You Can't Run From The Dark

{Part 27}

~Dessa~

Once Dessa had successfully managed to dress herself, she didn't feel as proud of herself as she had when she had maneuvered her way into her uniform for The Den. Aside from the fact that this dress was much lighter, and there was no corset or petticoat to accompany the outfit, it felt decidedly wrong to wear something so nice. She felt inexplicably guilty to possess something that seemed so expensive, and so very ostentatious. At least for the waitress job, it wasn't really a choice, and the dress wasn't actually hers, despite it being tailored to her measurements. Even still, putting it on should  have made her feel better. Dessa was never one to show much skin, and she had always preferred to hide her too-thin body with hoodies and formless sweatpants. Those clothes were her armor against the world that would judge her body as insufficient. But this gorgeous lavender gown was not armor. If anything, she felt more naked than she had just wearing the damn shirt. When she put it on, it seemed to fit itself to her petite frame as if magic was woven through the fibers, to give the dress the ability to form to her shape like it had been made for her. She didn't need to look in a mirror to know that regardless of it fitting like a glove, such a dress wasn't meant for someone like her. She was a pauper pretending to be a princess, and it was such a blatant lie. The only thing that consoled her was that the long sleeves covered the symbol on her arm. She couldn't remove it from her skin as far as she knew, but at least she wouldn't have to see it for the moment.

The last  fucking thing that she wanted to do was be seen in such a dress, especially by a man - and a Fae man, at that - but she knew that it was unlikely that he would let her linger on the other side of the room for the rest of her miserable life. So trying to shove down the guilt, embarrassment, and fear, she tiptoed around the partition. To her surprise, the beast was using the closed trunk as a makeshift table, and he was spreading out food across it like he expected her to join him for a picnic. You can't be serious?   She wanted to ask, her mouth falling open slightly.

Without glancing up at her while he arranged the food, he asked,

"Are you hungry?"

Oh. My. God. No!

Dessa's mouth snapped shut and she wanted to throw herself in the fire all over again. She hadn't even thought about food until that moment, she hadn't had a chance to realize that she was terribly hungry. In her nightmare. She was never hungry in her dreams. No, no, no! This couldn't be real, though! This couldn't really be happening to her. None of it made sense! She had to be in a coma, right?

"No," Dessa lied too quickly.

She remembered what Auntie had told her on more than one occasion: Never eat or drink something a faerie offers to you. You would never be able to leave their world, if you did. At the time, Dessa was a teenager, and she had thought that her aunt was metaphorically trying to warn her against human danger, intending for her to be cautious of someone drugging her and locking her up in their creepy basement. She didn't want to find out if her aunt was right about partaking in such things in this imaginary place. It already felt like she would never escape this world, but she couldn't risk the possibility of sealing her fate. How could the woman know about all these things? Had she had dreams like Dessa's? Had she ever met a Fae? Or was she just a crazy person who had read too many books about the magical creatures, like how Dessa had begun to think of her as she got older? She would never really know the truth. Short of a stupid séance with a Ouija board, she had no way to ask Auntie the questions that she should have asked back then. She had always avoided asking any  questions, and had always hoped that those haunting conversations would end sooner rather than later. She knew that if she had asked anything, it would only cause her aunt to ramble more. Dessa was always eager to change the subject as soon as she could do so without upsetting the woman. Now, those unwanted, ominous warnings were the only things that Dessa had to defend herself with here.