Mrs Waterfield got out of her car and made it to the front door carrying a medium sized box …

“Hello Julie” she shouted, barging cheerily into the house.

“In the kitchen Mum” called Julie whilst putting a tray of hot cookies on the worktop ... 

“Ooh can I have one?”  they did look delicious ..

“No Mum, they are Truth cookies” Julie replied in a sad tone.

“Why do you need Truth cookies baby?” Julies Mum said with deep concern.

 

“It’s John, he’s been spending far too much time playing a game.” Julie sighed.

Victoria put her box down and gave her daughter a hug. “He’s a techy, they like that stuff, I’m not surprised, but surely this is a bit extreme?” Victoria said carefully ..”How much is too much ?”

Julie plonked herself on a kitchen  stool and indicated her mother should take the other stool.

“It’s so bad that he does the shopping once a week, plans the meals and everything so he only has to go shopping just the once … then he rushes around the house doing chores just so he can play VRlife. He’s even been talking about getting one of those ridiculous headsets..”

“You know men never grow up, He’s just going through yet another fad, remember the welder and the 3d printer … He’s good at that stuff ”

Julie sighed again, annoying Victoria. Her daughter was proving to her she was prone to over dramatization again.

 

“I don’t mind the time he's spending doing it, it stops him getting all romantic and snuggling up to me trying to persuade me to have sex with him” the face of mild disgust lasted only a few moments before Julie sighed.

“He’s a good familiar for you, if you hadn’t married him Tracy Jones would have had him and Goddess knows what trouble she would have caused with access to that amount of latent magical energy”

“But I don’t like men… in bed … I didn't want to marry him” Julie blushed, she felt like an electric radiator… who discussed their bed room preferences with their Mother?.

“I’m glad you did dear, The Coven needed his energy, especially last year …. Does he remember any of it ?”

Julie paused… “John mentioned a crazy dream about a mad Troll or something but hasn’t said anything else”. “We got lucky then “ Victoria smiled… “But back to the Truth cookies, Why?”

 

“He’s always with the same woman in his game, they ‘Dance’ together a lot, She’s rather attractive and it makes me angry, I mean I love John like a brother but …” Victoria stared at her daughter.. “ You really don’t like John in …” her hands waved about uncertainly “ .. bed? I heard he was quite good…” Victoria blushed a little, hoping her daughter wouldn’t see … That time she had “helped” her daughter by taking her place on any early date with John came back to her … she really would have liked to have educated him, he showed great promise if only he had a good ‘tutor’.... But the least said and thought about that the better.

 

Julie was deep in thought and oblivious to her Mother's embarrassment.

“Could you sleep with John as me a few times? That should stop him getting obsessed with this Lisa?”

“What!?” her Mother exclaimed, “You can’t be serious?” although she didn't want to admit it might be good. It was not something you did .. for .. ? your daughter, well … not again. This was getting to be migraine inducing …

 

“So the Truth cookies are to find out if he's ‘infatuated’ with this Lisa? ” She was jealous but couldn’t figure out why.

“Yes and then I can wipe his mind and that should be the end of it!”

“NO!” here Mother angrily shouted and slammed her hand hard on the table making Julie jump in startled shock.

“He’s your familiar and a locked Morph, That’s just unethical and if you break his lock, which you could with that sort of magic,  you will be tasked with hunting and killing him. I can’t allow that you stupid girl!` This sort of rage was not something Julie had ever seen from her mother and terrified her. 

“He’s a Morph?” Julie whispered… “You never said..”

“Didn't you learn anything during training! It's like a lighthouse in his aura!” Victoria stared again at her daughter in disbelief .. not the brightest student in the world but she was remarkably good at the simple and normal magics.. So why?...

“I never could see auras that well” Julie whimpered, cowering from her mother..

“How did you pass that part of training?”, “I got lucky” Julie whispered in embarrassment ..

“You and I will have a long discussion next week at Camp, but first John...”

Victoria strode around the kitchen deep in thought for a few minutes…

“What do John and this Lisa talk about?”

Julie looked down at the floor “I don’t want to know ..” she was close to tears, first John and now her Mother… 

 

“Right show me his computer ..Turn it on and let's have a look shall we?”

Julie moved to the living room, pulled the chair to the desk and turned on the PC. 

“He plays here?” Victoria queried slightly confused …

“Yes, He shows me some of the places they visit and we listen to the music”

“He’s not hiding it?”

“No, it’s like he’s not worried about what I think, he’s tried to get me to play with him.. Especially when he was away on business” she says in a small sad voice.

“I haven't paid much attention to it , he does explain stuff but to be honest it's boring and I tune it out...”

“Ok, how do we sign in?”

“The password there” pointing to a post it note.” you need to add our wedding date to the front and my birthday to the end. They stay the same but the words change“.

“So he’s doing nothing sneaky ?” she asked confused having heard the tails of woe from some of the other coven members about their men and online activities “Ok… where this VR life game ? ”

Victoria looked at the desktop background … it reminded her of the enchanted forest they had taken John to the previous year…

“Where did this picture come from Julie ?” Victoria asked, it looked familiar to her.

“Somewhere in VRlife, it looks like the Forest..” Julie mused also haunted by the image.

 

The game loaded and there was the login … name and password already filled in.

Victoria was stunned .. John was clever, not a genius but surely he would lock anything that he wanted hidden, but no… it was an open book, so to speak. She pressed the login button. The scene that opened in front of her was not exactly like the Forest where they had taken John to force the Troll home, but it was strikingly similar ..

After fumbling around for a bit the chat window opened .. there was the last conversation … Lisa had bid Good Night and Sweet dreams to RonDayDreama .. so that was John's name here …

Victoria hit the enter key absent mindedly as Julie pointed at something in the scene… It looked like the shrine from the forest they sometimes used. This was very concerning .. “We need to talk to John about this … ” Victoria’s voice was edged with worry.

A message popped up from Ron “Lisa your way to early, couldn’t keep away from completing the Sim eh?”

Julie pointed at the screen “Is John in the game from work?, we've been caught!” she wasn't worried, erasing John’s mind would fix this...but it made her sad, he was a great person... for a guy.

Victoria looked at the chat box and typed “No, just popped in for a moment and now got to go.” she pressed enter.

Julie looked confused, Victoria paused, looked at her daughter and excitedly exclaimed “Yesss!”, she grinned just a little manically.