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Song- "Waiting For Love" by Avicii

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I think it was on March 23, 2018 that my life changed forever.

And I don't mean it like I got married, or a loved one died. No. Not anything sentimental like that. March twenty-third was the day I left my hometown in New York for the first time in my entire life.

I lived in Queens on Main Street on the top floor apartment by myself. I wasn't lonely. I had a cat named Gizmo and a fish named Bubbles. My neighbors weren't annoying all the time. I had a good job that didn't make me want to tear my hair out at the coffee shop down the road.

I guess it was because of Ethan that I was at home that March twenty-first. I was supposed to be engaged to him. I even had a ring. Then I found out he was married. And has three children. So, I dumped him, tossed the ring in the sewer, and told his wife. She was very understanding.

I guess that's why I have a black eye, but oh well.

I was nursing a rather large pint of chocolate peanut butter ice cream when there was a knock at my door. I sighed heavily, slamming the pint on the table, and opened the door, not caring that I was red faced from crying and not caring who saw me like this at this point.

Standing in the doorway was a man. He was old and had a gray beard, a gray sweater, some dirty jeans and old tennis shoes. He was leaning on a cane and he smiled up at me, his blue eyes twinkling as if he was planning mischief. But this was Mr. Ian. He never did anything out of the ordinary other than maybe leave his apartment to sit on the bench outside the apartment complex's door or go grocery shopping.

I wiped at my face and he seemed to notice how I must have looked like utter crap in my sweatpants and old college t-shirt because he said,

"Do you need help with something, Miss Baggs?" He asks sweetly.

I shook my head. "No. I'm fine."

He nods thoughtfully and just stared at me. I squirmed a bit uncomfortably under his gaze, then asked, "Can I help you with something, Mr. Ian?"

He raised a bushy eyebrow. "That remains to be seen, Abigail ." He says and I was thoroughly confused. I shifted to my other foot and fiddled with a blonde curl.

"I'm looking for someone to work for a friend of mine that's hiring."

"Hiring? Hiring for what?" I asked because another job sounded tempting. You can only get so much from a Dippin' Donuts paycheck.

"I'm not sure. Just hiring." He says and I didn't like how vague he's being. I was also starting to get annoyed. I had a pint of ice cream that wasn't gone and more Netflix binging to do, after all.

"Is it an online application?" I asked because almost all were. A paper application was as rare as a unicorn now a days. Everything was online.

"No. He has a paper application, actually." Of course he does. Mr. Ian says and reaches into his pocket and hands me a book. It was tiny and thin. I wasn't surprised it could fit in his pocket but I was confused as to why he was giving me a book about mythical creatures.

"You're a writer. He's looking for a writer. You'll be perfect for the job. I'll tell him you accept then?" He asks and I raised an eyebrow.

"Uh excuse me? No. I want to know all of the job, Mr. Ian. I want to know what I'm walking into."

"I'll have him come meet you if that's alright." He continues, turning to walk back down the hall. "How about four o'clock on Thursday? Does that work for you? The twenty-third. Oh good. I'll tell him then that you agree. You should read that book there, dear Abigail. Otherwise you'll most likely have a very hard time with this. Have a good day, Abigail and we shall see you on Thursday!"

Before I could protest or throw the book at the little old man, he was gone again.

I sighed heavily and closed the door then tossed the book into the kitchen table and sat down on the couch and finished my ice cream.

I hadn't even read the title and could barely pay attention to the episode of Pretty Little Liars. Eventually, my curiosity won and I got up and picked up the book.

It was small and compact and had a hard cover. It was a dark green color and had a gold circle on the front. There were a few ink splatters and some faded stains I didn't want to know the origin of splattered across the cover pitifully. The spine was red and had gold designs on it. I tossed the now empty ice cream container into the sink with the other dishes and plopped into a chair and opened the book. The title read:

The Essential Handbook to Lands and Beasts of Legend

I frowned at it and saw there was no author. What kind of book had no author? The pages were browning and ripped in a few places and had that old book smell you find in antique shops. I turned the page and scanned the table of contents.

Introduction
Dragons
Wraiths
Dark Creatures
Fairies
Magic
Magical artifacts
Gems
Elves
Dwarves
Orcs
Goblins

I raised an eyebrow. Why was I given this book? Does this guy have a thing for fantasy or something? Maybe he was a movie director and wanted me to write the basic story for it? Maybe this was just a test to see if I would actually read it. After all, it's not every day your little old neighbor comes to your door and gives you a mysterious book and tells you about an even more mysterious job and employer.

I opened up to the page on dragons and flipped through the pages talking about anatomy, ability to breathe fire, names, a natural greed for gold, and for some reason a picture of a man was stapled to the page. A colored photograph that definitely didn't belong in this ancient book. This book had to have been published in the 1800's at least. Seeing the staple through the old page made me almost mad.

Dragons.

The man in the photograph had wide cheekbones, dark maroon eyes that scared me a little, and a mop of curly black hair. He wore a high-collared trench coat and a scar was visible across his face, starting over his left eyebrow, then across his nose to curl under the right ear.

I turned the page and skimmed over the wraiths, dark creatures, fairies, magic, magical artifacts, and gems. All of these things felt foreign to me, but for some reason in the pit of my stomach, I thought I was reading someone's private thoughts. The cursive scrawl and hand-drawn pictures alone made me feel as though I was reading someone's diary.

I wondered briefly if it was Mr. Ian that had written this book.

This time, instead of a single stapled photograph, there were five photographs of snobbish-looking people in a paper clip. That made me feel a bit better. All of them had some sort of expensive clothing on, and their hair was perfect. I almost thought they were magazine clippings, but they weren't. They were Polaroid pictures just like the photo of the creepy man in the Dragon's section. I looked at the title of "Elves" again and let out a humorless laugh.

Yup. These must be the actors for this mysterious employer's movie he wants me to write the story for. I've got you figured out, Mystery Dude.

Then I got to the section about dwarves and began to read a story about how a dragon came and looted their mountain, taking everything and killing the dwarves there.

There was a photograph of a man. He had a square jaw, round blue eyes that looked soft despite his rugged and hard appearance. He had a dark beard and dark hair. He was hot.

I blinked and closed the book, shaking my head and squinted at the clock and sighed a little and got up and went to bed, leaving the book on the kitchen table.

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Hey! Thank you for reading my first update to my newest Hobbit Fanfic! I hope you enjoy this story, and updates will come once I have finished the chapter, so they'll be a bit sporadic but they will all be about this length 😊

Thank you and I hope you enjoy this story!

~Cora Knight