Page 2 of The Slug Crystal
He nods at Alina, who raises her cupcake at him like a toast.
Jake’s eyes land on the brass bowl and stay there. “We’re doing this, then?”
I nod. “We’re doing this.” I herd them to the living room, where I’ve set out three mismatched mugs for wine. No one wants to risk glass near an open flame.
Alina does the honors and pours from a bottle of Merlot with surgical steadiness, filling each mug to the brim. She hands mine over, her blue eyes crinkling at the corners, and settles cross-legged onto the rug. Jake sits beside her, careful not to crowd, arms resting on his knees. Looking a little out of place in the girl’s night type vibe of the evening, but he’s my second closest friend for nearly a decade, and I need him here.
“So,” Alina says, “what’s the plan? Do we chant? Do we do interpretive dance?”
I fetch the package and peel away the tape. Inside is the crystal, a cylinder shape, pale green, and cold, nestled in tissue paper stamped with tiny pentagrams and a single tiny triangle featuring a snail, which I believe is the symbol for the website. There’s a black, glossy card with “Vermis Transformo” in Gothic font, and a set of instructions printed in Comic Sans, which somewhat ruins the ominous vibe. “To activate: Place the subject’s image in proximity. Light three black candles. Recite the incantation below, visualizing the desired transformation. Dispose of remains in a compostable fashion. WARNING: Unintended results are possible. Customer assumes all risk.”
I light the candles I bought earlier, one by one, each with its own little eruption of smoke as the wick ignites. The flames wobble and settle, casting flickering shadows across Jake and Alina’s faces.
I pass the crystal to Alina, who sniffs it, then holds it up to her eye. “It’s pretty,” she says, “but if it turns our fingers green, you owe me a manicure.”
She passes it to Jake. His hands are big and careful, the kind of hands that could crush the crystal but don’t. He rolls it between his palms, as if testing the weight of it. “What’s the incantation?”
I hold up the card, clearing my throat. “By shell and slime, I bind your heart in time. What once was warm and vibrant is now cold and slow. Crawl away and let new roots grow. Vermis Transformo. It is spoken, so it will be.”
There’s a pause, like the air itself is waiting to see if I’m serious. Alina raises her eyebrows, daring me to break. Jake’s mouth tugs at the edge, not quite a smile, but it’s close.
I square my shoulder and pick up a photo from the bowl. It’s a candid, our teeth bared in giant smiles, both of us squinting into the sun. For a second, the memory is sharp and bright and almost enough to make me stop. But then I remember the breakup, the texts, the hollow feeling of never being enough, and the urge to burn it all comes roaring back.
“Ready?” I ask.
Alina nods, face solemn but shining with the thrill of the ridiculous. Jake nods, too, and I notice the pulse in his neck jump.
I hold the photo close to a candle. “By shell and slime, I bind your heart in time.”
Alina echoes me, her voice clear and theatrical: “By shell and slime, I bind your heart in time.”
Jake says nothing for a beat, then says, “By shell and slime, I bind your heart in time.” It sounds like a dare or a promise.
“What once was warm and vibrant is now cold and slow,” I continue. The air is thick with burnt sage and melting wax and something else, fear maybe, or hope.
Alina repeats, softer this time, “What once was warm and vibrant is now cold and slow.”
Jake echoes, “What once was warm and vibrant is now cold and slow.”
“Crawl away and let new roots grow,” I say, and the edge in my voice surprises me.
Alina says, “Crawl away and let new roots grow.”
Jake’s voice catches, but he finishes his sentence before clearing his throat. “Crawl away and let new roots grow.”
I look at the card, then at the photo, then at my two friends. The moment feels huge, like we’re standing on the edge of something real and irreversible.
“Vermis Transformo. It is spoken, so it will be,” I say, and the last word hangs in the air.
Alina, barely containing a laugh, half-sings the last few words. “Vermis Transformo. It is spoken, so it will be.”
Jake repeats, “Vermis Transformo. It is spoken, so it will be.” His eyes meet mine, brown, steady, and concerned, and I have to look away.
The candlelight flickers. The crystal in Jake’s hand glows, just for a second. It flares with a pale green shimmer, like something alive. We all see it, but no one says anything.
I drop the photo into the brass bowl. The edges catch first, curling black, then the whole image wrinkles and dissolves into ash. For a moment, it almost looks like the face in the photo is melting, pulling into itself, vanishing.
I can’t breathe.
