“Shannon, you are such a blonde, thinking that shadows exist and all.” Erica just couldn’t fathom that her friend still believed in shadows. Little people no bigger than an inch that live and thrive using magic. It was an urban legend one passed down and her friend was going to write her senior thesis on how they could still be alive and purposely ignoring humans.
“Look at the evidence, people swear when they were in a burning house with no way out they would look and see a small person watching them in trouble and an entry way would open. A person who was trapped under inside a car swears a shadow looked and the car door ripped open and a force pulled them out. Another is from a mom who was frantic trying to get the baby to stop choking and she saw a shadow next thing you know the baby is crying and still alive.” Shannon countered to Erica. Maybe it was the child in her, the one that still wanted Santa and the tooth fairy to be real that made her believe in the shadows.
“Those are all people who got lucky and it can be explained away with science. The fire burned away a support me, as it collapsed it opened an exit; the person inside the car was suffering from lack of air and just imagined the whole thing when fire fighters pulled them out, the mother thought she saw a shadow but really she just squeezed her baby tight enough to cause the obstruction to be coughed out.” Is Shannon really this dimwitted. Erica had to dye her hair to not be associated with this dumb blonde.
“Then what about the founding fathers? In all their notes like the Madison notes about the constitutional convention he said they were guided by the shadow hands, George Washington said it was with a shadow plan they devised the attack on Trenton. Washington also said that the plan of Benedict Arnold was discovered when the shadows revealed it to him.” Shannon wasn’t going to be out talked and out debated by her blonde friend Erica. She must dye her hair as to not be associated with that dumb blonde.
“Fine, you can write on whatever you want and fail the course. I’m just telling you that there is no such thing as shadows. We are both twenty-two years old and are graduating college this year, I’m ready to leave childhood behind and you are believing fairy tales.” The two friends hugged after some more friendly insults and went back to their dorm rooms.
If Erica didn’t want to believe that’s fine, but Shannon had a trick up her sleeve. She was doing some reading and found that there was a practice that would make a shadow come to you. When she was reading for her thesis she found a passage in George Washington about shadows coming when two triangles were pointed away from each other with the circle placed inside. So, that each base of the triangles was barely touching the circle. On the outside, there was another circle which touched the tips of the triangles. This design reflected the lay-out of New Washington DC having been destroyed by the Nazis in 1946 but rebuilt after they were driven out of the country and ultimately defeated under General Kennedy. There were too many coincidences to be ignored and Shannon knew if she did it right, tonight she would be talking to a shadow.
Shannon got her supplies ready and waited for 9:15 PM. It was said in the writings that Shadows would only come after dark so she prepared her circle out of pieces of paper so it looked just like what was written by George Washington. She grabbed the book and repeated the prayer hoping shadows would soon come. “Shadows come from all bends, to mend, to fend, they disappear but will fight your fear. Hear me shadows one and all, please hear my call.” Shannon looked around her tiny dorm room and saw nothing. She repeated rhyme but nothing happened. Nothing, she was an idiot to believe in shadows and Erica was right. But luckily no one knew she tried this so at least that embarrassment wouldn’t get out to anyone.
Just as she picked up the scraps of paper she remembered a passage from Thomas Jefferson’s diary. She ran over to her notes and found it, as she read it she got an idea in her head. It said that Shadows were the salts of the earth. She ran to her small kitchen and grabbed the salt and ran back to her little summoning area. Did she really want to cause such a mess with all this salt if it didn’t work? A moment fell on Shannon until she realized she made a huge fool of herself so far, why not go for the gold? After the salt was out and she raised the page and said “Shadows come from all bends, to mend, to fend, they disappear but will fight your fear. Hear me shadows one and all, please hear my call.”
Nothing happened and Shannon’s hopes fell and she scale of her idiocy came to her, she had salt over her floor and was reading a rhyme from a book over 300 years old. Believing in shadows, little men and women who guided humanity when needed was as believable as bigfoot or UFOs. She better think fast and change her senior thesis so she can get her degree and forget this whole embarrassing event ever occurred.
“What are you doing?” The voice was soft. Shannon looked around and saw nothing. “Seriously, you said the rhyme, did the whole thing the correct way, so what are you doing?”
“Who said that?” Was Shannon going crazy? Had to stop eating the sushi at the cafeteria on campus. She stood up and looked frantically to find the source of the voice, it had to be a trick, but no one knew what she was doing tonight.
“Look down” The soft voice said in annoyance. Shannon looked down to her feet and saw it, or better put him. There a foot in front of her feet stood a little man. He had to be only an inch or two tall. He wore blues jeans and a black button down shirt tucked in, with little brown shoes and a brown belt. “What are you doing?”
“You’re real?” Shannon screamed and immediately dropped to her knees which caused the little man to fall on his ass and hold his ears.
“Could you not scream, you are so much bigger than I, it’s just rude. I’ll ask again, what are you doing?” Shannon gazed on this little man. She lied down on her stomach and turned her head to the side and stared at him.
“I’m sorry” Shannon said trying to keep her voice down to be more courteous. “What I was doing? I’m curious, no one believes you existed I have so many questions.”
“Well, I’m yours for the next week. Those are the rules if one of us is summoned. You get to have me here instead of me being at the party I was at, so I hope your happy.” The shadow said with a look of ice.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know.” Shannon didn’t know, how could she know he was at a party. This was not how she pictured a shadow to look like either.
“You look disappointed, well, are you disappointed?” The little man said as he started to walk away from Shannon and explore his new home for the next week.
“A little, I wasn’t expecting” Shannon started to speak but was cut off by the little man.
“And what exactly were you expecting? Did you want me to look like a leprechaun? To wear the clothing of a wizard? To fly and be this mystical being riding a dragon?” The little man continued to walk. Shannon raised to her knees and followed him slowly while on her knees.
“No, I just, I don’t know, I didn’t expect it to work. Look I’m sorry if you don’t want to be here, I’m Shannon.” If Shannon didn’t get ahead of this conversation the next week would be terrible.
“It’s not your fault, you didn’t know, I’m Kevin.” He turned around and looked at the still shocked gigantic woman.
“What are you?” Shannon didn’t know what to ask and she kind of wished that wasn’t the one she had blurted out.
“HAHAHAHA, I’m a shadow. If that is all you wanted to know this is going to be a long week.” The tiny man continued to walk with a chuckle. “I see that humanity has gone downhill since the last time we helped out. Got any other questions or should I make a place for myself to get some sleep?”
“Why have you helped us out and why have you left us?” Shannon tried to recover the conversation before it goes too far into the wrong direction.
“We have been here far longer than humans, it is our job to guide them when they ask for help. We have helped many times. As for leaving you, we never did, it was humans that left us.” The tiny man turned around and looked at his companion for the next week. She was white with blonde hair, more round than a normal human girl but wasn’t unattractive on the eyes. Her breasts and butt were the most noticeable. “I see that you do want to learn and that is something I can say is rare for your people today. I will explain more in the morning but for now please this evening has been tiring enough. Where do you sleep?”
“You’re going to be sleeping with me?” Shannon said with a blush.
“You don’t understand, stand up and walk backwards.” Shannon did as she was asked and as she gotten ten feet away she saw the little man being forced to follow her in the air. Shannon now realized why this little man was upset, she had made him a prisoner.