What Could Go Wrong?

Glimpses of Magic

Joan Nunez ~

Age 10

Dante Redgrave lives in California Heights, and he’s half-French, half-American. He gets his French side from his dad, Sparda (that’s a French name). He’s a war hero. Click! Click! As Dante wakes up, his mother Eva is watching him wake up.

“Rise and shine, Sleepybones,” she says cheerfully to him. Dante wakes up and looks at himself in the bathroom mirror. He has white hair (it’s a French hybrid thing). His father had the same hair color. Then, he puts on his clothes—yellowish pants, a red hoodie, a jean jacket, and then he puts on his black Converse. He meets his friend AK, which stands for Akuma Kiriasso, a famous Japanese warrior in 1479. Soooooooooooo, on the bus Dante meets Laura for the first time, and Dante is crushing HARD on Laura. She asks, “Is this seat taken?” Dante says no and lets her sit next to him on the bus. Then, the bus stopped at California Heights Junior High.

“Ugh, this place is like a prison but with kids,” says a complaining and discouraged AK. They see Laura go to her friends, Trish and Tron. “Hey, there’s a back-to-school dance on Friday, maybe you can invite her to the dance!” AK tells Dante.

“Alright, I just need her email, and I’m good.”

“I meant in person. If you ask in an email, she’ll think it’s a joke and spam you, so you HAVE to ASK her in person.”

“OK,” Dante says as they enter homeroom.

“Dude, you have the same homeroom with Laura . . . coincidence?” AK whispers to Dante as they sit in the middle row together. “Look, she’s sitting in front of you!” whispers AK. Dante looks at Morrigan, the school’s popularity queen, and she’s dating Wade Wilson AKA the Deadpool.

“Really AK? You think some scary nickname is going to scare me? Oooh look at me, I’m the ‘Deadpool.’” Then, he accidentally bumps into Wade Wilson, the “DEADPOOL,” the star quarterback, and the “King Jock” of the school.

“You got something to say to me, fresh meat?” says an angry Wade Wilson.

Dante takes a big gulp, “Uhhhhhhh . . . no.”

“If I catch you talkin trash about me again, you’re DEAD,” he says silently

crossing his neck with his finger, and then he grabs his books and goes to biology with his best friend Strider. Dante checks his schedule and goes to English, and Laura is there too, but AK has a different schedule so that meant Dante was on his own from here on out. In social studies, AK and Dante meet again, so they can discuss who they’ll invite to the dance

“Maybe I’ll take Hysen-Ko to the dance,” says a moody AK.

“Hey dude, Stephen just asked Mia to the dance, and Steve asked Jill to the dance too, not many options left, dude.”

“There has to be another way”

“Sometimes I have to face the music. The worst she can say is ‘no’ right? Fine, I’ll TRY to ask her, but if she says no I’m pinning it on you, dude.”

“I’ll take that bet,” says a confident AK. When Dante goes to his locker, he sees Laura across the hallway.

Then, he musters up the little courage he has and says to himself, “Let’s get this over with, AND if she says no, I can finally get it over with.” Then, as he gets close to Laura, he takes a big gulp and then asks Laura if she wants to go to the dance with him.

She says, “Sure, I’m down,” and when she heads to science, she winks at him and walks into the classroom. Then, Dante goes to math with Mr. Wesly. After math, lunch comes, and then after lunch, comes free period. Laura was there alone because Jill and Mia were in Algebra, and Laura was at her locker that was next to Dante’s. He goes to ask her what’s wrong, and she says that she is just alone because Jill and Mia have chemistry (and NOT the romantic kind). Then, Dante asks if she wants to hang out with Dante after school at Dave’s Diner. She says “Sure, guess it couldn’t hurt.”

Later, at Dave’s Diner: “There you are, Dante. I almost bailed since you took so long.”

“Sorry, I had to help my mom decide where to put one of my dad’s old paintings he bought in France.”

“That sounds cool.”

“Yeah, it’s not as glamorous as you’d think it would be.”

Then, the waiter asks, “Can I get you lovebirds anything?”

“What! We’re not lovebirds.”

“OK,” says the waiter, and then he asks for our order. Dante and Laura will have two chocolate milkshakes and chicken nuggets and fries and the monsterzilla quesadilla and some devil tacos. When the waiter gets back, he brings exactly what they ordered. Then, the waiter goes for his one hour break. When the waiter is gone . . . “Maybe we should,” then Laura stops Dante, “kiss.”

Then, that’s exactly what they do. Meanwhile, in the kitchen: “You owe me five bucks, Glen.”

“Awwww fine. See? I told you they were lovebirds.” Dante and Laura left holding hands, but then when Dante walks Laura home, she has to tell him something.

“Dante, I have to tell you something.”

“What?” says Dante.

“I’m going to Canada.”

“WHAT,” says Dante.

“It’ll only be until next month. I’m going to trace my Canadian roots,” says Laura.

“But, we just started dating,” replies Dante.

“Please, you can live without me for a month,” replies Laura, “Then, when I get back, we can keep dating.”

“OK,” says a discouraged Dante. As Laura walks to her house, she winks at him.

Will Dante be able to live without Laura for a month?

To be continued . . .

After a week, Dante desperately gets into fights with the football star quarterback Wade Wilson. He takes out all his anger at him then, which just made Wade make Dante’s life miserable, but Dante has barely tapped into his burning inferno that is inside of him . . . it turned him into something . . . now, he gets so tired when he fights Wade. He takes an after-school nap that lasts until the next day to use his power again.

But then, that’s when Morrigan started to notice Dante and started flirting with him. After a while, Morrigan broke up with Wade for Dante, but Dante knew that when Laura came back she would be livid at him for dating Morrigan behind her back, but it was worth it. So then, in the last week before Laura came back, Dante broke up with Morrigan, so she dated Strider, Wade’s friend, (publicly) to make Wade jealous, and it worked, and they are now dating like nothing happened.

Once Laura finally came back, they hung out at a bench at the California Heights park. Then, they called each other to say they love each other. After that, both of them went to bed. The next day, Dante and Laura were walking in the hallway, holding hands. After the bell rang, they had to go to separate homerooms. Before they went to homeroom, Laura winked at him just like she winked at him when he asked her to prom.

A few months have passed, and the prom is only two days away. People 62

are getting desperate. Luckily, Dante already has a date, and the theme is the Handsome Devil Dance. His brother, Vergil, found out and started teasing him, but then got tired and started playing Final Fantasy. When he got to the dance, he didn’t see Laura anywhere, but then when he walked outside the door to the gym, he saw Laura crying on a bench. Dante asked what happened and Laura said that her mom died in a car crash when she was driving back home from work. Dante, Vergil, and his mom, Eva, went to the funeral, and at the end of the ceremony, Dante ran into Laura who was sadly staring at her mother’s grave. Then, Dante says, “I’m sorry for your loss.”

Laura screams. “How do you know how I feel? Your dad died for his country, but my mother didn’t want to die!!”

Then, Laura hugs Dante, crying, “I’m sorry.”

Dante says, “It’s OK,” and they gave each other a comforting smile.

A few weeks have passed, and now Vergil is pranking Dante now more than ever. Then, Dante went to tell his mom, who is reading a French novel on the couch. “Yes, Honey?” She asked.

“Vergil pranked me!” says Dante.

“Vergil, no GTA for the rest of the week, and apologize to your brother or you’re grounded!”

“OK. Uhhhh, Mom, I’m going to the park with Laura.” *Vergil makes kissy face sounds at Dante* “Vergil, stop, you’ve already got yourself in enough trouble for one day.” Then, at the park, Dante sees AK. They do their secret handshake and hug.

“Hey, man, I haven’t seen you since Laura’s mom’s funeral.”

“Sorry, dude. I had to be there for Laura because she’s still in the grieving phase of the process.”

“OK, that’s cool, bro.”

“Soooo, how’s Hysen-Ko?”

“Ohh . . . after the dance, we started dating. In fact, she’s really nice when you get to know her personally.”

To be continued . . .