Part 1: Peculiar feelings

CHAPTER 1

“Are you looking for someone Mr  Spielberg?” A lanky slim man asked,  carrying few books in his hands.

Charles Spielberg shrugged his shoulder, and took out a paper giving it  to the man. “I am here to meet someone--an old looking man,” he said.

The lanky man constrained into a  belly laugh, taking the paper from  Charles with his free hand. “I will call him right away.” He walked away, and entered into the castle.

Charles heaved a sigh, his hands into his pocket, and roamed around the palace filled with lilacs. It was a large  palace, and the garden looked like  paradise, for the flowering trees were  vibrant.

About few minutes of waiting, an old  chiseled man came out of the castle  doors. He strolled towards Charles smiling. He stretched out his contorted  hand for a handshake. “It is so good to  see you Charleston Jones. I doubted to  believe that you will accept my invitation.”

“I wanted to see who my mother was talking about. She described you as an old man with fine looks, and indeed you are.”

They shook hands laughingly.

“Why have you invited me here Mr...”

“You can call me Mr Lovetto. I'd like  you to come with me at once, and we  shall talk about something that means a lot to me.” Mr Lovetto sauntered  ahead, with his hands clasped behind  him.

Bringing strikes, Charles stood his ground as his gaze fell upon a girl dressed in a sleeveless white dress,  swaying her long wavy rainbow hair  but what seemed to appear was mostly  the red color.

It was the girl with red hair, he said to  himself in awe.

It's her again!

“Who is that?” He asked breathlessly,  his heart thudding against his chest as he felt a gravitational force pulling him towards the mysterious girl.

Mr Lovetto stood beside him with a  genuine smile. “Well, isn't she just  beautiful?”

“She's indeed beautiful...”

As the girl span to face both men, Charles was interrupted by someone  touching him twice on the shoulder.

“Mr Spielberg, wake up.”

A hand tapped him lightly on the  shoulder.

“Mr Spielberg. Hello there...”

He gradually fluttered his eyes open,  coming face-to-face with a blonde head 30-years-old woman, dressed in a black and white maiden dress.

He groaned in annoyance. Being  disturbed from his dreams was one  thing he hated.

He got up to sit straighter on the bed,  his eyes still heavy from sleep.

“I've been waking you up for the past  ten minutes, Mr Spielberg,” Constance  whined. "I almost thought you were dead."

“My apology, Constance, I was captured by a dream,” he replied yawning.

“Is it about the same girl again?” She  asked, raising her brows. She knew about Charles dreaming about the redhead girl, because he had never stopped telling her about it.

A dazzling smile passed across his kissable lips. “You got it right, but I couldn't see her face as usual.” He frowned a little, and  he immediately replaced with his trademark smile. “What do you want?”

“Breakfast will be served in fifteen  minutes. Your parents and Mr Hensworth will be waiting for you at  the table.”

Charles sighed in exasperation; his  friend's father was joining them 

for breakfast, boring, he thought.

“They summoned me to tell you not to  take time in the shower,” Constance  stated, and exited his room.

Charles lazily got up from his bed. It  was a weird dream but nice. But who the heck was that old man? He asked  himself, shaking his head in  exasperation.

The girl with red hair has been  appearing in his dreams. He has never had a chance to see her face. Every  time he woke up from the dream, he would feel her presence in his room. It was a strange feeling but a good feeling too.

He decided to take a shower because it  helped his thoughts flow. He pressed a button, and the shower glass door slid  open. He stepped into the shower, and turned the dial. His body tingled as the  cold water cascaded down his body. He closed his eyes at the sound of the water plopping down on the ceramic floor. He can't take the picture of the redhead girl out of his mind.

Who was she? He sighed, the placation  was clear in his tone.

After twelve  minutes of taking a shower, he grabbed a white towel, and wore it around his waist and walked out of the bathroom.

"Breakfast is ready, son. What are you  still doing up there?"

He rolled his eyes as he heard his  mother's high pitched voice in the  intercom. Wearing a black t-shirt and black jeans, styling his dark coffee hair, he headed to the breakfast room. 

* *  *

"There you are," Mrs Mariana Spielberg uttered  in an elated tone as soon as Charles had stepped his foot into the breakfast room.

He greeted his parents and  Mr. Hensworth a good morning, grabbing a chair and took his seat.

"What took you so long?"  Mrs Spielberg asked.

Charles looked at his father and  then at Mr Hensworth before replying, "I was freshening up."

Alabaster Hensworth chuckled at his response. Charleston expected that  from him.

"Freshening up?" Mr Donne Spielberg asked with narrowed brows.

"I over slept," he said in irritation,  taking a bite from a waffle.  "I guess the dream took over."

Mrs Spielberg groaned. "My son finally  had a dream. What's the dream you had all about?” she asked, biting on her cottage bread.

Charles groaned irritably as his father and Mr Hensworth fixed their eyes on  him attentively.

“Do we have to do this now, Mom?” He asked in irritation.

“Come on son, we would like to know  what you dreamt about. It's not a big  deal. Perhaps Mr Hensworth will interpret a meaning to it.”

“Spill it out Charles, we're all ears,” Mr Hensworth said in amusement.

“Okay fine.” He exhaled, “But I only  remember seeing a girl, and an old looking man whom he called himself Mr Lovetto.”

“Mr Lovetto?” Mr Spielberg asked, his brows creased in curiosity.

“Yes, perhaps you have an idea of whom it might be because he  looked exactly like Mr Montero, but what  was the girl with red hair doing at his palace?”

“It's a meaningless dream. Mr Montero  has no daughter, and he stays in no palace,” Mrs  Spielberg stated.

Charles shrugged his shoulder. He  dares not tell them that the red-headed  girl has been appearing in his dreams  for the past few months.

“Is there something else you need to tell  us about the dream? You know I can't interpret a real meaning to it if you  don't remember most part of it,” Mr Hensworth uttered.

Alabaster Hensworth wasn't just the governor of Iceland, but deep down he knew he had a calling to become a clairvoyant someow. At least that's what he believed, even if it had to do with his intuitive virtue.

“I am sure that's all.”

“But I have a slight feeling you're not  telling us everything.”

“Well, your feelings are at fault Mr  Hensworth.”

“What was the girl with red hair doing  in  your dream? Did she says something to you?” Mrs Spielberg asked curiously. “She must have said something to you. Every dream has a meaning behind it.”

Charles blinked his eyes, and sighed. “The girl has been appearing in my dreams recently without saying words. She is silent. She just smiles at me without having to see her whole face, and the odd thing is that I feel her whenever I wake up. I feel her presence.”

Silence filled the breakfast room. Charles flickered his eyes from his mother, to his father and then to Mr Hensworth. He rubbed his hands and  hunched his shoulder. “And I have a sensation that she might be a lucid, or she's trying to tell me something, without words.”

“It doesn't make sense to me!” Mrs Spielberg shook her head in denial.

“That's totally out of right senses, son. It is impossible to dream of  someone and then feel their presence,” Mr Spielberg added in disbelief.

“Maybe she just exists in your dreams, Charles.” Mr Hensworth re-joined. “And if you feel her presence, it means the girl might be a ghost.”

Charles widened his eyes in horror, taken aback by Alabaster's interpretation. “I--I don't believe in ghosts,” he said, taking a sip from his cup of coffee.

"Then, you must believe now," Mr. Hensworth replied, "because the girl you've been seeing is a ghost!"

Charles planted the cup on the table, and drew his lowerlip between his teeth. "I don't believe she's a ghost," he said uncertainly.

"Charles, feeling someone's presence and you can't see them, that's a definition of a ghost," Mrs. Spielberg added. "Don't think too much of it."

He pressed his lips together, standing up from his chair. “Excuse me, I will be late for class.”

As he was about to quit the room, his father stopped him.

“I'll need you at the Elites castle later, son.”

He sighed. “Not today, Dad.” He strolled out of the breakfast room  without looking back.

Mr Hensworth chuckled. “I don't think  your son wants to be the next president of the Elites organisation. Don't  you want to reconsider that, Donne?”

Mr Spielberg relaxed his jaw. "He is the only son have, and I know he will take over the Elites organisation very soon."