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Sorry about the last chapter. I didn't get to edit it much since I've been grouchy. Yeah, having wisdom teeth yanked out is not fun. And no, the painkillers are not fun. (Shakes head) nope, they aren't. I can't read or think with them! ARGH!
How did the great writers do it?
Anyway, I hope you enjoy this chapter and LEAVE A COMMENT! Or...you know, vote. I know you guys are reading the chapters. Just tell me what you think...Please. Pretty please with sugar on top?
Song for this chapter:
Brick by Boring Brick by Paramore
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Chapter Six:
Plastic Roses
Once upon a freaking time, I had a prince.
Yeah, yeah, I know how cheesy that sounds, but it’s true. No, he didn’t come to save me on a white horse with a big sword to save me or anything like that. It all had to do with an accident.
I sat by the wolf as he slept peacefully while I petted him. His fur began showing its original silver color under all the mud and blood. His ribcage expanded and deflated as his body curled around me like a protective father before he blinked a few times and stared up at me without saying a word which gave me comfort. I texted Cooper and told him that he can go to the mall without me; that I was too sick too go. He was thankful and said he was happy I finally took care of myself.
My lousy fairytale like prince came soon after my scars finally healed. My mom didn’t want to go back to Ocean City until my scars healed up to ward off infections, so we lived in this small house with my step grandparents who lived in the woods similar to the one near the school. The small gated community was supposedly safe from all the bad things in the world, but a few weeks after we moved in, a kid suddenly disappeared after he went to explore the woods. This made my whole family go on a paranoia alert and cling to me like I was made of glass.
Not that this stopped me. Instead, Hanuel and I explored the woods, but he got bored with his little sister for being so slow and left me behind soon after. I didn’t mind really because I liked the silence in the woods even with the faeries talking, whispering. It was like the trees whispered deadly gossip to one another and laughed at me. I learned by then to keep my mouth shut about the faeries, but they still scared me.
Plop!
The sound reminded me of how Hanuel would throw stones into the small stream when he got bored. I climbed down the rocky ledge to find Hanuel when I began to hear crunching noises and for some god forsaken reason, I got more curious and followed the sound until I saw a reddish hue in the water that slipped between the stones, branches, and sticks.
Plop! Plop! Plop!
I smelled something funny as I continued to go upstream to find Hanuel. The smell reminded me of rotting meat and perfume, but I didn’t think twice of it because Hanuel, who acted more like a dog than a human, thought that smells that attacked the nose were a good thing. My stomach churned at the smell as I got closer and closer until I finally found more diluted red in the water and heard loud plop! Plop! Plop!
My body froze.
The lost boy’s organs made the noise as they fell into the water, but the green ogre with long yellow nails snatched them out of the water and stuffed his mouth. I barely recognized the boy since his body looked so mangled with his empty eye sockets and his skin on the right side of his face ripped off while his jaw remained open in a horrid silent scream. The ogre worked on the rest of the boy’s body with his ribs poking out of the mass of ripped, bleeding flesh before the ogre took a bit out of the boy’s head and kicked it into the water.
I can’t be sure what I felt first. The sick realization that the kid was never going to hug his parents again, the horror of watching another human being get eaten, or the fear of having the same fate, but I felt all of these in an ugly twisted mixture that made my heart pound and tears well up in my eyes.
He licked his fingers before he noticed me and grunted.
“You can see me? You can see me! Haha, how funny! Human girl, come to me. I’m still very hungry and you look perfect for dessert.”
I let out a scream before turning to run, but the ogre snatched me by the leg and pulled me into the air. He already had his jaw opened when I passed out.
Then I slept in the warmth of my bed as I rolled over to find that night settled. Lots of thoughts crowded my head. Was I dead? Was Heaven always dark like a summer night? Am I in a coma like I was in the car accident? Did I get eaten whole? Or did the ogre smash my head against a rock?
“Hello, fluer.”
I looked up from under the covers to see another faerie. He didn’t look nearly as scary as the ogre, I realized, but his skin reminded me the color of mud and his hair was a royal purple that I’ve seen princes and princesses wear in fairytales. His blue eyes studied me as he smiled at me. He smelled of herbs and flowers while warmth radiated from his body as he sat on my bed. I then saw the translucent wings and the pointed ears.
Bursting into tears, I flung myself to the ground and hid under my bed and used toys and books to block him. “Go away! I don’t want to see you! I don’t want to see monsters anymore! GO AWAY!” I screamed as I hit his hand with a toy sword.
He pulled his hand back and peered down so that I could see his pretty blue eyes. “Why would you want to be an ignorant human? I can understand why you’re scared, but why would you want to be like the others in your world? That seems awfully boring, princesse.”
I sniffled as I scooted back from him.
“Please, I mean no harm, princesse.” He reached out his hand. “Do you want to know the secrets of the fae? I can teach you all of them, cher. I can teach you how to hide and be safe and pretend to be as ignorant as the rest of the humain.”
The offer tempted me so I grabbed his hand.
Later, I found out that he took me home in a human guise and told my mom I passed out when I found the body of the lost boy. He then glamoured himself and sat up in my room until I woke up.
He hung out with me and played with me, protected me. He taught me about what to do and what not to do around the other faeries. He taught me about vampires and werewolves. I did research too as I got older, but he always had that one detail I needed. We danced in the sand. Well, actually, he danced while I stood on his feet. He kept me sane.
One day he left though.
For two whole years I felt like a princess, but I turned back into a pumpkin.
“Be strong,” he told me. “Do not let them scare you. Do research and find our weaknesses and once you are full grown, come and find me.”
I never did though. Because when I grew up, I stopped believing in princes, but I never forgot about the monsters.
“What are you thinking about so deeply?” The wolf asked to pull me from my thoughts as he opened his eyes. “I’ve never heard you so quiet. You usually talk about some human business.”
“Oh nothing,” I lied as he sat up and turned. He took a deep sniff of me.
“Liar.”
Oh great, so when I lie I have a scent now?
“Nothing important, I guess,” I admitted, “Drake is sure weird though. He protects me, but he won’t tell me why and I don’t see why the Lunae-whatever court would want to protect me. I’m just another human, correct?”
“Hmph, you really don’t know, do you?”
Well, that’s arrogant. “Okay smartass, why don’t you tell me then.”
He opened his heavy jaw when someone broke through the silence, “I can’t believe you ran off like that! Like a child born of the street! Like a common thief!” Drake yelled insults and worries at me as he flew over to me. “You shouldn’t have left me there without a word! You are not mute! You could’ve given me a secret code to where you were going or some sort of hint! I know that is not too difficult for you considering everything!” I rubbed my head. How can one person’s voice bring on such a bad headache? “Do you have any idea how worried I was about you?”
“Gee, you’re screaming is a good hint,” I said as I rubbed my temples. Drake’s face flushed a little at this. “Okay, okay, I’m sorry. Gee, what is with you?”
The wolf snorted before resting his head on the ground again while I threaded my fingers into his fur.
“I am supposed to be your protector so when you run off like a wild child and I have no sense of where you are, I will panic.”
“Clearly,” I said as I yawned. I wanted to curl up by the wolf and sleep, but Drake would start on his yelling again. “I’m going back to my dorm. My body is angry enough with me as it is for the hell I put it through.”
Drake’s whole body deflated and blinked a few times at me. “You’re…going to sleep?”
I nodded. “Yeah, of course, why’d you look so surprise?”
“You’re going to let your body heal?”
“Uhm yeah, could you please quit looking at me like that?” I asked him. His eyes just stared at me like I was his kid and for the first time in years, I listened to him when he asked for something. “It’s creepy.”
He shook his head as if erasing the look on his face. “Forgive me, I was unprepared for this, but I am grateful.”
†
I slept. And slept. And slept.
It’s not the dreaming kind of sleep. It’s sort of a dead sleep where the body doesn’t move and my head remains blank. There’s something absolutely beautiful about this sort of sleeping.
Drake slept next to me as I listened to my Ipod. Sometimes the songs broke through sleep and startled me for a split second before drifting back to sleep.
“Don’t tell me about old lovers.
Don’t tell me about the passer bys.
Tell me something new.”
I opened my eyes and checked my phone to find that it was late Sunday afternoon. Cooper texted me and sent me pictures of white plastic flowers that he thought I’d like for the homecoming dress and something that said, “Alex helped me out.”
“What are those flowers? They aren’t very attractive. They look rather sickly if you asked me.” Drake said as he looked over at the screen of my phone.
“They’re plastic roses.” He tilted his head at me before I explained, “Fake roses.” My throat didn’t feel nearly as bad and my muscles only ached not burned. The bruises turned dark and a sickly yellow around the edges.
His face twisted into a disgusted frown. “Fake roses? What’s wrong with the real ones? I know that you humans have decent roses with heavy thorns and with many different colors of petals.”
I rolled my eyes when I heard something hit the window. “Oh god, now what is it?”
Drake flew off my bed and went over to the window. “Fawns.”
“What?”
He looked at me and then the window. “A couple of fawns are outside, demanding your presence, but they hold no weapon so they’re pitifully defenseless. They are harmless at worst.”
“And at their best?”
“They are harmless and have information for me.” He explained as I got out of bed before getting on a pair of jeans and throwing on a jacket.
I looked out to see a girl who looked about thirteen with blonde tasseled hair and freckles sprinkled on her cheeks as well as some mud and dirt. Twigs stuck out in her hair and a small pair of antlers stuck out with her pointed ears twitching at every sound. I looked down to find her without clothes, but this didn’t bother her because she had hooves for feet with fur climbing up her legs until her hips. A boy with jet black hair stood behind her with black fur on his legs. His antlers were a good deal larger and his face didn’t have the freckles. He towered over the girl in a protective manner with his muscular, slightly hairy arms folded over his chest. He had a few scars on his chest and shoulders while the girl only had a scar on her hands that were folded up in a prayer as she stared up at me.
“No,” I said as I opened the window.
“I knew we would find you! Good for us too because my big brother here,” she jabbed her thumb to the guy behind her as he scowled at me, “we got lost! And-”
“Don’t you blame this on me! You’re the one who just had to see the human world.” He said through gritted teeth.
“Matty, at least hear their proposition.” Drake said as he eyed the two.
“And what are you going to do if they have nothing for you?” I asked him with my hands on my hips.
“I’ll still help them.”
Why did I have trouble believing him?
“You could’ve told me no. You are supposed to be the responsible big brother, aren’t you?” She asked him with her hands still clasped together.
“Are you really going to resort to that argument?” Her brother asked as Drake gaped at them like a fish for a moment.
He turned his back to me before he said, “I’m going back to sleep’s embrace.”
I grabbed him by the wings. “Uh, no, you’re not. If I have to deal with them, Mister all powerful guardian-slash-protector, then you’re going to have to help.” I turned my attention back to the fawn girl. “What do you want?”
“Oh,” the girl turned back to me as she smiled sweetly which made me think that she was ninety-nine percent evil and one percent good, but that one percent could make her look like an angel. “We just need you to help us get back to Faerieworld.”
“Oh for…What kind of faeries can’t get back to our world?” Drake asked as I let him go.
“We’ve never been here before! And our home is a bit complicated to get there.” Drake looked like he wanted to throttle her as he slouched over a little. Who knew Drake could lose his king of ice mask? I guess lack of sleep makes him cranky.
“Sorry, I don’t go anywhere near your world. That’s not in my job description,” I said as I began shutting the window.
“Wait!” She squeaked, “If you come with us and help us, we’ll pay you.”
Drake’s ears twitched and his back straightened.
“What exactly will you be paying?” Drake asked.
“I am not going to let you sell me out, you understand me?” I yelled, but Drake ignored me.
“Do you have anything in particular you wanted?” The fawn’s brother asked.
Drake dug his hand into his pocket and pulled out a small glowing light before he explained, “I need to go to Hero, the metal girl, but as you can see, I can’t go and personally attend to my business with my ward here. I need a reason to go and I’m sure my ward here needs a few things from Fae to help protect her.”
The brother looked at his sister before nodding. “We agree to your terms.”
“Good,” Drake then looked at me, “Get ready Matty, we’re in business.”
My left eye twitched.
Have you ever had a moment when you were so mad that you weren’t really sure how you could have your revenge because you had so many damn ideas that you couldn’t quite be sure which one you liked the best? Well, this was me. There’s always the chemical option since faeries can die with that stuff. It’s a slow painful death, but I’m wondering if its too slow.
Drake didn’t even look at me. “Do not give me that look. We both know that you do not want a bunch of fawns walking the ground of your human school anyway. This kills two goblins with one ax if you get my meaning.”
“They’re harmless. I can live with harmless faeries.”
The girl fawn pouted and folded her arms over her chest. “I can be very terrifying if you must know.”
“Oh please,” I said with my hands on my hips.
“How dare you underestimate us! We are powerful creatures that have lived through all the poisons of humans and-” She stopped her stupid rant because her brother put a hand over her mouth.
“How much do you want?” He asked as Drake tugged on my shirt.
“I am not going near your world. I think you should get that. I am not your biggest fan,” I tried to explain, holding my hands in the air. “I may not be the brightest person in the world, but I have enough sense to not go near your world.”
“You’re scared.” Drake said out loud as the two fawns both glanced at me.
I stood there for a moment as my eyes darted around them. I quickly looked away and folded my arms over my chest as I said, “Well, sorry for not wanting to be around your Alice in Wonderland world.”
This always had been the image of Faerie in my head.
Drake flew in front of my face which made me want to flick him, but he had an odd expression on his face that I couldn’t read. Then again, Drake had never been real easy to read. His eyes were darker than usual and her lips were in a deep set frown. He sighed heavily which caused his shoulders to sag a bit.
“Matty, I’ll protect you,” he reminded me. He sounded so sincere like he was Hanuel, telling me that there were no monsters.
“For some reason, that doesn’t make me feel better.” I told him bluntly as Drake’s cool demeanor fell apart.
“Why you-”
“Please, my lady,” the brother asked me as my stomach dropped and then the girl gave me a big-eyed look. I sighed and got a small bag before leaving my room. Everyone in the dorms remained silent, probably because everyone needed to do homework or study for a test the next day that they had been putting off for awhile and the rain didn’t really help.
I looked up at the grey clouds above me. Maybe it was a bad omen for me going to faerie world or something. I didn’t like thinking about this so I ignored it as I walked over to the fawns.
“We appreciate this,” the fawn boy said.
“Oh shut up and point me the way, Drake.” I ordered as he flew in front of me into the forest. We snuck out through the broken gate and we went into the forest without incident.
“Thank you for doing this for us.” The fawn girl said as I ignored her. I stuffed my hands into my pockets. “Really, it’s very nice of you to do this.”
Leafs crunched beneath my feet. They had all the pretty colors of autumn; yellow, orange, and red. Trees towered over us, but the deeper we got in the weirder things got. The air tasted different on my tongue. It didn’t taste moist and like dirt, but almost sweet like food was cooking nearby. My palms started to sweat and my mouth went dry like cotton balls. I started losing feeling in my legs.
Do not go in there! Do not go there! Do not go there! There are monsters in there!
“Matty, focus on me and not of anything else.” Drake whispered as the fawn girl kept talking happily.
“Oh, is that the hole to the market place?” The fawn girl asked as she ran in front of me to where there was a hole in a large tree. “I can hear them, big brother!” She cried out to us as he walked ahead of us.
She jumped into the hole and her big brother followed.
“Everything will be fine, Matty. Nothing will harm you in my protection.” Drake kept whispering my name like a prayer or a chant. Please, oh god, don’t make me go. My feet dragged me there for a moment. I closed my eyes.
And jumped.
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For some reason, I couldn't think of a song for this chapter. I picked a random song that seemed to fit, but I don't know. I do hope you enjoyed this chapter and leave a comment. Sorry, there wasn't as much action as I usually like. They'll be lots and lots of action in the next one, promise! Oh, to writers out there, do you guys have a playlist that you listen to when you're writing one story or another? Or is that just me?
II'd love to hear what you guys think. Or vote. Or write a comment. Please? Please?