Creative+writing-fountain+of+youth+story



Irony of Youth By Ian Snider It was a sunny day, clouds were hanging lazily in the sky, and the gentle sea breeze caressed the beach as a mother would to soothe an upset child. I thought of the past three days, hoping that today would prove more peaceful than the others. The hammock was comfortable, the sunlight warm. Not much could spoil my time of relaxation, but //I// wasn't prepared for what happened next.

"This isn’t what I asked for!” exclaimed the upset customer. "My sincerest apologies" replied his frazzled waiter, "I’ll be right back with what you did order" as the waiter scurried away, the customer got up and left discreetly, remembering a previous engagement.

As he approached the beach, he noticed an unusual amount of activity and excitement intermingled with a touch of underlying fear and panic. As he continued forward, large groups of people talking in hurried and hushed voices eyed him suspiciously, as if he was a wanted criminal that was deemed to dangerous to call attention to. He spotted two uniformed officers talking calmly to a woman who looked panic-stricken. As he walked over to ask what had happened, the panicked woman pointed at him and one of the officers walked briskly towards him. Upon reaching him, the officer asked him to come back to the woman with him, to which the man agreed, intrigued in an inexplicable manner. The woman had apparently seen another, who looked like the customer from the restaurant, make off with a elderly lady, only to come back with a girl in her early teens, who seemed to thank him, and run off. This had the police worried, as this was the seventh time that this particular incident had happened that month, but with no report from the families of the elderly on their disappearance. The customer was taken in for questioning, but as they had no evidence of him being involved in the disappearances, they had to let him go. He walked out with a subtle smirk on his face.

The panicked shrieking of a woman in her mid-thirties slices through the calm oceanic breeze, making me jump up out of the hammock, knocking over a side table that had a root beer and a book on it, to the tiled patio. Looking over the low wall of the patio, he saw his soon-to-be business partner had made another deal, but a beach-goer had spotted the transaction, causing a bit of a ruckus. Great, I thought, so much for subtlety.

A persistent buzzing and vibrating awoke the man from the restaurant. “Xavier? Is that you?” he asked, still half asleep. “Yes” I replied, annoyed by the man’s laziness. “I’ve been calling intermittently for the past hour; I was beginning to think that you had dropped your cell in a pond” “You would be asleep too, if the police interrogated you for hours over a transaction that you did. Convincing them that I knew nothing and that I wasn’t involved was mentally fatiguing.” “Point taken; I called because I think it’s about time that you took me to this puddle of yours, I’m a busy man, and don’t have much time to wait for a egocentric practitioner of “magic”. Meet me at my room, we’ll discuss your terms and the costs there, I don’t trust cell lines.” “Okay, which-“ “My room is number 196, I expect you to be here within a half-hour” “But….what do I-“. The man never finished, as Xavier had hung up.

At the hotel, the man walked cautiously towards room 196. When he arrived, he rang the doorbell, and waited. After a minute had passed, he moved forward, to ring the bell again, only to be stopped by a man wearing dark clothes that blended in with the shadows. “Are you looking for someone?” asked dark clothed stranger “Yes, I’m looking for a man that goes by the name Xavier. He had said that his room was number 196, but he appears to be out at the moment. If you happen to see him, could you-“ “It’s me; I gave you the wrong room number to avoid surveillance if you tipped off the authorities. It’s just a standard precaution for someone of my profession.” “Makes sense, I’ve taken those precautions in the past myself, but with more dangerous clientele.” “Then you don’t truly know how dangerous I am. But that’s for a different discussion. It’s about time we start on our way, unless, of course, you wish to delay my busy schedule…..” “Not at all, let’s be on our way.” The trip through the jungle was uneventful for the most part, save for a few sightings of large reptiles which we assumed to be crocodiles and alligators. We arrived at a campsite in the early evening, at the centre of it, a small, perfectly round patch of dead vegetation, with a very small pond, almost a puddle in the middle. “Surely this isn’t the legendary fountain of youth” I asked dubiously “The one and only,” replied my guide “due to it’s name, this “fountain” is often seen as just a puddle surrounded by dead grass. Although, if you look closely, you will be able to see that the grass is not dead, only brittle from its age.” “I see” Without warning, I pulled a pistol with a silencer on it and pointed it at my guides’ head. “Have a drink, I don’t entirely trust your story, but if it is the ‘fountain’ of youth, you should have not objection to having some” “If that’s the way you feel, then sure, but the gun is unnecessary.” As my guide drank from the puddle, his facial features, which had been softened with age, began to sharpen, and his numerous insect bites fro the trip disappeared. “There, are you satisfied now?” “We shall wait until morning, if you are still alive, I will be convinced. Until then, farewell” As Xavier walked off, the guide thought about him; he though about different ways to kill a devil. His fifteen-hundred year old brain had recognized him the moment he saw Xavier. He knew that he would live through the night, a fact Xavier seemed unsure of. As he though, he remembered the easiest way to kill a devil, and a smile crept slowly to his lips. The Next morning, I drank from the puddle of youth, and immediately blacked out. I woke up of the ground, with my gun pointed directly at my face. “So, you woke up, what a surprise! I thought the iron would have killed you.” “Iron? What does iron have to do with this? “You have an allergy to high concentrations of Iron. It comes racially to your kind, devil.” “Devil? You mean those monsters from fantasy games? You can’t be serious.” “I’ve never been more serious about anything during my life. I’m sorry to say, but I have to kill you before you cause any trouble. The last time a devil was kept alive, he started a world war, and I just cant take any chances that you might do something worse. Goodbye, Xavier.” My guide then proceeded to splash my face with water, and then everything went black.