This story is using the writing prompt Magic Jewels-what are they and what do they do. This one I thought would be a part of the Faires story originally. But I could never work out how to work it in. At some point I thought about making the jewels birthstones. But nothing came from that idea. Sitting down one day to brainstorm different prompts I thought about a scepter being found that the jewels are missing from. This is going to be another chapter book so you will only get to read the rough first draft a chapter at a time. But I do hope you enjoy it just as much. And don’t worry I’m still working on Amy’s story as well.
When Karl Stinton wakes up tomorrow morning he will dress, make coffee, grab his briefcase and walk out the door. It’s what he has done for the last twenty plus years, and he refused to change his ways no matter what happened in his life. His work was too important to stop for anyone else. He didn’t change when he got married. He didn’t change when he had a son. He didn’t change when his wife got sick and he didn’t change when he was forced to become a single father. So, I know he won’t change in the morning even though I will be gone.
That’s why I didn’t leave a note for him. My father only cared about his job, so I had no plans to ever care about him again. My name is Scott Stinton, and I just ran away from a cold and unforgiving man because I was starting to turn into him. That had been my mother’s biggest fear when she got sick. On her last day of life she made me promise to never close my heart off to anyone. That job won’t be the thing that pushes everyone in my life away. That was a big promise to put on a seven-year old’s shoulders. But I promised all the same. Why wouldn’t I? I loved her, and she was dying fast.
A month ago, I realized that her biggest fear was coming true. My father forced me into an internship a few months ago. I got wrapped up in it. I was praised for my work ethic, brushing off my friends, and only ever talking about work whenever I was with any of them. Two weeks ago, my best friend and my girlfriend tried talking some reason into me, I didn’t listen and they stopped responding to me. A few hours ago, it hit me, I was breaking my promise to my mom. And I didn’t like the man I would become if I kept going.
Now I’m sitting in my jeep on the edge of Blackthorn Lake in the middle of the night. I don’t know what I need to do for the rest of my life. I just know that Karl Stinton would not be apart of it anymore. And it probably would be someone else who would tell him that I had left.
When my best friend, James, and my girlfriend, Cassidey, tried intervening to make me see what I was becoming. I didn’t want to listen to them. I don’t want to admit it. I just made excuses.
“This is not who you are. You are meant to be so much more than this.” Cassidey had pleaded.
“Your destained to be great. But your mother’s legacy will die if you follow this path set by your father.” James tried to reason.
“Why can’t you just let me be? My future depends on the choices I make now. I need to be successful.” I spoke like I was years older. It was my voice but very obviously my father’s words. I just refused to acknowledge that.
Those words were the final straw for them. They stopped talking to me at school and stopped texting me at night. Last night when my boss had handed me an award for my dedication I tried to text both. Neither of them answered. And it hit me like a ton of bricks. They were right, my mother’s worst fear was coming true. I pushed away the two most important people in my life. That’s when I decided I needed to get out of there.
I packed my bags, grabbed the old camping gear of my grandfathers, loaded up the jeep that my grandma bought me and started driving away from my house.
Blackthorn Lake seemed to hold a special kind of magic. My grandparents brought my mother and me to this place when I was super young. My grandfather used to tell me a story of the siren of Blackthorn Lake. He told me the siren protected the lake. I can’t remember the story so much now. I mostly recall my imagination thinking I could find the siren.
I’m exhausted. I drove four hours to get here. It’s so late now that it might as well be morning. I decided that I’m just going to sleep in my car for a while before setting up.
Before I know it, the birds wake me up and I can smell that lake breeze through the vents of my car. I get out and stretch. Taking a deeper breath then I have taken since my mother died. I open the back of the jeep and start setting up the campsite.
The survival skills grandpa had taught me came back surprisingly fast. The tent is set up a fire pit is built and a fire started and food is caught and cooked in no time at all. Now that I’m full, I stare into the fire and the weight of what I have done has hit me. Not only have I left home at seventeen, but I also quit school months before graduation and abandoned a good job with no notice. I only have a few thousand dollars to my name, which dad has full access to and could empty that as soon as he realizes I’m gone. Maybe, I’m not sure if he would or not? The thought of being on my own starts to overwhelm me.
Maybe if I leave now, I can make it home by nightfall and no one will notice that I left. I put my head in my hands trying to decide what to do.
Then the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. I look all around me. I have this feeling that someone was just watching me. No one is around and I can smell a storm forming in the distance. But that feeling was so overwhelming I was sure someone was right next to me.
I check the time on my phone and see that it is late afternoon. When I hear the car coming through the tress. It stopes right next to my jeep and James and Cassidy get out looking thoroughly pissed off.
A Writer's Starting Line 
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