There's always a quaint village in a remote forest where all the dark mystical shit of the world happens. Usually in low-cut corsets and out-of-period leather breeches.

It's never the sketchy Walgreens on the corner, or the public library where the employees all look like they're about to put on a children's musical using sock puppets. That would be too unrealistic.

The MC of this tale is not some sinus medicine desperate delinquent, or your average too-poor-to-buy-your-own-damn-books young person.

No, that would be Valerie. Valerie with the swoopy golden hair, bulbous blue eyes, and remarkable likeness to Amanda Seyfried. Go figure.

Yeah, Valerie's the pretty one, and her mother tells her all the time. Even when Valerie's older sister is in the same room.

Parents without tact. What a concept.

It's like when, at dinners, my dad would tell my little brother how good he was doing in school, and then follow with a heavy silence. His way of saying, And you are the little shit I don't deserve, underlined, bolded, exclamation mark, pass the salad.

Boy, did I show him.

So, there's hot Valerie, her ugly older sister, and her tactless mother; and they all live in a misty little village in some deserted woods where a lot of pine trees and predictable superstitions grow. It's probably somewhere in Eastern Europe, except to make matters even more of a mess everyone walks around using a strange mix of British and American accents.

And then, to take the steamy mist in this mystic woods mystery up a notch... there's also Jungkook.