I sat alone in my secondary-school’s cafeteria. It figured that everyone would try to avoid me. After all, I was apparently a “party-pooping Grinch”. I thought that people were supposed to act like adults when they turned 18! Or, at the very least, that I’d be treated like an adult now that I was 18! Why were they all so pissy about me not wanting to be in the stupid Christmas play?! The solitude was, however, quickly broken by my best-friend sitting down beside me and asking what was wrong.
“What do you think?” I scowled, shoving another mouthful that could barely be classified as food into my mouth.
I watched as the look of concern on his face changed to that of confusion. He was clearly drawing a blank here. Perhaps the answer to my question wasn’t as blatantly obvious to him as it was to me? With my teachers and other classmates, I could understand their ignorance. But this was my best friend we’re talking about! He was supposed to get me!
“My mum, remember?” I said, hoping to maybe jog his memory without having to go on another of my tangential tirades.
“Oh, that’s right,” he said as it finally clicked why I didn’t want to partake in the school play. “You hate Christmas, don’t you, Erin?”
I stared dumbfounded at my best-friend. Surely you’d remember something like that? It’s not like many people hate Christmas, I know that much. That was all the more reason for me to be surprised that he didn’t recall that detail about me.
“Well, don’t worry, Erin,” he smiled, “I’ll just talk to Mr. Poe and see if he’ll let you skip out.”
“Don’t bother,” I said dismissively, “term’s nearly over anyways. I can just skip school until after New Year’s.”
“Erin, if the school finds out you’re scheming…”
“Then maybe they’ll think twice about casting me in their shitty play!” I retorted, grabbing my schoolbag off the floor and marching to the door leading outside.

I could picture my friend facepalming as I put one leg after the other over the waist-high schoolyard walls and headed to the nearest tram stop. But that was none of my concern. I wasn’t going to be in that school play, even if it meant the difference between life and death! Since last year, I’ve hated Christmas with a dying passion, and nothing in this world was ever going to change that!
A passerby greeted me with a friendly “top of the morning”, even though it was already afternoon, and asked me if school had finished up early. I laughed and told them I wasn’t feeling well so I was going to catch the tram home. Which wasn’t technically a lie, since I wasn’t feeling well emotionally.
“Oh, the tram’s not running,” they told me, “apparently there’s some weird purple thing floating above the track.”
Well, that was certainly odd. I’d bumped into this person a few times and they never seemed like the crazy type.
“What sort of ‘purple thing’?” I inquired, my mind running wild with thoughts of magic or aliens like something out of one of my favorite M.S. Webber novels or something.
“My brother John saw it, y’know? Said it looked like something straight out of one of those Japanimation cartoons he watches.”
A purple thing floating on the tramline, like something out of an anime? I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. There was no way that could be true! I rolled my eyes and headed towards the nearest tram stop regardless. Clearly that guy had just lost the plot! …Or so I thought. Indeed, when I got to my usual tram stop, there was a notice announcing the line was closed due to “unforeseen circumstances”. I resigned to that fact that I was just going to have to get home on foot. It was still better than staying another second in that school, being chastised by my peers for refusing to act a fool in their stupid production!

As I trudged towards my house, I was stopped by a cream-haired man with a horrible fashion sense.
“Erin Wilde?” he asked, holding his hand out to shake mine.
“Uh, yeah? What’s the craic?” I hesitated, before offering out my own arm and shaking his hand. “Do I know you?”
“You’re a fan of M.S. Webber, correct?”
I stepped back a little. How could this guy have known I liked M.S. Webber’s books? I wasn’t wearing one of my many Chronicles of Phantasia t-shirts – I was still in my school uniform, after all – nor was I waiting in line at the local bookstore to preorder the upcoming Two Beings, Or Not Two Beings – I had already done that the previous week. He looked too old to be a fellow student, so there was no chance he’d just overheard me talking about it with my friends. Who was he?
“Listen, Erin, would you like to meet Webber?” he asked me with a smile.
Of-course, he was a kidnapper! There was no other explanation I could think of for an oddly-dressed man to be asking a girl in a school uniform if she wanted to meet a famous author. Without second thought, I punched him right on the nose and ran towards my suburb. I was going to be in enough trouble with Daddy for scheming. The last thing I needed was to be kidnapped! As I ran, I noticed something out of the corner of my eye. There, in an alleyway, was what appeared to be a black portal floating in midair. I cautiously approached it. Was it a mirror, I wondered.
“What doth be the craic?” a voice called out.
I quickly swung my head around. That guy from before certainly wasn’t behind me. I’d recognize his garish flame-printed shorts anywhere. As I turned my gaze back to the thing in the alley, I noticed another oddly-dressed figure standing inside it. So much for it being a mirror…
“Thou art Erin Wilde, I doth presumeth?” she whispered, slowly stepping out of the dark circle.
As she did so, her blonde hair receded and blackened, her ridiculous outfit turning into a much more acceptable black jumper, trackie trousers and beret. I demanded she tell me how she knew my name and what was with the weird portal and transforming before my very eyes.
“But of-course,” the mysterious woman began, “whither art mine mann’rs? I doth be known as Chloe Webber, but thee can calleth me Lady Kuro Shakespeare.”
“Webber?” I asked, assured that my next question was probably going to sound completely stupid. “Like M.S. Webber?”
The woman who was apparently called “Kuro” rolled her eyes and let out a deep sigh.
“Aye. That lady’s sister art I.”
She was M.S. Webber’s sister?! I couldn’t believe it. Maybe I could ask her to get M.S. Webber to sign my books and shirts, maybe even my pants?!
“Hark, Erin… would thee likeeth to visiteth Phantasia?”
Figures. Another kidnapper. If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Without a word, I turned to head home. I was done with this shit. Why did it have to be that day, of all days?
“I assure thee this doth be not a farce,” Kuro called back. “Thee seeth me appeareth from out of nowhere and transformeth ere thy very eyes, didst thee not?”
I slowly turned back around. It was true that I couldn’t explain Kuro’s appearance from within that portal thingy, nor how she changed her hair and clothes in a single instant. Maybe she really was from a magical land?
“If I go to Phantasia,” I began, “can I stay there? Until the holiday season is over?”
Kuro raised an eyebrow and flashed a sharp-toothed grin and a low cackle.
…
……
………
“Welcome to Phantasia.”