A gentle shake woke Lily out of her blank dreams.
No nightmares this time...
No real dreams that were filled with adventure.
It was just pure black and white. Like she were floating through the abyss....
They shook Lily again, making her groan in annoyance. “Five more minutes.”
Exhaustion weighed her down onto the bed, making her eyes seal shut.
“Get up, Lily,” Jason whispered. “I want to show you something.”
Her lashes opened slightly, seeing Jason sitting beside her on the couch through the blurriness of her eyes.
His bright green eyes glistened in the darkness, and his dark hair haloed a soft white from the moonlight casting through the window.
“Where are we going?” she whispered.
“Come on, I want to show you something,” he responded.
“Ugh,” Lily sighed, dragging her hand down her face. “What time is it?”
“Four-ish.”
She shot him a look, but doubted he saw it in the darkness. “This better be important.”
Jason grinned as she sat up, slipped her legs off the couch, and then paused.
Hold on... she was on a couch... not a bed...
She must’ve fallen asleep in Jason’s lap earlier that night.
Her cheeks burned at the memory, and she hoped he couldn’t see the redness in the darkness.
“What did you need?” she asked.
“I want to show you something really cool,” he responded excitedly.
“At four in the morning?” Lily wondered, shooting him another look.
“You know,” Jason raised a brow, “those looks get crustier and crustier every time.”
“Hold on...” Lily shifted toward his shadowed figure. “Can you see... in the darkness...?”
But there was no response, just a light touch on her hand.
She almost pulled away, but forced herself to clarify first. “That’s you touching my hand... right, Jason?”
“Of course it is,” he said as if she were stupid. “Who else would it be?”
And why wasn’t she pulling away...?
But he got her to her feet, guiding her to the hotel door, opening it and turned to the right, walking down the hall.
Lily couldn’t help feebly follow, the curiosity washing out all thoughts about how he scared her and how she should be pulling back.
She could see now, in the hallway, watching hotel rooms, staircases, and the lobby pass...
Until they stood before a staircase that spiraled down into darkness.
It looked like it led to the underworld...
She stopped at the head of the steps, and Jason—already a few feet down—almost fell backward toward her at her sudden resistance.
He then turned to her. “Are you coming?” Despite his typical playfulness, he sounded genuinely curious.
“Where are you taking me?” Lily glanced around, finding no figure within sight of this place that looked like a dungeon...
Why the hell was this in a hotel...?
“Why? Are you scared?” Jason smirked.
She gave him a “duh” look.
But he only shook his head, eyes lowering to the end of the staircase that looked like a black fog.
“Lily...” he said gently, “I know your scared, alright? But is it really that hard to accept that I’m not planning your demise?”
“I think I question it a little when your taking me into some kind of abandoned stone basement, yes.”
He sighed, shaking his head. “Lily, I’m not going to hurt you. And the reason why no one’s around is because humans can’t see this place, that’s all. I’m not going to kill you. Haven’t you already guessed that?”
Lily hesitated for a moment, searching for a snarky response but ended up finding none.
She didn’t know Jason all that well. He was kind in some moments and scary in others... His personality kept on switching...
He had a point whether or not she liked to admit it...
She kept on thinking, if he wanted her dead, why hadn’t he already tried to kill her?
He followed her home... Held her when she was crying... Carried her back to his apartment...
But instead of using her... hurting her... he wrapped up her burns and healed her...
She wasn’t sure what his intentions were...
Whether they were good or bad...
And she also wasn’t sure if she trusted him...
But she nodded anyway, letting him guide her down the steps into the darkness...
At the end of the staircase, there was a solid oak door.
It had some kind of carving in it... but Lily couldn’t tell what it was in the darkness.
They stepped into the room together, and she noticed he lightly rubbed the back of her hand with his thumb.
As if... he was trying to comfort her in the darkness...
Because her heart pounded against her ribcage... and her chest grew heavy after every moment that passed.
But Jason whispered something in a different language. Something Lily had never heard before... The words sounded nothing like Spanish or Japanese... though almost like a mix between gibberish and English.
She flinched as a sudden light burst through the entire room, pulling her arm over her eyes.
When she looked up from the crook of her elbow, she noticed that she was in a room full of paintings and statues of Angels.
The walls were lined with portraits of castles full of princesses, queens and kings... though all had large feathery wings sprouting from their backs.
After glancing at Jason, he gave her a smile and a little nod, letting go of her hand as she padded over to the biggest picture.
It kind of looked like a fantasy realm... A kingdom like it was torn out of the pages of a fairy tale.
There was a woman with dark black skin sitting on a throne, and there were grey streaks in her hair that fell down to her waist.
Another woman with dark grey hair and large blue eyes stared off into the camera lens, settled into a throne next to the other...
It was like queen and queen...
There was another photo with three teenagers that sat on a stone staircase. One of which was a girl with dark brown hair that spiraled down to her shoulders. The other two had light blonde hair that glistened with the gas lamps on the walls.
Though, all three had bright white wings grown from their shoulder-blades...
Lily’s breath caught...
Wait...
The girl on the right… and the one on the left…
The two blonde women that stared into the camera.
They looked... familiar...
No... No...
How could this be possible?
It wasn’t... right...?
She looked to the one on the right. Aunt Melody.
Then to the left, where the blonde girl with bright blue eyes and soft brown freckles held a book in her lap.
Mom… Lily thought.
Her heart pounded widely in her chest, breaths becoming shallower.
“This can’t be real…” she murmured.
She looked around the room where there were statues and pictures of her mom, her aunt melody, and that other girl she didn’t recognize were.
Jason watched as Lily ran up to a photo of her mother with her wings spread wide, feathers falling around her like snow.
My mom...
She darted over to another picture where her mother read under a tree, her wings curling around her arms as if shielding herself from the icy wind.
Then there was a picture of Lily and her mom when Lily was ten.
They both smiled at the camera, her mother’s hands on her shoulders.
But they were still in the castle...
Lily didn’t remember this... castle...
She also didn’t remember this photo...
How could she not remember when this would’ve been taken six years ago?
But a bigger realization clouded her thoughts, and she turned to Jason, eyes glistening in the dim lighting of the room.
“My… mom’s... an… Angel?”
“It’s always hard to believe at first, huh?” Jason said, smiling gently. “Quite a surprise, too.”
“How did you... know this?” she demanded.
He chuckled, leaning against the wood of the doorway. “Lily, I know a lot about you. Stuff you haven’t remembered yet.”
Remember?
What did he mean by that?
She remembered her life clearly!
She went to Elementary School, Middle School, and High School!
What could she have possibly forgotten?
“I’ll take us back to our room,” Jason said, nodding to the door.
“But I... don’t understand...” she said.
“I know,” he responded with the same gentleness. “Baby steps.”
Baby steps? What’s going on?
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