Trifecta: Ice [Complete]

Ch7: Resemblance

I spent the rest of the day attempting to function through the shaking and cowering I could not control. I made myself eat with no appetite, and I made myself move without motivation, but I only left the guest room when Karen came for me.

When it got dark out and I was nearly ready for bed, I picked up my mp3 player from where it was lying on the desk and plugged a pair of headphones into it with quaking hands. I put the ear buds in my ears, and walked over to the bed. I turned off the bedside lamp and I slipped under the covers and curled into a ball. If Karen had come into my room right then, all she would have seen was a lump of blankets.

In the pitch black of my covers, I touched the screen of my mp3 player and brought it to life. I scrolled through my music indecisively and finally started a random playlist.

An upbeat pop song came on, and I felt my body stiffen as the magic fear ripped through me. I dropped the device and pulled my earbuds out of my ears. I could still hear the music so I scrambled to shut it off.

It took me a long minute to slow my racing heart. Was everything I enjoyed lost to me?

I decided to try again. I scrolled through my music library until I found the most melancholy song I owned. I put only one earbud in this time and I waited, ready to stop it if it provoked another terrible magical reaction.

The notes came through my earbud and I barely felt a ripple. I exhaled slowly, grateful that maybe I could manage to find a way to cope with this nightmare.

I spent the next hour huddled under my covers, holding Lizzy and sifting through my songs to find anything negative enough that I thought I could bear to listen to it. The whole time I listened to the one song I knew was safe on repeat; I was not ready to risk another fright.

Eventually I fell asleep.

* * * * * * * * *

I woke in the morning with my heart pounding like a drum, but no memories of what I had been dreaming to upset me so.

I could guess what my nightmares might have been, though. Maybe I had been doing something terrifying like opening my backpack or trying to slip my feet into fluffy bunny slippers.

I was rewarded for my internal sass with familiar shivers running outwards from the back of my neck.

I huddled back under the covers and waited for the magic to pass.

Before I had had time for the shaking to wear off, I heard a knock on my door and then the familiar second knock before Karen carefully came into the guest room. I pushed my face up out of the covers.

She was holding a roll of gauze and tape in her hand.

"Your bandages need changing, then I've got an idea that I want to try with you."

Well, that sounded as terrifying as bunny slippers, I thought with another cold shiver in response to my sarcasm. The curse really had no sense of humour.

I pushed myself up and turned so that my neck was accessible to her. I pulled the long mass of my hair out of the way.

I could feel her cool fingers on my skin as she pulled off the old bandage. It pulled out a few of my hairs, but I did not dare complain.

"It's looking much better. The wound is already closed," she told me. "I don't see any signs of infection or anything."

I waited while she squeezed antibiotic cream onto the bandage and then placed it on my neck and taped it down again.

"You should probably get ready and before you eat breakfast, then we'll try my little experiment."

I did as she suggested then walked out of the guest room as if I was being led to a hangman's tree.