I'm not scared anymore

Chapter fifty two: burning gazes

Amelia's pov:

Finally it's time for the last ritual. The last ritual before we go home. All of us were waiting behind the stage, it was almost time to go. I was leaning to a wall, keeping my eyes closed, trying to calm down before the ritual.

     "Are you okay?" Aurora asked, walking next to me. I opened my eyes and looked at her. She had a cute curious smile on her face. "Yeah, I'm fine. You?" I asked. She leaned against the wall as well.

     "I'm good. I was just thinking when we get back home and i'm going to meet the ghoulette I'm substituting, do you think she is gonna like me?" Aurora asks. "Sunshine?" I asked. "Mhm." Aurora just hummed. "Of course she will like you, I'm sure the two of you are going to be good friends." I said. "What is she like?" Aurora asked. "Actually I think It's pretty funny, but you remind me of her. She, Cirrus and Cumulus were my first friends when I got here. On my first day on earth, she and Cirrus literally ran to the door to greet me." I explained.

    "Really?" She asked. "Yeah, she is really nice and friendly. She is literally friends with everyone. No matter how bad I felt, she always managed to make me feel happy. Now that I think of it, she was always so happy, until "it" happened." I sighed. "What do you mean?" Aurora asked.

      "Have Swiss told you anything about Susan?" I asked. "Well, not much." She said. "Well, I'm not sure if I can tell you all the details, but Susan was a human who tried to destroy our church, and destroy us. Unfortunately Sunshine got the worst of it. After that she really started to struggle with her mental health so that's why she left out of the band and so did Aether to watch over her." I explained.

      "Oh, why didn't anyone tell me?" Aurora asked. "I guess it's still a bit of a sore subject" I said, shrugging my shoulders. "But Aether told me that Sunshine has been feeling better, so I hope that the Sunshine you meet is the Sunshine that I first met." I smiled. "I hope so too." Aurora smiled.

     "I think it's time for us to go." I said standing up. "Oh, I almost forgot that we were about to start soon." Aurora laughed, also standing up. Both of us started to walk towards others, who were already collecting their instruments.

     "I thought that you were never gonna show up." Ifrit laughed. "Oh yeah, I thought that we should take a headstart and head back to the church." I joked. "Who headed back to the church!?" Copia asked, not even listening to our conversation. All of us bursted into laughter watching confused Copia, who was still trying to figure out what was going on.

      "No one left Copia, you can calm down." Aurora laughed. "You guys are going to cause me a heart attack one day." Copia sighed.

      Before any of us had time to say anything, one of our staff came to tell us that it was time to start. When we were almost at the stage, another crew member came to tell us that they had some sort of technical issues with the white sheet and they weren't able to get it up. Copia assured them that it's okay, so we continued our way to the stage.

     I was walking next to Rain. As soon as we stepped on the stage, the crowd went wild. Me and Rain walked up to our spots and then started to wait, until others got to their spots.

      It felt pretty awkward to just stand there when there wasn't a sheet. I turned to look at Rain who was already looking at me. He took a small step closer to me. "You look tense." He whispered. "How long until we start?" I just asked. "I hope it won't take long." Rain answered. "Ughh, could we start already, I hate to just stand here doing nothing." I sighed. "Just try to relax, I'm sure we will start soon." Rain said, lifting his arm over my shoulders.

      Right away I felt better. I felt like burning gazes from the crowd became only gazes.

      Finally we got the que from the staff that we could start, so that's what we did. We started to play the intro of Kaisarion. I took a step forward and headed to the edge of the stage. I leaned a bit forward, playing the song and observing the crowd.