"The story of her creation?" Kristle looked at her friend with a perplexed smile. "Why do you want to know about that?" she asked hesitantly.
"Well," Angel began, "We used to be such close friends. Now you are off in Norrath so much of the time... I feel like we've drifted apart, and I don't know anything about your new life. I don't even know how you met Jaden!"
Kristle, having often been chastised for the time she spent away from her friends and family, was prepared to defend herself. But Angel seemed genuinely interested. Maybe, just maybe, she actually was, and not just in demanding more of her time be spent doing things with her. It's not that Kristle wasn't interested in her family or friends, moreover, she simply hated having demands on her time be made by anyone, for any reason.
"Jaden," Kristle breathed his name aloud, and a dreamy smile washed over her face. Angel giggled girishly at her. She wanted to talk about Jaden, she always did. Her mind revolved around him regularly, and often thoughts of him filled her head so much so that she could barely concentrate on anything else. But to tell his story fairly, accurately, and to introduce him in away so as her audience would not be skewn, she knew she needed to talk about Zeph first.
"Remember that Christmas we were snowed in for weeks? Remember we could get down to the shopping center, but the passes out of town were treacherous and essentially socking the city in? What was that, three maybe four years ago?"
It had been, Kristle knew down to the day, three years and 6 months ago. For Kristle, discovering Norrath was akin to Lucy discovering Narnia; a much needed escape in a time of uncertainty and gloom. Unlike Lucy, though, Kristle had not gone in search of adventure. She had not gone in search of a fantasy world in which to reside, she had simply gone in search of a Christmas present for her husband.
By the time Christmas came around, her five year marriage was already showing signs of it's demise. She and her husband had been romantically involved for the five years prior to their marriage, as well. That Christmas they had already spent nearly ten years together. In that time they had grown apart. They had different wants and needs, and neither was too interested in bending to meet the other anymore. They didn't argue, they smiled kindly at each other, and they prepared dinner and washed dishes for each other, but their relationship was a hollow thing. Not a bad thing, but not a fulfilling thing. Not the thing either of them had hoped for or intended it to be.
That winter was particularly harsh. He had been laid off from his job six months earlier, and his unemployment checks barely helped to supplement Kristle's part-time wages. They were falling further and further into financial debt, not just with creditors, but with her parents, who were always willing to lend a hand or a dollar, as well. Her Dad came for Christmas that year, stayed with them for a week or so. He had come unprepared, and hauled Krystle along with him to do his last-minute gift shopping. Kristle, who typically shopped periodically throughout the year, whenever she noticed a trinket one of her friends or family members would adore, abhored Walmart as much as she hated the holiday shopping crowds.
That's how she had found herself stuck in a crowded isle of the electronics section, listenting to the screaming wants and desires of anxious children, who were already waiting for Santa, overdosed on the sugary goodies of the season. When her dad had handed her a computer video game, and mentioned he thought her husband would like it, she barely glanced at it as she tossed it in the cart and hastily crossed him off of the list. They were nearly done. Besides, he liked that kind of game, and she was no judge of that sort of thing. She didn't play many video games, and had found that she was a terrible judge of which would be good and which wouldn't. This would be fine. "Perfect!" she thought, as they shuffled through the crowded isles to the register.
The third day after Christmas she knew it had been a success. For three nights now, her husband had stayed awake long after she did, playing that game long into the wee hours of the night. She smiled happily at what a great gift she and her dad had chosen, and drifted off to sleep.
By the end of January she was pretty tired of never seeing her husband anymore, he never came to bed when she went anymore, and he barely acknowledged her when she spoke to him if he was playing that game. She was lucky to drag him off of the computer to eat even, and often he would stay at his desk to do so, claiming others were counting on him. Just the facts that she was working and going to school, and he was collecting unemployment and playing that damn game all the time made her resent him and the game both. For a marriage that had already lost its passion, this road was definately headed for rocky ground.
She had begun classes at the local university to prepare for enrolling in their Master's degree program. Fortunately, she was pretty immersed in her studies, and didn't really have a whole lot of time to be upset at his "abandonment" of her. She started complaining about his excessive gaming, and heard from a lot of people that Everquest was renowned for exactly that type of behavior. It was pretty common, actually, most people who knew of it had assured her. She didn't find it of much comfort.
February was more of the same, and she got to the point that she barely spoke with him--the man that lived in her house. The roommate that shared her livingroom glued to the computer monitor, and her bed by getting into it as she was getting out of it... At one point she had made a gigantic fuss about it, him not coming to bed, so for a few nights he made a show of doing so, coming in, lying down and pretending to sleep while she drifted off. Three times she awoke an hour later to find he had jumped ship and was back at the monitor. The next time he tried to come to bed when she went, she simply said, "Don't bother." And while he might have wanted to do the right thing, the game called him; Norrath's fingers beconed him, and and he followed.
By March, her quarter was over, and she had managed to fail Finite Mathmatics once again, leaving her desperately short the five required credits for admission to the Master's program. It was the day after classes let out, the 16th of March, that he made his final attempt to suggest that she try playing this game. Figuring it was likely the only possible path that their relationship might be repaired (and not realizing that they were long past that point) she hesitantly agreed. Besides, she thought, it's spring break, and it might be fun. We're broke anyway, what else am I gonna' do?
She had played a cleric in their D&D campaign for several years, and decided when she loaded up Everquest that it would be a good first choice, since she already knew the structure for what that character was expected to do. Listening to her favorite band playing Zephyr Wind in the background, in conjunction with her new Zephrine rose's first buds appearing, Zephrine, the cleric was born.
For a few weeks, her friendship with her husband had generally improved. They were playing the game together, and he was showing her tips and tricks he had come up with. There was a pretty steep learning curve, and there was something new to find out every day. Pretty soon the two of them had constructed her first set of armor, by tracking and killing particular creatures and combining the loot they drop in varius types of containers, forges and ovens and so forth. They were begining to get the low-level cleric/ranger duoing thing worked out. They were spending time together for the first time in ages.
That's about the time they were invited to join their first guild. He chose not to join right away, being a loner by nature. She accepted immediately, delighted at the oppertunity to make new friends and have more resources for learning to better play the game at her fingers. The guild was The Karmic Circle. It's mission to help new players learn what they needed to know to play the game. It's players were some of the friendliest and most helpful on the server. It's leader. It's leader was Jadenleaf, a ranger Zephrine would ultimately fall in love with. A man Kristle would eventually find much passion with.
"But how did he go from being a ranger named Jaden, to being the real life guy? How did you meet? How did you...?"
Kristle smiled a distant smile, her head tilted slightly to the side...
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