashed and giggled.
The train pulled to a stop and almost everyone in the car rushed out in hopes of getting away from the crazy, metal-clawed woman. Joan got up and left last right before the doors shut, stepping out onto the busy platform. She had lost sight of the man, not that she cared, sharks were better trackers than bloodhounds.
“Follow me,” Buddy said as he swam over the crowd sniffing as he went.
Once the two had walked up the stairs onto street level, Buddy continued guiding Joan as she deftly weaved through the crowd, easily keeping pace with her flying shark. Within a minute she was walking right behind the man.
“Excuse me, sir,” she said as she tapped his shoulder.
The man turned around and recoiled once he realized who she was.
“Oh,” he said, “you’re the girl from the train,” he said with obvious discomfort.
“Yep, but don’t worry I’m not crazy” she responded, “I’m a medium.”
“Like… you talk to ghosts,” he asked, obviously not comforted by the clarification.
“Yes I do,” she said as she reached into the bag again and pulled out a business card.
She gave the man the card which read: Joan Baker Paranormal Investigator-Medium-Exorcist as well as a phone number and email address and the slogan, “Please hire me, I’m broke”.
The man looked like he was gonna try to run away, or at least try to end the conversation as soon as possible, but he stopped and looked more seriously at Joan, something she completely expected.
“How did you know to give me this,” he asked.
“I’m guessing you’ve been feeling depressed, have had a constant feeling you are being watched and have had terrible nightmares where something is tormenting you?” she asked.
The man was taken aback. “Ye…Yes, how did you-”
“You’re being haunted.” She said. “You can’t see it but I can and the little bugger is wrapped around your neck.”
The man rubbed his neck. “I have been feeling like something is there..”
“Well don’t worry, we can help. I just need to touch your neck with this.” she held up the hand with the gauntlet.
“Um…” The man said eyeing the talons on the end of the fingers.
“I know it looks freaky but trust me the talons are for the spirit.”
She held his hand with her ungloved hand and looked into his eyes. “I promise, I just want to help.”
The man was tired, both physically and mentally from the symptoms Joan had correctly predicted he had and though he never put much stock into the supernatural, he had to admit she had been spot on. Besides that, he could see something in her eyes and hear it in her voice. A genuine kindness he couldn’t help but want to trust.
He nodded to her and bent forward slightly. Joan reached up and placed an armored finger on the man’s throat. The rune on the back of the gauntlet started to glow and the man swore he heard something give out a demonic shriek. Suddenly, Joan grabbed at something wrapped around his neck that he of course couldn’t see and pulled hard. The man suddenly felt a tremendous weight he hadn’t even noticed was there lift off of his shoulders, his neck felt unrestrained, and his prevailing anxiety washed away. Joan threw the invisible thing into the air and called out “Now”.
Joan was the only one who bore witness as Buddy explosively grew into a shark the size of a car and chomped the spirit in a single bite.
“Wow, the man said as his face lit up. “This is…”
“You have been exorcised,” Joan said with a smile and an exaggerated bow.
Buddy shrank back down and floated down to be eye level with Joan, still chewing on a few final bits.
“So,” Joan said, “what does it taste like.”
Buddy paused for a moment as if in deep contemplation and plainly stated “Chicken.”
Bruin Armstrong Writing 