The Lost Diamond
OPEN YOUR EYES

“I need to tell you something important,” Rossy whispered to me. “When I dreamed of my grandmother, I immediately looked at her hands to see the pillow you described. But she didn’t have a pillow; she had a bright light, like a firefly, but with a very bright light, like the sun. When I heard you talk, I understood that it wasn’t a firefly but a diamond. My grandmother had a shining diamond in her hands. What does that mean? Is it representing our money? Is it good or bad?”

“I honestly don’t know, but what I do know is that we shouldn’t seek rational explanations for these kinds of revelations. It’s better to focus on the message and always have the attitude of helping unconditionally those who, like I believe your grandmother is, are struggling to communicate with us.”

“A wooden box... I’ve been there, I have some kind of memory of that place, but it confuses me that there are diamonds inside. Could it be a place where she kept money? Maybe she saved money for us and is trying to tell us where it is.”

“Maybe, maybe. Rossy, I have a proposal for you, I hope you don’t mind, and if you do, just tell me, okay? I’m going to try to meet with your grandmother and ask her how I can help her. For that, I need a comfortable place to sit for a while. If you can stay close, support me with a prayer, or even if you’re asleep, having you nearby will help me.”

I looked at her again, what a beautiful woman she was! I was captivated by her eyes and her smile. In the end, I did what I clearly knew I shouldn’t have done.

“Rossy, every time I look at you, I think about how difficult my life will be when all of this is over, when you’re not near me anymore, how will I survive without your smile close to me. I’m sorry... I shouldn’t have said that. Let’s focus on solving this problem.”

She nodded gently.

I sat comfortably in a spacious armchair that was much more comfortable than the mattress I slept on every night. It was the ideal place to watch television for hours, read thick books, or leave my physical body “parked” while I finished my spiritual activities. I told Rossy that she could go to her room if she wished or stay close in one of the other armchairs, and in any case, try to project her best energy towards me.

I closed my eyes, focused on my breathing, and stared at a point on the horizon. I waited while repeating the name of Grandma Dainik in my mind, but I didn’t receive any specific message. I tried to project the spiritual image of the grandmother with the pillow in her hands, but still nothing. After some time, I sought help by projecting the image of the grandmother with a diamond in her hands, and only then did I receive the first message. The grandmother disappeared, and in my vision, only the diamond remained shining like the sun. It couldn’t be a matter of money, or maybe it could be…

“Open your eyes!” I heard someone shout, not knowing where the voice was coming from.

Even for an experienced shaman, leaving the physical body to embark on a spiritual quest is a complex process. Returning to the bag of hot water and bones that is the physical body is equally challenging. One doesn’t return instantaneously, unless there is an emergency, and the experience is quite unpleasant.

I opened my eyes, startled. The sensation of rushing back into my body was not pleasant at all, but I was back. Rossy was asleep in a chair next to me. With her eyes closed, breathing softly, and her head turned to the side, she still resembled the Europa that would drive even the god Zeus to madness.

Standing next to her was the same woman from my vision. She didn’t look well; her clothes were worn, her skin had a more grayish hue than the natural color of an elderly white woman, her hair was covered in gray strands, and she looked dirty.

“Follow me!” she commanded. It wasn’t a suggestion or a request; it was a very direct order.

I followed her outside the house, where three luxury cars and mine coexisted despite their differences. The woman walked without looking at me to the gardens in the rear area, furthest from the lake. Once there, she stopped.

Her appearance would have terrified anyone else, but not me. I had long left behind the fear of spiritual presences. She extended her arm toward me and opened her hand. Inside was a diamond. The faint moonlight cast white reflections on it. Once she was sure I had seen the diamond, she closed her fist and forcefully threw the stone into the thick vegetation. She marked the direction where she had thrown the diamond with her fingers and started walking toward it. I tried to follow her, but I couldn’t. There was no way to advance through the darkness of the night, with all those plants in the way, and besides, who knows how many spiders, snakes, scorpions, and other creatures might be there, and these did indeed fill me with immense terror.

I returned to the cabin, where silence still reigned. The clock showed 5:05 AM. Whatever it was, the diamond was stored on that property, somewhere in the middle of the forest surrounding the house. Likewise, the wooden box that held that diamond inside would also be there.

I stopped by the fireplace, pondering what to do. Then, I was confronted with a truly terrifying sight. Rossy’s father was coming down the stairs with the look of someone who had just woken up, barely dressed in his underwear and with his hair disheveled. He hardly resembled the polished businessman who wore suits and ties and had a perfectly groomed hairstyle covered in gel. He had made it abundantly clear that he didn’t want to see me again.

With no time to hide or pretend to be a statue of a Greek minotaur, I had no choice but to smile at him. I must have looked quite foolish. I raised my right arm in a greeting and said “good morning” as innocently as I could.

The charlatan sorcerer of rich girls was the last thing Alfred Dainik expected to find after sleeping so little.

“What are you still doing in my house!” he said, as if he had stumbled upon a pair of skunks mating in his bedroom. This woke up Rossy, who stood up and, ignoring her father’s annoyance, asked me what had happened.

“I think I know where the diamond is. There’s a wooden shack somewhere in the woods, and the diamond is inside,” I quickly said, trying to divert attention from her father’s question.

The word “diamond” magically caught Alfred’s attention, and he asked his daughter which diamond we were talking about. Rossy told him that perhaps their grandmother had left a diamond stored or hidden somewhere, and I believed that place to be a wooden shack in the forest.

“I know that place,” Alfred said. “There’s a small wooden structure where some of the people who built the cabin used to sleep. Later, we used it to store tools whenever we did renovations.”

“I remember now,” Rossy added. “Grandma used to take me there sometimes to walk in the forest while she told me stories. I don’t remember how to get there anymore; Grandma always led the way.”

“When they renovated the cabin over twenty years ago, they used it to store tools,” Alfred said. “I was nearby, but I don’t remember how I got there.”

“Grandma showed me the direction we need to go,” I said, “but there’s no clear path, and I have a serious problem with spiders. Surely, among all those plants, there are hundreds of spiders. I can’t even think about it.” I told them.

We had to wait for Alfred to get dressed. Since the journey involved venturing into the dense forest, his thousand-dollar suit would have been quite inappropriate attire. However, he had nothing else to wear, so he asked his daughter for some clothes. After half an hour in the closet, Alfred chose the least feminine attire he could find, and we ended up heading to the backyard. Seeing arch millionaire Alfred Dainik wearing tightly fitted pink sweatpants with two-thousand-dollar shoes was a sight to behold. Any journalist would have paid millions for that photo, and if I, the shaman, appeared in it, it would be even better.

Although the moon illuminated the garden with the lake in the background quite well, each of us took a flashlight. Rossy quickly found a small trail that led to the area where her grandmother’s spirit had thrown the diamond. After a walk of no more than ten minutes, we arrived at the location. The wooden shack was still standing, looking identical to the image I had received in my vision. All that remained was to search inside for the diamond or whatever the diamond represented. I did my best to ignore a huge spider web hanging from a plant next to the door. Such webs don’t spin themselves, so there should be a spider the size of an elephant lurking somewhere around here, which sent a shiver down my spine.

Alfred opened the door and entered first, followed by Rossy and then me. We found no diamond. In the place, there was a small portable gas stove, a wooden table, a bed, and an empty bag. Everything seemed to have been abandoned for many, many years. On the bed, there was some dusty clothing and more spider webs. We couldn’t understand what all this was about; maybe some vagabond lived there for a while. There was no money. Then, as I pointed my flashlight toward the floor, I saw a cluster of bone fragments that unmistakably formed the shape of a human skeleton. Clearly, someone had died in that very place. We decided to leave without touching anything in case it was a crime scene. Outside the shack, there was only dense vegetation.

As soon as we returned to the cabin, Alfred called one of his best friends, who held a high-ranking position in the police department. The man promised to act discreetly and immediately send a forensic team and a criminalistics team to analyze the site and determine what had happened, although he said it was very likely that it was some vagrant who lived there until his death.

In less than an hour, when the first rays of sunlight were already illuminating the property, the police arrived with a deployment of officers like I had never seen before. The operation’s leader had a lengthy conversation with Alfred, who had returned to his carefully groomed image in a luxury suit and gel-slicked hair. When he returned to the house, he told us it was best for each of us to go about our lives until the investigation concluded.

“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” I said. “While it may seem logical to the police that a vagrant lived hidden in that place until he died, it doesn’t explain the visions with your mother or the use of a diamond as a symbol of what was inside. I suggest we stay here until the police tell us what they found. If it turns out to be a vagrant, I recommend that we continue investigating, even beneath the surface.”

Once again, Alfred chose not to confront a fanatic. He said he would call one of his employees to bring us food to spend the next few hours together.

Four hours later, the head of the operation asked to speak with Alfred alone. However, Alfred had him come in and said there was no problem, and anything he needed to say could be said in front of us.

“First of all, Mr. Dainik, the body we found almost certainly belongs to a woman, possibly elderly. We may need to wait around twenty-four hours for full confirmation. Second and most importantly, we found an envelope where she apparently explains who she is and what happened to her before she died. This envelope involves your family, Mr. Dainik, so we can exclude you from the investigation if you wish.”

He handed over a yellow envelope with a note inside. When Alfred took the envelope, the policeman respectfully bid farewell and left the cabin.

When he saw the note, Alfred recognized his mother’s handwriting and began to read:

“My beloved son, I want you to know that you have always been my greatest pride. There is no other mother in the world who could be happier than me. You have become a successful man in business and in raising your own family.

I received some very bad news recently. Dr. Thompson told me they had detected a highly aggressive lung cancer, and it was already too late for treatment. I was sad for a few days, but in the end, I decided to tell everyone and enjoy the time I have left with all of you.

But what just happened with Ernst is much worse news than facing the few months of life I have left. We are all so devastated that I decided not to tell anyone about my illness. I couldn’t bear to tell you that in a few months, you would lose your eldest son and your mother, so I invented my return to Denmark and decided to spend the time I have left in this wooden shack. I didn’t want to add to your pain. S~ᴇaʀᴄh the Find ɴøᴠel.nᴇt website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

Please know that I forced Dr. Thompson to sign a confidentiality agreement so he couldn’t reveal my illness to anyone. Don’t blame him for his silence.

I don’t know what you’ll think when you read this letter; I may have already passed away. But I believe I did what was best not to add to your pain.

I will always love you.

Mom.”

Alfred made a tremendous effort to stand upright, like a soldier in the middle of a parade. Trembling, he placed the note on the table.

“So... my mother never returned to her homeland, huh... very well... that’s why she didn’t say goodbye to us...”

His heart needed to scream and cry, but the discipline with which he was born and raised held him displaying that flawless image, without weaknesses. Rossy rushed upstairs to her bedroom, and from downstairs, her cries could be heard.

“I must say goodbye to the detective and return this envelope for the necessary examinations,” he told me with the same expression as a marble statue.

He left the cabin, and I remained alone on the lower floor, thinking that we had finally found the diamond that shone in the darkness inside a wooden shack. But my mission was not yet complete; I felt an obligation to meet with the grandmother now that she was free from the anguish of her physical body’s abandonment, and her family would soon be giving her the funeral she couldn’t have at the time.

I quickly said my farewells to Rossy and her father. They needed a moment alone as a family to figure out how to break the news to the other relatives. I sped down the mountains as if I were driving the Lamborghini, and I arrived at my home with the urgency of not delaying grandmother Dainik’s agony for another minute.

It was much more challenging to relax my body than to connect with her. This time, her spirit appeared radiant and youthful. In fact, she looked like a young bride about to get married. She was very happy and grateful to me. I took her hand and thanked her for being such a wonderful woman. I told her I was proud to have met her and her family. We walked a short distance on a spiritual path very similar to the forest where we found her body, and immediately, four spiritual beings arrived to welcome her and thank me for my help.

As we were beginning to say our goodbyes, her husband and a young, brightly shining spirit appeared next to him. It was her grandson who had died in a car accident. Beyond them, her parents and many others were waiting.

Before completing her ascension to the spiritual world, she had a moment to give me a message. She told me to watch over her granddaughter with that boyfriend of hers because he only wanted to keep the cabin, and Grandma Dainik had done everything possible to keep that selfish person away from the place where she had died.

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