Cupid's Kiss

Daphne had never been one to buy into all the Valentine’s Day craze. To her it was just another day and if you were lucky, you may get some chocolates. However, this year, something piqued her interest. Everyone at school had been going on about the new viral challenge. The aptly named Cupid’s Kiss Challenge. This wasn’t just any game though, this was a paranormal one. Daphne loved reading about the supernatural and has even played a game or two with no consequences. So, upon hearing about the Cupid’s Kiss Challenge, Daphne was intrigued.

Although only in high school and still young, Daphne hadn’t really had much luck in love. She had gone on a few dates and had a short-term relationship, but she never really felt like anyone was really into her. Daphne didn’t mind being single as she had a great group of friends, but she did have that longing to connect with someone deeper than on a platonic level.

A few weeks ago, at lunch, Daphne’s friend Kim started going on about the Cupid’s Kiss Challenge. Saying how she saw so many people do it online with positive results. She even swore that the only reason that their fellow classmate Dani got a new boyfriend was because she successfully completed the challenge. Daphne at first just laughed at it, but then curiosity got the better of her and she fell down the rabbit hole. Before she knew it, Daphne had spent over two hours watching videos on the Cupid’s Kiss Challenge. Teenagers and even adults were doing the ritual and claiming they got positive results. Even a few producing “evidence” that the day after they completed the challenge they were bombarded with matches and messages on a dating app. An app these people claimed had given them no concrete results before.

Daphne being a fan if the paranormal and loving a good challenge, decided she wanted to try it out. Afterall, she had played supernatural games riskier than this with nothing bad ever happening and Daphne was pretty sure absolutely nothing would come from playing Cupid’s Kiss. She knew not to believe everything you see on the internet. Any testimony presented in a fifteen second video was probably not to be trusted.

Looking at the rules, nothing was out of the ordinary for a game like this. You needed one participant, two red and one pink votive candle, a lighter or match, red lipstick, a decorative heart (anything will do but a paper cutout is suggested), a mirror (preferably a wall mirror) and the purest intention to be irresistible to love. The last part made Daphne chuckle, “What does that even mean?” she thought. The ritual had to be performed between midnight and 3:00 a.m. and only during the month of January through February 13th. If you perform this ritual outside this timeframe apparently the results will be disastrous.

Daphne decided that this Friday night she would try it. She already had everything she needed, and it was still five days out from Valentine’s Day. She opted not to tell anyone that she was going to give this challenge a go. For one, it probably was a joke, two if it did work, she didn’t want people knowing that her newfound luck in love was because of a ritual and three Daphne knew if she told Kim, she would insist on being there and one of the rules was this had to be done alone or else. If Daphne was going to do this, she was going to do this right.

It was finally Friday. Daphne felt her school day just drag. She was both nervous and excited for the Cupid’s Kiss Challenge. Daphne decided at midnight she would start. Once home from school, Daphne quickly ran upstairs barely acknowledging her mother. She wanted to make sure all her homework was done, so that she had absolutely nothing else on her mind this weekend. Afterall, she had to have “the purest intention to be irresistible to love” and how could she do that knowing she had a history paper to finish. Once again Daphne laughed at that part. She thought it was sort of ironic to have pure intent while performing a ritual to make you lucky in love.

Before she knew it, it was 11:50 p.m. Daphne’s history paper had taken her longer to finish than she anticipated. She hurriedly put her schoolbooks away and got together everything she needed for Cupid’s Kiss. Daphne felt both a knot of anxiety in her stomach and an overwhelming jolt of energy. She knew this was just something stupid, but there is that slight element of danger to it that both excited and terrified her.

Daphne grabbed her phone and pulled up the rules for the game. It was now 12:01 a.m., she could officially proceed. She sat down in front of her wall length mirror. The ritual didn’t specify whether you had to sit or stand, just that you had to be in front of a mirror. The three candles had to be placed directly in front of the mirror. The two red candles on the end and the pink one in the middle. You then needed to put the red lipstick on your lips. After that using the lipstick you had to draw a heart with an arrow through it on the mirror. After this you had to light the candles in a specific order. The pink one first, the red to the left and then the red on the right.

The participant now must take their decorative heart and hold it over their chest, close their eyes and say the following incantation four times. “Oh Cupid, oh Cupid come to me. Help me find love and make me irresistible to thee.” Once you’ve recited everything you need to kiss the mirror while keeping your eyes closed and your symbolic heart against your chest. Then you bid Cupid thank you and farewell. Fully ending the ritual by blowing out the candles in the opposite order you lit them. Once all extinguished you can open your eyes. If you look into the mirror and only see your reflection than either Cupid has chosen to grant your wish for love, or they have chosen to ignore you. Either way you must place whatever you used as your heart under your pillow as you sleep tonight and clean the lipstick off the mirror the next day. If successful one will begin to feel confident and beautiful. Secret admirers will come out of the blue and you will easily know which one is your perfect match. If Cupid didn’t answer your call, nothing will change. Just go on with life and do not attempt this ritual again for one full year. If you look in the mirror and you see anything else besides your reflection, something went wrong. You need to immediately smear the lipstick all over blocking whatever you see with it and you then you must rip up your heart and burn the pieces, burying them somewhere outside. Do not enter that room again until daylight and always proceed with caution when going into that room. Be cautious with love, it’s a dangerous territory for you.

Daphne put on the lipstick, drew the heart with the arrow and lit the candles in the correct order. She laughed a little, since at this very moment her stomach felt like it had little cupids flying around in it. Even though she didn’t have high hopes for results, that tiny chance it could work or go bad made Daphne jittery. She slowly closed her eyes and recited “Oh Cupid, oh Cupid come to me. Help me find love and make me irresistible to thee” four times. Daphne carefully leaned over and kissed the mirror making sure not to lean into the lit candles. She then blew each one out.

Daphne hesitated before opening her eyes. What if she saw something or someone besides herself in the mirror? Would she really be cursed in love for the rest of her life? Or worse did she summon some monster who will torture her for the rest of her days? Daphne couldn’t keep her eyes closed forever, so she finally opened them. Not surprisingly all the only thing that was looking back at her in the mirror was her own reflection. It was a perfectly normal one too. Not some scary mirror person doppelganger, just her. She waived at herself, stuck her tongue, and laughed. She felt kind of silly now. However, Daphne just shrugged her shoulders and got up. She took her paper heart and placed it under her pillow and went to bed.

Just as she figured nothing special happened over the next few days. Valentine’s Day came and went with no new love matches in sight. Daphne was a bit relieved, she didn’t really want to find love because of some magic ritual. Although nothing odd happened during the Cupid’s Kiss Ritual and she wasn’t suddenly bombarded with declarations of love, Daphne couldn’t shake an odd feeling she would sometimes get when in her bedroom. Everyone once and while she swore, she could see something in mirror watching her from the corner of her eye. Yet, when she looked nothing was ever there. Daphne chalked it up to her being a little uneasy from the ritual. Although nothing happened, she still didn’t love the idea that she performed an occult game in her bedroom.

This concerned feeling continued over the next few months. Daphne took to burning sage and palo santo on a regular basis in her room. No matter what she did, she kept seeing something in the mirror, yet there was nothing there. Daphne even stood in front of it one night and demanded the entity in the mirror reveal itself, but of course nothing happened other than Daphne feeling like a fool for giving into her fears and shouting at a mirror.

It had been exactly six months since Daphne performed the Cupid’s Kiss Ritual. That night she was particularly paranoid about the shadow or entity in the mirror. She swore she had seen it at least 3 times that evening. So once again she stood in front of the mirror and yelled at it. Just like every other time all she saw was her angry faced reflected back at her. Daphne grabbed some sage and smudged around the mirror, although this didn’t seem change anything it gave her some piece of mind before sleep.

Daphne went to bed very annoyed; six months of paranoia was enough. She made a promise to herself that starting tomorrow she would just forget about it. It was a new day, and she was starting it off right. Daphne tossed and turned, she kept having strange dreams all night. A shadowy figure kept taunting her. Calling her name, but when she would turn to look all, she would see is a black mist quickly floating out of sight. She screamed “I hate you! I don’t want you!” at it repeatedly.

The next morning Daphne woke up, she was groggy. Her sleep was anything but peaceful. She got up, made her bed, and then saw it. No quick moving shadow or entity just words written in red lipstick on her mirror. “You said hi first. You wanted to be irresistible and now you are. I will forever admire you from here.” Daphne nearly choked. At first, she figured this was a prank but then she remembered she never told anyone about the ritual. She then decided she was still dreaming, but quickly realized she wasn’t when digging her nails into her arm actually hurt. Daphne couldn’t figure out what happened. She vividly remembered doing to ritual correctly and nothing out of the ordinary happening. So how could she end up with this result? Then it came back, Daphne recalled that right after she opened her eyes, she waived at what she thought was just her reflection. She said “hi”. Then Daphne felt a knot tighten in her stomach as she remembered the last line on the ritual’s instructions “Love is dangerous, be careful what you wish for. Cupid only puts the call out there, they do not see who answers it.”