NOTE: This is only a first draft.

Chapter 5

Father McKenzie Pays a Visit

 

Walking in the back door that let directly into the kitchen, the screen door slammed shut behind him as Maxwell halted to a stop. Anna, his mother, was sitting at the small, round, Formica kitchen table having a cup of coffee with a stranger. A plate of homemade chocolate chip peanut butter cookies rested on a plate in the center of the table.

“Uh . . .” Maxwell said.

“Oh, Maxy darling. You have a visitor,” Anna said smiling, offering him another chair.

“I do?” Maxwell said as he came to stand behind the chair, preferring not to sit at that moment. “I don’t believe we have met, have we, Mr. . . . ?”

“McKenzie, John McKenzie,” the man said standing up and offering his right hand to Maxwell. He had a slight Irish accent.

Maxwell tentatively stretched out his arm and shook the man’s hand. Mr. McKenzie shook Maxwell’s hand firmly and then smiled as their hands returned to their sides. He sat back down and took a sip of his hot tea as he looked at Maxwell over the rim of the cup. He pushed his round glasses back up his long, straight nose.

Anna jumped in excitedly, “John . . . umm, Mr. McKenzie was just telling me about an exciting opportunity.”

“Oh,” Maxwell said as he pulled out his chair, sat down, and grabbed a cookie from the pile. He took a bite and chewed as he stared at the stranger.

Mr. McKenzie smiled at him.

“What kind of opportunity for you?” Maxwell asked his mother. He wiped away some crumbs from his lips with the back of his hand.

“Oh, not for me. It’s for you.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you.” Mr. McKenzie placed the cup of tea on a saucer and looking directly at Maxwell.

“Why?”

“Why, what?”

“Why are you offering me anything? My grades are just mediocre and I’m not in any clubs or sports.”

“Those things don’t matter to me.” Mr. McKenzie dismissed the notion with a wave of his arm.

“Then why would you want to offer me anything?” He took the last bite of his cookie and chewed quietly.

“We have our reasons.”

“What reasons?” Maxwell asked, puzzled, reaching for another cookie.

Mr. McKenzie looked at Anna and his eyes returned to Maxwell. “Let’s just say that you did something important yesterday and we would like to offer you a position in a very special school.”

Anna clutched her hands at her chest and smiled proudly at Maxwell.

Maxwell just stared at the stranger in his house, sitting at his kitchen table, with his mom smiling at him. The second cookie hovered in front of his open mouth. Is he talking about the silver hammer and that shadow creature? Maxwell thought. Is this man dangerous? Are our lives in danger? Maxwell put the cookie down on the table in front of him and looked around the kitchen for the nearest escape route.

Mr. McKenzie noted Maxwell’s eyes darting around the room, like that of a caged animal. Realizing that he was making the boy nervous, he decided to unzip his jacket, which he had neglected to take off when he entered the house. He had purposely zipped it up to his neck to hide what was underneath. His right hand reached up to the zipper and then slowly pulled it down.

Maxwell stared at the priest’s collar under the man’s jacket and he instantly relaxed.

Father McKenzie said, “Maxwell, I am here to offer you a full-ride scholarship at our school for talented youth. We believe that you would fit in perfectly with our other students and would excel at everything we have to offer. Now, the school is not near here, in fact, it isn’t even in this dimension.”

“Wha . . . wha . . . huh?” Maxwell stammered. He looked at his mom. Anna kept smiling, looking back and forth between the priest and her son.

“Don’t worry about you mother,” Father McKenzie said, “I cast a forget spell on her when I arrived and she won’t remember most of what we talk about here.”

“A spell?” This was getting to be a little much. Maxwell felt a little faint and rested his head upon both of his hands, his elbows on the table.

“Yes, I said a spell,” Father McKenzie confirmed. “Magic is real.”

Maxwell’s head snapped up. “I knew it! No one ever believed me!”

“Only those that still believe in magic after they hit puberty are ones that can help us,” Father McKenzie said after taking another sip of tea. “Most young adults let that part of their childhood slip away as they grow older. Only a few continue to believe in all of the wondrous creatures they believed in as a child. These are the ones that can help us. And, Maxwell, you are one of those that still believes. And, apparently, your belief is stronger than most. In fact, it’s the strongest we have ever measured.”

“Measured?” Maxwell asked with raised eyebrows, picking up the cookie in front of him and taking a bite. “How did you measure me?”

“Magic, remember,” Father McKenzie said, winking at the boy.

Maxwell laughed and exclaimed, “Oh, yeah,” while cookie crumbs tumbled out of his mouth onto the table.

Anna continued to smile at both Maxwell and Father McKenzie.

“So, how about it, Maxwell? Would you like to go to a place that’ll teach you how to use magic? There’s so much you could learn there, and I think that you would really love it and excel there. Every student we have, and there are over one thousand, loves the Crabalocker Order of Multidimensional Magical Arsenal. We have wonderful teachers and, umm, highly interesting creatures in our academy.”

“Creatures?”

“There are too many to talk about now, but just know that everything you have read about in fantasy books actually exists.”

“Everything?” Maxwell asked, raising one eyebrow. “Even dragons?”

“Yes, of course. We even have one that’s a teacher.”

“Wow!”

Father McKenzie took the last sip of his tea and placed the cup back on the saucer. “So, Maxwell, do you think you would like to attend Crabalocker? I think you would really love it there and would fit in perfectly with all of the other students. After all, they all have the same interests and talents that you do.”

Maxwell looked again at his smiling mother and she nodded to him. “What about my mom? What’ll she tell everyone once I’ve gone? Will I ever be able to visit?”

Father McKenzie nodded his head to each of Maxwell’s questions. “Your mother will be fine. You’ll be able to talk to her after classes any time you’d like. We have two-way mirrors, called the Amalgaphone, that use interdimensional magic so people can talk to one another. We always put one in the house of the parents of a student and another in your dorm room. Anna will believe that you are attending a special school somewhere in rural Oregon deep in the mountains. She won’t know where you actually are.”

“Okay, that sounds great.”

“As for visiting her, of course, you’ll be able to do this during breaks in teaching. You know, the typical breaks like winter, spring, and summer. In summer, it is mandatory that you leave, as we close down the academy for restoration and revitalization.”

“I see,” Maxwell said, a slow smile appearing on his face.

“So . . .” Father McKenzie prompted, “Would you like to explore your potential and learn how to use magic?”

Maxwell sat there and thought about what he would be leaving behind. The only thing he could think that he would miss would be his mother, his room, and of course, Billy.

“I have a friend . . .”

“Yes, we know of Billy Shears,” Father Makenzie said, taking his last sip of tea and placing the cup on the saucer. “We have our eyes on him. Please don’t share any of this information with him. I don’t want to have to wipe his memory too.”

“Okay, I won’t.” Maxwell said, worriedly. He had already told Billy about the attack last night and the silver hammer. Now he would have to make up some kind of story about where he was going, since he couldn’t tell Billy about Crabalocker. “Well, then, I’m in!” Maxwell shouted, jumping up from his chair. “This is so cool. When do we go?”

“I have to leave now, but I’ll let you have the weekend to get your affairs in order. Be ready to go any time before midnight tomorrow night. Here, take this.”

Father McKenzie pulled a coin out of his coat pocket and handed it to the young man.

Maxwell looked down at the coin in his hand, flipped it over, and frowned. “A dime? What’s this for?”

“It’s a Dimensional Dime. When you are ready to go, flip it high in the air.”

“That’s it?”

“Yes, that’s it,” Father McKenzie said as he stood up and snapped his fingers loudly. Maxwell saw them flash blue very briefly. “I have just called forth two travelling trunks and they are now in your room. Fill them with whatever you feel you’ll need at Crabalocker. If you need another, just knock on the top of one of them three times and snap your fingers twice. Another one will appear.”

“Thank you,” Maxwell replied as he started to get excited about leaving, and, of course, using magic to call forth another travelling trunk.

“I must get back to Crabalocker as I always have too much work to do. I’ll see you in a couple of days.”

Anna stood up and shook Father McKenzie’s hand. “Thank you for this wonderful opportunity for Maxy.”

“It’s my pleasure, madam,” Father McKenzie said as he zipped up his jacket and made his way to the front door. As the door closed behind him, Maxwell heard a loud pop, and the door rattled on its hinges. He ran to the door and flung it open. The porch was empty, as was the street. Father McKenzie was gone.

“Wow!” was all that Maxwell could say.