Two White Mochas and Blood on His Sleeve (Part One)

First half of Chapter One in my Adventure/Fantasy/Romance, "Declan Kent and the Underground Orchestra".

     It was usually the same thing: a few tumors healed, a gnarled hand softened and usable again, a walking stick made useless. It didn't end with physical ailments either. Business partnerships were mended (or broken, if that was more pertinent), years of silence between bitter siblings broken, strife with a wife healed.
     Small towns meant small problems, and that's how Declan liked it. Ten years of country roads and ferries between Ireland, Scotland and Britain, stopping in towns small enough to be forgotten. He didn't have to space out visits because of the effect he had on  memories. After he would work his (literal) magic, he would pack up, have a coffee from the local cafe, and leave to be forgotten forever. It was his ritual and his way of life.
     He would start early in the morning, usually in the town square or train station. Anywhere with high pedestrian traffic was the most effective, and started things quickly. He would unpack his guitar (old, weathered, the color of charred wood), put on the strap and close his eyes. He would feel electricity in the air around him, like the soft hum of power-lines or the low buzz of a thicket of crickets.
     Today was just like any other: he found the town center and tuned his guitar quietly while people walked passed without noticing, humming each note in perfect pitch to find the dissonance and eradicate it. He closed his eyes, felt the air around him crackle, found the right note, and played the first chord.
     The effect was immediate. Some slowed down while turning their heads in small wonder. A child stopped and pointed. The electricity crackled again, making his hair stand on end. He sang the first few notes on the lift chord, soft and mid-register, clear and warm. The words were simple and sweet, relate-able and almost ordinary. The words themselves weren't special, but the order that they were in, coupled with the power in his blood.
     It was around the first chorus that the real effect became visible. The mood shifted as the chords and melodies bathed the square in warmth and energy. People began to gather around, smiling and laughing, some pulling out their phones to record him (the recordings would never survive, an effect of the magic he was grateful for). Towards the second verse a couple started to dance, laughing and twisting in ornate little circles while others applauded. When the second chorus started, an old bent branch of a man straightened slowly and relaxed, eyes widened and surprised. He put his hands on the small of his back and laughed, astonished. Others around him saw and laughed, giddy and joyful. A man proposed, a daughter apologized to her mother, a child with  dark circles under her eyes began to breathe clearly again. All seemed like it was going as planned, and he was almost bored. That was, until he saw her. She walked through hurriedly, head buried in a book. His heart almost stopped. Not only did she seem unaffected, but she was completely unaware . He sang louder and changed the chord. She didn't even flinch. She stopped when she neared the crowd gathered around Declan, and looked around, puzzled. She saw the people laughing gaily , and she sort of shrugged before snaking her way through the crowd. He watched her as he sang, and confusion set in. He finished the song early while the throng pressed in around him, congratulating him and shaking his hand, girls approaching shyly. He looked over their heads in search of the girl while they littered his guitar case with bills and change. For the first time, he didn't stay. Confusion and doubt tore at his stomach, while his mind writhed. His mind raced for an explanation, and no memory or tale from his father helped. Never had anyone ever been less affected.
     He made his way out of the crowd, searching frantically. She was nowhere to be found.
     She's not just unaware... She's immune .

--

     Declan stuffed the wad of bills into the front of his jacket and picked up his guitar case. His brow was furrowed as he walked down the cobblestone street. Someone pushed past him and almost fell forward. He caught the man, which was returned with a curt apology and without a second glance before hurrying away. People had already forgotten about him. Declan's mouth curved into a slight, sad smile.
     He walked towards the cafe he knew was still there (had been for 8 years), and pondered the possibilities the girl's immunity proposed. Was she special? If so, where did it come from? He supposed it may be genetic, but that would mean that there were more . The likelihood of the existence of entire bloodlines that were resistant to his gift were close to zero. Not without him hearing about it, anyway.
     Not possible. No way.
     Or was it?
     He wasn't sure, but his father never mentioned it, and he was positive that something like that would merit the attention of the ever detail-oriented patriarch. He shook the train of thought as he neared the cafe, pushing the glass door open and stepping inside. It was warm and the familiar smell entered his lungs like a Saturday morning. When he approached the counter he saw an argument developing between a sulky-looking customer and the spunky teen barista.
     "Sir, I put the order in for two white mochas because you said specifically , 'Two white mochas, please'," she quipped.
     "Well I said two white mochas but I meant two espressos. So I want my espressos, and I'm not paying for them," came the snide reply.
     "Well, here we have to pay for things to get them. Have a good day."
     He scoffed and walked out empty-handed, pushing past Declan and those behind him. Declan watched the man as the barista addressed him.
     "Hey tall ,dark and moody, take these before I throw them out."
     She put the mochas in Declan's hands as he said, "I take my coffee black."
     "And I'm sure you're very manly and sophisticated, but my co-worker just went on a smoke break and I have a small village in line behind you. It's on the house." She smiled and tilted her head before addressing the customer behind him, all before he could protest.
     He turned, scowling a little bit before scanning the room for a spot. When he spotted an empty chair by the window, he froze. Sitting on the other side of the empty chair was the girl that he had seen earlier. She was still buried in a leather-bound book, and he was now buried in self-doubt. He looked at the mochas, looked back at the spot, and decided he had to investigate.
     He sat down and put the drink in front of her. She didn't look up.
     "I don't think it's poisoned."
     She started at the sound of his voice, realizing he was there.
     "Don't worry, I'm not going to sell you anything or ask for your number. This is just the best spot in the shop, and she gave me an extra drink."
     "U-um, sure!" she spluttered, caught off guard.
     "Okay." He pretended to look out the window while she moved the drink closer to her, without drinking it.
     "Are you here a lot?"
     "Not really. I just moved here, I'm an intern," she said over the top of her book.
     American, he thought. Interesting.
     He watched her for a moment, trying to scry anything he could about who she was. She had dark brown hair that she wore in waves past her shoulders but tucked into burnt orange scarf. Her eyes were big, warm and hazel.  Her face was defined but soft, and her lips had a slight pout. She was slight in her build and height, the layers under her coat only made her look smaller.
     She looked like she felt his eyes on her, and she shifted in her seat uncomfortably and asked, "Is there anything you need specifically..? I'm sorry, I'm just trying to enjoy what I'm reading."
     He ignored her question. "It's good that you read. Most people worship their phones nowadays."
      She seemed put off by his evasion, and she put her book down. "I suppose, but it only works when people let me read it."
     "I wanna ask you something, is that okay?"
     "Do I have a choice?"
     "There's always a choice."
     She looked at him with her eyebrow raised. He continued.
     "Have you ever felt different from everyone else? Like you don't belong here? I'm not talking about teen angst or an everyday mood. I mean really feeling like you and everyone are on separate wave-lengths, and home never felt like home?"
     As he finished he realized that he was leaning forward and looking directly into her eyes with intensity. He pulled back a little and something flashed quickly behind her eyes before she took her book and stood up.
     "I really have to go. This was... interesting."
     Before he could reply, she walked quickly out of the door, and out of his reach.
     He sat back and sighed.
     Damnit.
     He picked up his guitar and followed her.
     I have to know.
    

    

Author's Note

Part 1, stay tuned. Review for Review? <3 First post.

Reviews

[Hailey Juliet]

"humming each note in perfect pitch to find the dissonance and eradicate it", gawd, I wish I could do that! I can usually pick out something close to an E and go from there by ear:P

' "And I'm sure you're very manly and sophisticated, but my co-worker just went on a smoke break and I have a small village in line behind you. It's on the house." She smiled and tilted her head before addressing the customer behind him, all before he could protest.'
I love this girl. She's one helluva spunky barista and probably deserves a raise!

As others mentioned in the reviews, there are a few odd typos and a couple of phrases/sentences that read a bit awkwardly, but I won't bore you to death with grammar and syntax, it's really nothing a couple rounds of editing can't fix.

As for the story, it has a pulse. lol. No, it's pretty darn good, I liked what I read so far. Of course genre and style preferences vary from reader to reader and if I'm honest, I'm not sure if the modern/fantasy/romance thing is my cup of tea, or white mocha, or espresso, or black coffee, or . . . yea, you get the point. That being said, the tea was free and I owed you a review so here I am, happy to be here:)

I did enjoy the pace and the progression of the story as it moved with purpose from the street performance to chasing after the mysterious girl, to the coffee shop and the table by the window. You didn't linger long in any one place, nor did you get overly sentimental with any of the events, descriptions, or emotions. You were clear, descriptive and colourful enough with the imagery for my tastes, and compelling with the character motives. The characters didn't feel forced to move, react, or feel anything, their motivations seemed to be grounded in reality. Case in point: If some guy approached me in a coffee shop and assumed the seat across from me, before proceeding out of the blue to ask me a personal and intimate question, I think I'd also be inclined to leave. On the flip side, you set up just enough of Declan's psyche to justify his confusion and urgency about the imperviousness of the girl to his magic. Of course as the story progresses, I'd expect to learn more about Declan and his father and this 'magic' that he has at his disposal. The comment that Karen Redburn makes in one of the other reviews about the quickness of Declan's mental jump to bloodlines, is a valid one I think, but not necessarily something I would change. I think that thought gave us readers insight into his mind and his almost complete preoccupation with this power. Relatable; if I had that kind of power, I probably wouldn't think of much else either.

Again, as I can't say the genre is likely to keep me up at night, I couldn't really offer any comparative criticism to similar work or literary handling of magic powers along side music and the modern world. In any case, it sounds like an original combination, so ignore my genre preference (maybe I'm just boring).

The real litmus test for me, however, is always the characters. If they feel real and believable, not contrived and exaggerated, then I tend to think the rest of the process will work itself out. People don't care about magic, or music, or poetry, or really any construct superfluous to pure and raw human existence: humans care about humanity. In my mind anyway, those things, while I love most of them dearly, are only mediums by which to communicate the incommunicable. Humans are the real beating heart of any music, poem, story, or fantasy, and so they should stay. Ok, now I might be getting carried away, sorry. I'm just a lowly frozen nobody who probably should have stayed in her little rabbit hole ruminating til well past groundhog day. Anyway, I think what I'm trying to say is, you done well, in my eyes anyhow, take that as you will, lol. I felt that your story to this point was very much centered on the humans within it. Though you wrote about magic, and music, and mocha v. espresso, the real crux of the piece was the people. Nicely done:)

Well, this is why I don't normally review stories. I can't help myself. I'm terribly tangential and I often have way too much time to think. Thanks for sharing this and I hope there's at least a little bit of constructive feedback for you in that mess up there. Maybe I'll come back and review part two sometime, if you'll have me back, that is.

Hailey

[Sarah Wilson]

Wow! I love how this teases you right away. There are so many queations about the mc's powers and nature and then you are about as curious as he is to find out about the girl. Its wonderfully worded and it mixes the details in with the action well. A lot oftimes when characters shift scenes there is a gap between them, but this flows well. I evwn like the conversation between the barista and the grumpy customer

[Emma]

I really enjoyed this, and that the 'magic' element was slowly introduced, the first couple of paragraph just describing the mundane town I thought were brilliant. Great description, particularly like the 'unaffected' to 'unaware' to 'immune', although I've got to say I didn't really like the image of the air 'crackling' and focus on the electric feeling, it just felt too fantastical and blatant magic but might just be me. Great character development with the dialogue, although him having honest responses to her rudeness either spoken or thoughts could be very funny. Hope you carry on sharing more stories.

[Karen Redburn]

I enjoyed this first chapter. You have built the mystery into it on two levels for me. First I want to understand Declan's "abilities" to heal with music, and secondly how the girl is immune, and what it might mean to the future of your story.

It is well written and easy to read. However, if I an offer one criticism, that may or may not be of value, I would say Declan's internal dialogue regarding the reasons for her immunity was a bit much. Would he really be thinking about entire blood lines being immune so quickly in the story? Just something that threw me a little, take it for what it's worth.

This is a good story and I'll be back to read the next chapter. Cheers!

[Yari Garcia]

This is incredibly good. The story is interesting, everything flowed nicely, and you added touches of the senses in all the right places.

I enjoyed how much characterization you were able to add in such brief time, with such brief dialogue. You did an amazing job.

Only typo I noticed, paragraph 4 says "walked passed" instead of "walked past." Otherwise, everything was excellent. I'll be looking out for more writing from you!

Yari

[Alexa Apothic Red]

So, this is pretty good.. it's very descriptive, flowing action and sequences which I imagine would match the music in the scene (I imagined it like an Indy/foreign film). Her character was described fully while his was not quite introduced.. and maybe you intend to do a deeper characterization for him later.. but withbit jumping right into action I was left wondering the basic details about him. Also the references to the father were out of place and again I wondered what that was about. A few things to be proofread/corrected.. I loved how the scene of all the people's' predicaments becoming solved came to life. It was very uplifting. I wanted to learn more about them though. I wanted to see more descriptors for them.. though they did proportionately seem minimized against the portrayal of the girl.. and so maybe the other folks' minimal role was quite appropriate. I loved her personality-her little quips back to him. I also loved the part about living books and mocking society's addiction to their phones. I am interested to find out what happens next and what the meaning is behind the mystery and magic powers. Great work!

[therealtadkent]

Absolutely wonderful review, thank you! In the passage I'm submitting today you'l get to see a little of how he looks. It was omitted for a reason. Also, you caught on to the minimization perfectly. While what he does is important, the focus is the girl. Also we'll get to analyze what he does and get to enjoy it later. Anything you're curious about (with Declan) will be seen through someone else's eyes, as I want the reader to see him how she sees him. How he sees himself and how the third person sees him is a bit of a twist.

[olympiuslu]

I love the idea behind this story! You really know how to engage the reader as I cannot wait to read more and to see where it goes, keep writing!
However, be careful and read back through what you have written as I noticed a few grammatical errors. Apart from that, good job!

[therealtadkent]

Thank you! I'm glad you liked it.
Also, this is more of a free-from with no editing really involved. When I put it all together I'll have it edited as a whole.

[olympiuslu]

Fair enough, I'm looking forward to see the story progress!