War No More

Encapsulated

Michael is a 19-yr-old college student. He’s a jovial virgin with more integrity than most young men his age. Although he has already met a couple new friends in class, he and his family are new to the neighborhood. He arrives home—just in time to witness a clock on the wall tick ‘five-eighteen’. Though the home is only semi-furnished, everything is in order. This allows a hand-written note on the counter to be noticeable as it seems to be begging for investigation. Michael begins reading.

“We went to visit Aunt Marlow and your new cousin. …Left in a bit of a hurry. …Should be home on Sunday. Do, enjoy the weekend without the girls. I know how they aggravate you sometimes. Have fun. You may even want to go fishing at the new lake. Be safe. Love you.”

The message is received absent-mindedly as Michael escapes to his room, throws his backpack down and drops to his bed.

“I can’t remember the last time I’d been afforded the opportunity to enjoy a nap.” he admits.

Michael's a simple guy with simple desires. A nap is the only thing he wants. As he begins to doze off, the sound of the doorbell awakens him. Michael scarfs under his breath while approaching the front entrance. Before he opens it, he wipes his eyes to wake up and scours through the peeping hole. Through it stands Clare. She’s a 19-yr old brunette who is also studying to earn her Bachelor of Arts in history. She’s stands about 5’-5” tall. She slender and hosts long, straight hair. Her face is free from any blemishes. …a pretty gal’. She’s wearing a gray t-shirt and a pair of white active-wear shorts. Her eyes are a stunning combination of green hazel and ice blue. She’s waiting (smiling sheepishly) on the steps with her backpack over one shoulder and her history notebook clasped in one hand. He’d forgotten that he pre-arranged to study with her on this date. Michael had scheduled it so his parents (and the girls) would also be there to meet Clare. He would never invite a young lady over with intent to defile her. As he swings the door open, he fails to hide evidence that he’d just woken up.

“Michael! I’m sorry. Did I wake you up?” she expresses genuinely.

She continues before Michael could gesture everything is OK.

“I should’ve called first. I’ll go. I’m so sorry for waking you!”

“No, no! Please, Clare, stay. It’s cool. I just… I was so happy about my sisters being away with my parents this weekend, I forgot about our study time. It’s my fought. Please, come in. I’ll grab my book bag and we can get started.”

He gestures for her to come inside as she starts back down the steps. A woman of simplified beauty enters gleefully because she’d been looking forward to ‘one-on-one’ attention with Michael. In class, his enthusiasm for absorbing the materials being taught has impressed Clare from the beginning. Not only that, but she’d catch him eye-balling her from a distance. It was as though he knew something that she did not know yet. …Something he wanted to tell her. None-the-less, it was flattering to Clare. Their friendship was the product of a neutral curiosity. Her appreciation of him was no different than any other woman who would prefer to befriend an admirer.

As Clare kicked off her shoes on the tile entry-way, she accomplishes this in a way that shifting her own energy from that yucky feeling of imposing. The two step into the large living room.

“Let me grab my things. I’ll be right back.” he ensures her as he plans to take a couple minutes to freshen up a bit too.

As Clare looks around, she’s flabbergasted. The walls have hand-crafted inlays. The den is carpeted with a thick, golden fluff that creates the feeling you’re walking on a behemoth sheep. The couch and love seats are arranged around a flat screen TV. It has infinity edges that make it hard to cypher how it’s mounted. It towers over a cabinet of stained cherry wood. Off of the den are the closed doors of Michael’s father’s office. Directly in front of the door (through the den) lay black tile of the kitchen. Separating the den and the kitchen is a bar. Everything is full-sized. It’s masterful how the different areas are spread out as a museum’s interior. Three bar lights dangling down from the ceiling are perfectly situated.

“This entire space is where décor meets ingenuity.”

Clare is right. This design is simple, yet not overdone. It’s eloquent and luxurious while not being pompous or obnoxious.

“I’m sorry it took so long. Here we go! We can work on this table. Oh! I forgot to feed my bird. I’ll It won’t take me long. I’ll be right back. I promise.”

As he makes his way up the staircase again, he remembers something else. A gentleman offers his guest something to drink.

“Help yourself to anything in the fridge, or a drink of water. Please, make yourself at home.” he insists as he disappears from her view.

Clare drops her bag on one of the sofas and gazes around. Every direction had something worthy of conversation. Her house is pleasant, but this place is like the home of a king. Most of the furnishings seem unused. She walks into the kitchen, wanting for a glass of water. As her feet contact the tile, she shivers. The chill of Italian marble is relentless. Clare begins pondering to herself.

“I wonder what it would be like to live here.” she confesses out loud.

She opens up a few cabinets and is once again greeted by laps of luxury. Fine China and crystal wine glasses stare back at her from behind stained glass. In another cabinet, she finds two plastic cups, a package of paper plates and some cheap silverware. It seems odd for plastic-ware to be here. Maybe this family is new to this lifestyle. It would make sense because the convenience of paper plates is a hard connivance to cancel. Clare grabs one of the cups, shuts the cabinet and looks around to realize the stylized cabinetry is also holding the coffee mugs and the dishrags. After topping her cup off with ice cubes and water, she makes her way back to the table. The layout forces to experience the chill of Italian floor tiles and opts for scanting across them.

“There’s a stillness in this place. It’s peaceful.”

Little does she know; it’s not the styling she’s sensing. It’s purpose. She stops to observe and take it all in.

“This is really nice.” she internalizes while noticing how high the ceilings are above her head.

Everything on the floor is chrome or clean and place with calculation. There’s absolutely no evidence of dwelling in this home at all.

Michael returns with his backpack in tow. He’d wiped his face and brushed his teeth, or so it appears. Clare smiles at him as he stops at the bottom of the stairs. For Michael something about the way Clare is returning to the den set him off like a tuning fork. She has both of her hands clasped around her cup. Michael returns the smile and joins her on the way to the couch. The two sit down on the first sofa as the light brown leather crinkled under their combined weight.

“All right. What did you need help with?”

It's ‘eight-thirty’. The two are finishing with their studies.

“We’re just about done. You wanna’ take a break?” he asks.

She playfully answers him in a tone she believes a princess would respond.

“I (too) feel like a break is in order, Sire.”

As they journey to the kitchen for cup refills, Michael pulls a liter of lemonade from the fridge. He fills hers before filling his own. As she waited for Michael to stir the silence with his voice, he doesn’t. Instead, he looks over at her and admires her eyes. She turns and smiles at him before they walk together to sit at the bar.

“Michael, I have to ask. What do your parents do for a living? I mean… This is… amazing.”

“Clare. My parents are no longer employees. They don’t work.”

“Was it a settlement? Inheritance…?” she asks curiously.

Michael smiles and sets his cup down.

“Actually, you wouldn’t believe me if I swore to it, but I’ll try. Ok. For my eighteenth birthday, my dad gave me a fishing magnet.”

“A magnet?” she scoffs, squinting her eyes to understand.

“Not just any magnet. This is a magnet capable pulling things off the bottom of the ocean. With 2,200 pounds of force, any neodymium magnet becomes a treasure hunter. I mean… I’ve pulled fishing lures off muddy lake beds; and valuable jewelry from sandy beaches, but what I pulled up last year was astonishing.”

“Now I’m just curious. What kind of treasure did you pull up?”

“I pulled up an encapsulated promise. It’s a promise I still keep today.” he admits, almost emotional. “It was an old ammo-can.”

“You mean one of those kinds of cans that were used to carry ammunition?”

“That’s the kind. Inside it was 3 gold coins, 2 silver coins and a sealed jar that contained a mysterious, little, black book.” he describes with a sense of excitement in his throat.

“Wow! Those coins must’ve been worth a whole lot of money.”

“Actually; Clare, it wasn’t the coins that are continually causing me and my family fortune. It’s a promise. I believe it has something to do with what was inscribed inside the mysterious little black book.”

“Michael, you’re not making sense. How would text create a fortune?”

Although Michael remembers every line of the text, he looks at Clare and hesitates to speak them. He has a better idea.

“If you must know, I took pictures of its text. Would you like to read it for yourself?” he asks her, hesitantly.

“I wonder what war it’s from. Michael, I’d love to read it.”

He hesitates, but manages to convince himself that the text would not change the (growing) dynamic of their friendship. He retrieves the keepsake pictures and hands them to her.

“The mysterious little black book is still being analyzed by specialists.”

“Oh! I’m sure it is.” she replies with contentment on her gorgeous face.

“You’re not going to believe what you're about to read, but here it is.”

There are several photos handed to her in proper order. Clare starts scanning the first of them. The text is clear and she begin to read out loud.

“FORCED INTO CAMPAIGN, LET A MYSTICS’ LAST OATH BE FULFILLED VIA COSMIC RECOURSE. IF THIS WAR TEACHES YOUR ERA ANYTHING, IT’S THAT MURDEROUS SKIRMASHES AGAINST MEN WHO MISUNDERSTAND MEN PROFITS NEITHER MAN. ALL PAST WARS MUST BE YOUR INSTRUMENT TO EDUCATE OTHERS FOR RISING ABOVE WAR. THERE IS NO HATE IN THE ABSENSE OF ALL FEARS. ONLY LOVE RESIDES AND THE DESIRE TO UNDERSTAND SELF. UNIVERSAL CONSCIOUSNESS WITNESSES ALL INTENT. IT HONORS GOOD INTENT AND THE ISNESS FULFILLS.

TO YEE WHO HEARS THIS PLEA, THIS SILVER IS YOUR INCREASE. TO YEE WHO UNDERSTANDS THIS PLEA, THIS GOLD IS YOUR INCREASE. BUT ABOVE ALL, YEE WHO APLIES THE LESSONS OF THIS DAY THAT WAR SHALL NO-LONGER BE JUSTIFIED, THIS BLACK BOOKLET IS YOURS AND THIS PLEA SHALL BE MYSTERIOUS NO LONGER. LET IMEASURABLE INCREASE WRAP YOUR INTENT TO CHANGE THE WORLD. AS LONG AS YOU INTEND TO SPREAD THE IMPLEMENTATION OF WAR NO MORE, YEE SHALL INHEIRT INCREASE ALONG THOU ROUTE TO PLEASING UNTO HIMSELF AND HIS BEWEDDED, CLARE. AND SO IT IS.

– ASE' "

Clare sits silently at a loss for words. Michael understands her bewilderment and forces himself to break the awkward silence.

“I told you, you weren’t going to believe it.”

“Sounds like the time capsule is suggesting we date!” she answers, smiling ear to ear.