To celebrate the fact that J*A*D*E*S h
s*t*a*r*s/J*A*D*E*S
“Dad,” says Emma as she pulls out bread from the fridge, “do you want something? I can make French Toast or…”
“You have to get to work,” says Harry. “I am quite capable of making myself breakfast.”
Emma smirks. “Breakfasts are our thing.”
Harry pulls his iPad towards him, flicking it on and finding the news on the pad. “Really?”
Emma reaches for the iPad and takes it away from him. “At breakfast, at the Scott’s house, we don’t have phones: no iPads, no computers, no Androids or Blackberries, just us. Family time. So what do you want for breakfast?” asks Emma.
“I want candy!” says Rylee. She sings the words, she sounds nothing like Spencer or Sydney but her voice is sweet.
Harry turns to see Rylee, her eyes bloodshot and her face holding the look of someone who hasn’t slept. “Did you stay up all night?” asks Harry.
“I have a lot on my mind,” says Rylee. “Do you need help?” asks Rylee to her mother. “I can make the eggs. Dad should be back from his run in about five minutes. Don’t ask him about the blister.”
Emma chuckles, hands Rylee the eggs and milk from the fridge and they start making breakfast silently.
Harry watches them and reflects on their breakfast ritual: he and his wife reading a newspaper and Emma doing homework. He’d never visited Emma and Mario much in Hawaii. His work kept him busy and after his wife had died of a heart attack when Emma was twenty, he’d buried himself in work.
“Oh, did I tell you, Syd and I are in the Topaz dorm together now?” asked Rylee.
“I heard,” says Emma. Not saying that she saw it in a vision. “I think Nat mentioned it. You all packed? Or did you leave everything there when we were at the funeral?”
“It’s all there. You just have to drop me off, Grandfather are you coming with us?” asks Rylee. She pours the huge bowl of scrambled eggs into the pan with a practiced hand.
“I could go for a ride, would give me time with Emma on the way back. My flight back to New York leaves tonight,” he says.
“The offer of the beach house still stands,” says Spencer from the patio doors, her hands buried deep in her pockets and her voice is shy. “I’m sorry to intrude.”
Emma walks over and kisses Spencer’s cheek. “You are never intruding, you are family. Come have breakfast with us. You can zap the bacon, right?”
Spencer tries not to smile. “I just have to talk to Rylee.” She rolls her shoulders and Emma’s eyes cloud over and she resists the urge to touch her again.
“Mom, can you watch the eggs?” asks Rylee. Her hands break out into a slick sweat and she rubs them on her long shorts. She walks onto the patio just as her father comes in through the front door. He raises a hand of greeting to Spencer and she waves back, a sad smile on her lips.
“What’s going on?” asks Mario. He takes over cooking the eggs without Emma having to ask. He inclines his head to the patio.
“I don’t know.”
Harry says nothing, leaning back in his chair to catch a glimpse of what is going on outside but they’ve moved away from his line of sight.
Spencer looks down at the deck and takes a deep breath. “Look, I didn’t want to do this at school so I thought I’d catch you before we have to be there.”
“You’re breaking up with me, aren’t you?” asks Rylee taking a step back, swallowing hard. “No, Spencer, don’t do this….”
A pained look washes over Spencer’s pretty features. “I don’t know what to do, Lee.” She wipes the tears from her eyes. “I keep trying to figure out how I feel and I can’t. I just want this to end, this empty feeling inside of me, I want it gone. All I do is hurt you or I hurt Sydney. I can’t do that.”
“Are you in love with Sydney?” asks Rylee hotly.
“No. I-I-I don’t know,” says Spencer. That was the truth, she didn’t know.
“Then you need to find out,” says Rylee. “I know I’m in love with you. So here it is, you have permission to figure it out. But you’re not breaking up with me. You say you love me, you stay with me, but you are not breaking up with me. I am not giving up my bonding ring. I am not giving up on us. I refuse to believe that this fate and bloodlines thing will dictate my life. You are my life.” Rylee lifts up her shirt, showing off the handprints that still shown on her flesh. “This! This is love. You want to go on a date with Sydney, go for it. You want to kiss her, fine! You want to sort this out, great! But you are not going to break up with me, are we clear?”
Spencer laughs. “I should have known you’d say something like this. Exclamation points and all.”
“Yeah, you should have known! I don’t care. We always say we need to be honest, well, honestly, deal with it. Figure it out, I’m here, I’m going to wait till I die. Oh, wait, I don’t die unless I take this ring off. So….” She wiggles her fingers at Spencer.
Spencer kisses her and Rylee tastes the salt of her tears on her lips. Rylee cups her face. “I love you, Spencer Wheaton.”
“I love you too, Rylee Scott.”
“Now, come inside and have breakfast with me.”
Spencer nods and follows her girlfriend inside.
“Really, we need you to zap the bacon,” calls Emma, peeking around Mario and finding Spencer’s gaze.
Spencer removes the flannel shirt she’s wearing, the brilliant blue matching her eyes. “Honestly, you’d think these powers had a better use than bacon zapping.” She places the shirt on the back of a chair. Rylee turns on the radio and a slow ballad waffles through the room. “Oh no, no country music, you know I get hives.” Spencer slips past Emma and starts to spread the bacon out on paper towels. The bacon joke was from when she’d spent some time in Hawaii and Emma had her practice her power by cooking things with her power.
Rylee grunts. She turns the dial and finds a morning count down. “Better?”
“Da,” says Spencer.
“We’re speaking Russian now?” asks Emma. Mario cocks and eyebrow. “I do know Russian, Mario.”
“Damn FBI agents,” mutters Mario. “Always showing me up.”
“Emma, did you know that Spencer can speak Japanese?” asks Harry. He now gets up and removes the plates from the cabinet and Rylee pulls out the jelly and other things they need from the fridge.
“Yeah, she reminded me that I don’t speak it frequently,” says Emma. She bumps her hip into Spencer, who blushes.
“I liked Japan,” says Spencer.
“Then we should go,” says Rylee.
They all look at her.
“What?” asks Rylee. “You think I’m going to spend the rest of my life in California? You have got to be kidding me. No way. Travel, everywhere, I want to learn the secrets out there that people are hiding.”
Spencer smiles. “She wants to recreate all the places I lived,” says Spencer.
Mario separates the eggs, while Emma puts the home fries onto the plate, Spencer places the now zapped bacon on a plate. “I think that would be fun,” says Mario.
“Or dangerous,” says Harry.
“Yeah, I can see danger before it happens, Grandfather,” says Rylee, snapping her fingers. “I got that covered.”
“And I can blast it to the moon, literally – oh, we forgot toast,” says Spencer. She dances her way to the breadbox and as she removes some bread, she instantly toasts them with just a little bit of energy.
Harry rubs his chin. “Airplanes crash. Earth quakes, tsunami?”
“Bonding ring,” says Rylee carelessly, pouring the milk and orange juice into various glasses. She doesn’t see her mother’s frantic head shaking.
“What?” asks Harry.
“We didn’t tell him that, Rylee,” says Emma. She sighs. “Dad, the rings that Jo and Amy used to wear? They are rings of bonding, they bond an eternal to a mortal. Spencer to Rylee and if she keeps the ring on then she will live as long as she wants. She can’t die.”
Harry runs his hand through his short cropped hair. “Eternal?”
“Wow, you left out a whole chunk of the story there,” says Spencer. She takes over the narrative. “I am a descendent of Jesus H. F’ing Christ, who was a god, and who lived for eons. He had 13 pairs of boy-girl twins. He had a brother, Judas, who had more kids. We, s*t*a*r*s, are a convergence of those bloodlines.” She holds up her right hand to show him the ring. “He forged or created this ring to keep his mortal wife alive. I’m pretty sure he used ore from what was Mt Olympus and his blood to cool it, sealing his eternal DNA into it, anyway. Now, when soul mates pledge themselves to each other they wear the rings and until Lee wants to die, she’ll live.”
Harry reaches over and takes her hand; his thumb rubs over the silver of the ring. “Fascinating.”
“You simply can’t write about it,” whispers Spencer and then she winks.
Harry nods. “No, that I knew.” He is silent and Mario hands him a plate and refills his cup of coffee. “You are all taking this so, normally.”
“What isn’t normal about it?” asks Rylee, shoveling food into her mouth. “This is just our life. I mean, it sure as hell isn’t boring!”
Mario and Emma sit down too, eyeing Spencer and Rylee, who are sitting next to one another. There is no uneasiness, in fact, they keep sharing shy smiles.
Harry seems to mull things over and then says, “Well, at least you two have one another.”
Rylee grins and grabs Spencer’s hand, kissing her knuckles. “Yeah, that we do.”
Spencer grins, shaking her head and laughing. “Oui.”
“Ahhhhhh!” says Mario and Emma in unison.
Rylee flings a piece of perfectly cooked bacon at them, and they all laugh, falling into normal conversation.
s*t*a*r*s/J*A*D*E*S
“Matt will be here in ten minutes,” says Tegan. She dances from one foot to the other, and then decides to sit.
Amy munches on a piece of toast. “I’m not so sure about me not dropping you off.”
“Mom, he’s an excellent driver,” says Tegan with a wide grin. Amy shakes her head. “It will be fine. Are you heading up to da woods?”
Amy shakes her head. “No, Shelby is dealing with all that. I’m the liaison here in LA. Actually, I’m meeting with Emma today. She wants me to consult on a case.”
Tegan’s eyes widen. “Really?”
“I do have several psychology degrees, Tegan.”
Tegan shakes her head. “Oh, I didn’t mean it that way. Well, Spence was saying that Jo was going under cover? That she wasn’t going to have any contact with her for a while?”
Amy takes a sip of coffee. “Yeah.”
“You’re worried.”
“I always worry about her,” says Amy. “Just like I always worry about you.”
Tegan rolls her eyes and plays with her ankh. “Mom, I’m good. I swear, I’m all good.”
A horn honks and Tegan jumps up from her spot. She goes over, timidly kisses her mother’s cheek and says, “Don’t you worry about me, I have an arsenal at my disposal.” She rushes out of the apartment and Amy sighs.
“That’s part of the reason I worry.”
s*t*a*r*s
Abby rolls over in her dorm room bed and looks at the clock. It’s 8 a.m. She slowly gets up and starts to get dressed. She’d spent the night at Haven because Dathan was here and her mother was working an overnight shift in the ER. Natalie and Jayden hadn’t minded and Abby had enjoyed the last minute solitude.
Once dressed, she heads down to the main dining hall and gets some cereal. She sits at the first table and begins to pick around the floating marshmallows in her bowl.
“Do you not like the marshmallows?” asks a young man who is also getting a bowl of cereal.
Abby blushes. “No, I like them so I save them for last.”
The boy indicates the table. “Mind if I sit?”
“Nope.”
“You’re Abby, right?”
Abby raises an eyebrow. “Yup and you’re?”
“Liam Stone,” he says. He has sky blue eyes and messy dark blonde hair with copper colored highlights, he’s dressed in a bright orange tee shirt and is wearing shorts, and flip-flops. “I just transferred here. My dad had to leave on a business trip so Headmistress Summers said I could come a few days early. This your first year?”
“No, I’m a 3rd year,” says Abby. “What does your dad do?”
“He’s a US Marshal. Used to be an Air Marshal but now he chases fugitives,” smiles the young man. “He should retire but he won’t.”
“Ah that’s cool, how did you know who I was?” asks Abby.
“Oh, I was here during the funeral. I asked around.”
Abby’s eyes narrow.
“Oh, I’m not a stalker or anything!” says Liam, he holds his hands up. “I just,” he shrugs, “I don’t know, I just asked. So there is this dance thing tonight? We all have to go?”
Abby nods. “It’s an HIA thing. If you don’t go, you get Kitchens, which means you peel potatoes and get to serve your fellow students. Not the best way to start a Monday morning, let me tell you.”
Liam laughs. He pushes his cereal around and then takes a few bites. “So, do you need a date to this thing?”
“No, it’s like a huge mixer deal. Everyone talks to everyone else and the music is pretty good. It’s about seeing old friends and meeting new ones,” says Abby. “God, I sound like a geek.”
“That’s okay, geek is good. I’m not sure I’m going to survive without my phone, and my twitter, and my tumblr, and my Facebook,” he says. “I’ve never been away from a computer for more than a day.”
“It takes some getting used to,” says Abby with a nod. “We have computers but no twitter or any of that. Computes are strictly for research and writing papers. Of which, you will be writing many.”
“I’m sure I will,” says Liam. “Well, I am hitting the gym in a bit, do you want to join me? That is, if you work out or not, but I bet you do.”
Abby blushes. She does work out but not in the gym but in the dungeon. She shrugs. “Sure. Half an hour?”
He grins brightly. “Bring some music? I heard that CD’s are allowed but I just brought my iPod, I didn’t know.”
“I will dig something up, what do you like?”
Liam starts to walk away, and then turns, walking backwards. “Surprise me.”
s*t*a*r*s/J*A*D*E*S
“Is this Shelby Pryde?”
“Shelby Doyle,” says Shelby into her cell phone. She pulls it away from her ear and looks at the ID on the phone. It says private. “Who is this?” She instantly gets a bead on the whereabouts of the speaker.
“Oh, sorry, hi, this is Logan Fillion? I forgot I never gave you my number so I’m sure I’m showing up as some unknown number or something and….,” he pauses. “I’m rambling. I ramble when I’m nervous and I’m nervous, I’m quaking in my seat.”
Shelby takes a deep breath. Her brother. Her twin brother. She looks around and heads to a quieter place to speak to him. She’s shaking so she sits down on a bundle of 2x4s. “Hi Logan.”
“This is weird, right?” asks Logan. His voice holds a twinge of humor.
“Yeah,” says Shelby.
“It doesn’t have to be,” says Logan. “I know that we haven’t gotten off to a great start or anything. Hell, a bad start, I tried to corrupt your daughter and tried to bring some new dictator into the world through my own kid. I don’t have a great track record at the moment.”
“This is true,” says Shelby. “Where are you?”
“Um,” he looks around. “In my living room?”
“No, I mean, never mind, hold on.”
She closes her eyes and appears outside of his front door. She reaches out and knocks.
“Hey, there is someone at the front door,” says Logan. “I’ll call you back.”
Shelby is about to say something but he hangs up. The door whips open and he gasps. She holds up the phone. “I figured this would be easier,” says Shelby. “Can I come in?”
Logan’s face lights up into a smile. “Yeah, yeah, please. I gotta take notes.”
“Take notes?” She eases into the room.
“Yeah, I’m a writer and all this stuff, damn it would make an extraordinary novel.”
“Is Eden here?”
“No, she and Gaius are shopping. Thank goodness she has her own money, or I’d have to write about five more best sellers to support her shopping habit,” he laughs. “You want some coffee?”
Shelby nods her dark blue eyes feasting on the open loft. “This place is gorgeous.”
“Yeah, it is. When Eden asked where we should live, I told her here, it was way better than my one room bachelor pad. The living room feels like a church at high noon, but that’s okay. I like it,” says Logan. Shelby watches him.
“You look like Jon,” she says. “The eyes, the face too. I’m sorry.”
“No,” says Logan. “My dad and mom were both dark skinned, dark haired, dark eyes. Everyone always asked who I looked like. I always said I looked like my grandfather.” He shrugs. “I never knew.” He hands Shelby a cup of coffee. “Two sugars and two creams.”
“How did you know that?”
“It’s how I take it,” says Logan. He leads her to the living room, and to a comfortable looking couch. He sits and she does too. “I can’t dream about you. Dathan said its more than likely because we are twins, sometimes twins powers negate each other.”
Shelby nods. That is Logan’s power, he can dream of something, change it, and then dream about it again to fix anything he wants to get the reaction he wants. “I’m sorry.”
“Sort of refreshing,” says Logan. “I don’t see Gaius either.”
“Worried about that?”
“No,” he says, sipping his coffee. “I’d like to get to know you. I never wanted to know my family before. I had my family, my parents were great. They were perfect. I couldn’t have picked them better. But now I know where I get this writing bug. I know where I come from but I don’t know enough.”
Shelby laughs ruefully. “Jon never was my father,” she says. “If anything, Sean was more of a dad to me than he was. He wanted my mom to abort us.”
Logan nods. “He saw the pattern, don’t you think?”
Shelby sets the cup on the table to her left. “I think so. He was terrified.”
“I don’t think we are all too terrifying,” says Logan. He extends his hand. “I’m Logan Fillion, sometimes writer, sometimes teacher, father of Gaius, husband of Eden and your brother.”
Shelby can’t help but laugh. She takes his hand. “I’m Shelby Doyle, sometimes counselor at a school for wayward kids, sometimes teacher, sometimes hard ass, mother of Sydney Doyle and wife of Mike, and I’m your sister.”
“See, we have a lot in common already,” says Logan with a laugh.
s*t*a*r*s/J*A*D*E*S
Abby hugs Spencer and Spencer grimaces and sniffs Abby. “God, take a shower, will ya?” Spencer winks at Abby.
“I was working out. You know that no one arrives before noon,” says Abby. Her hair is pulled back in a ponytail, her shirt is drenched in sweat but she feels wonderful. She and Liam had bantered, had fun, learned a lot about one another. Abby had learned that he was raised by his mother, and that she’d died a few months prior. He was now living with a father he hardly knew. Abby had enjoyed getting to know him.
Abby sees Spencer’s eyes narrowing. “With who?”
“Whom,” says Abby.
Spencer swings an arm around Abby’s shoulder and whispers into her ear, “Is he cute?”
“Gorgeous!” says Abby spinning away from Spencer with a goofy grin on her face. “Where is everyone else?”
“Emma insisted on driving Lee, Tegan is off with Matt I think, and I have no clue where Syd is,” says Spencer. “Amy was supposed to stay in LA but I guess at the last minute she had to come over to the island for something.”
The entryway is beginning to fill up but they mingle with new students and a few old friends. Teachers were greeting some of the students too. Abby drags Spencer over to meet Liam, they all begin to chat. Rylee comes over, with Harry and Emma not far behind.
“Long time no see,” says Rylee, pecking Spencer’s cheek. Spencer gives her a hug and kisses her neck.
“No contact during school,” says Emma, wagging a finger.
Spencer rolls her eyes. “We can kiss. Other couples do, the Headmistress can’t do a thing about it. Unless she wants to go all homophobic. We aren’t snogging or screwing, it’s a kiss.”
“You guys are together?” asks Liam. His blue eyes shift to Abby. There is an almost panic in his tone. He shifts uncomfortably from one foot to the other.
“You have a problem with that?” asks Spencer, her eyes narrowed.
“Spencer,” growls Abby threateningly. “Quit being a hard-ass dyke, will you?”
“Ummm….,” begins Liam. “It’s not something I’m used to. My family is pretty religious, we don’t condone homosexuality in any form.”
“You will learn that at Haven Island Academy we do not discriminate. We do not condone any sort of discrimination. Your place is not to judge, young Mr. Stone, it is to learn. Part of learning is to accept and not oppress,” says Dathan. His towering frame heads above them.
“You shaved,” says Abby sweetly. She reaches up and pats his cheek. “Mom talked you into that, didn’t she?”
Dathan’s eyebrow lifts. “She did not. Mr. Stone?”
“Sir,” says Liam, inadvertently gulping a large swallow of air.
“Will there be a problem with the nature of Miss Wheaton and Miss Scott’s relationship?” asks Dathan.
Harry nudged Emma. She shrugs.
“No, sir, like I just said that well, my family is religious….”
“Might I remind you, also, that the Bible is made of many stories, many translations, and many, many, many passages that were left out,” says Dathan. “Do not let a book rule your life, instead, let it inspire you to seek your own answers.”
Liam brightens slightly. “I’ll take that into consideration.”
Dathan pats Spencer on the back. “Try not to hurt anyone today, not all are as easy to sway as your family.”
Spencer snorts. She turns and watches Sydney walking into the entryway. She’d felt her arriving, the air around her had changed. Sydney spots her and she waves, Spencer lifts her hand to wave back. She sees Jayden leaning over Natalie’s shoulder and kissing her. Not a friendly peck on the cheek. No, a full on kiss. They more than likely think that no one can see them, but Spencer can. Spencer growls. It clicks. The anger about everything is there full force and Spencer lets it overtake her better judgment.
“What?” asks Rylee. She turns around to look at what Spencer has locked on to like a heat seeking missile. She sees Sydney, so she doesn’t understand the growl.
“I’m gonna kill her,” says Spencer. She pulls away from the circle of friends.
“Kill? Sydney?” asks Abby. She hustles after Spencer but she’s too quick. “Damn one legged freak is faster than me,” mumbles Abby.
Spencer pushes past several people picking up amazing speed. Natalie sees her and eases away from Jayden. “Afternoon, Spen…”
Before Nat can finish, Spencer pulls her left hand back and punches her, hard. Natalie is shoved completely off her feet, landing hard on her back. “You fucking two faced homophobic bitch,” says Spencer in a low threatening voice. “You separate me from Lee, but you are kissing my barely legal aunt? Get up so I can put you down again.”
Jayden grabs Spencer and drags her away from Natalie, but not before the population of the entryway has seen what happened. Jayden adds bulk to her frame, holding off the tirade that Spencer is about to release on Natalie. “NO!” orders Jayden. But Spencer pushes at Jayden, getting loose from her grasp and heading back towards Natalie.
Sydney is there first, she grabs Spencer’s face and forces her to look into her eyes. “Hey, hey, focus here. What are you doing?” asks Sydney. “Spence, talk to me here, what is going on?”
Spencer snaps out of the odd daze that seems to have come over her when she’d seen Jayden and Natalie kissing. The brunt of what she’s done ripples over her and the anger starts to melt away from her.
Jayden turns and helps Natalie to her feet. Blood gushes over her lips and chin. “First broken nose?” asks Jayden. She touches Natalie’s nose and Natalie slaps her hand away in annoyance.
“My office, now!” says Natalie. She takes her bloody hand away from her face, grabbing Spencer’s upper arm and leading her towards the stairs. The other girls, Emma, Harry, Jayden and Dathan make to follow her. “Oh no, this is not a conference.”
She lets Spencer walk in front of her and they marches up the stairs. The pain in her nose and face is making her eyes water but there is no way she’s going to the medical office now, she’s going to take care of this.
Spencer opens the door and sits on the bench by the far wall, and not the nice padded chairs that visitors sit in. The anger is gone but she can’t look at Natalie. Her fists open and close to the beat of her heart and her face is screwed up in varying degrees of emotion.
“What the hell was that?” asks Natalie. She finds some tissue and mops up the blood on her lip.
“You lied,” whispers Spencer. The anger comes back, but not as deadly as before.
“I what?” asks Natalie. “I lied? When did I ever lie to you? I may not have told you everything but I never lied to you, you are seventeen you are not an adult who gets to know everything! I am the adult here, not you, Spencer!”
“Fine, you didn’t lie, you omitted the truth. You are fucking my aunt, who is three years older than me!” yells Spencer. “Don’t even deny it!”
“What I do with my personal life is none of your business,” says Natalie. Then she softens and takes a deep breath through her mouth. “I’m going to talk to you outside of my position at this school right now, Spencer, do you understand that? I’m going to talk to you as the girl who took care of you when you were a baby, changed your diapers, taught you French, sang you to sleep every night. The woman who cried at night because I missed you so much.”
Spencer swallows hard, tears threatening. She nods once.
“I spent a long time trying to figure out who I was once you were gone and with Jo. This school, it became my life. My heartbeat, just like music is your heartbeat. Now, I found someone who makes my heart beat faster, in Jayden,” says Natalie. She does a spell to take some of the pain away, and then kneels in front of Spencer, but out of arms reach. “I love her. The same way you love Rylee. Eternal and talent.”
Spencer snorts. Then shakes her head, she puts her hand to her face the words click into place for her. “What?”
“Love happens, she’s pretty spectacular, Jayden, and you know what a soul mate bond is like, it’s the same thing with us.”
“TMI,” whispers Spencer. “I don’t care that you’re with Jay. I care that you didn’t tell us, you hid it and you walked around this school and told me that I can’t room with Rylee. Even when you know we would never disrespect you by having sex here. Never do that to the other girls, either, but you never trusted us so you never found out.”
“Noted.”
Spencer stands up. “I’m sorry I hit you, ’m having a – a really rough go of things right now. I just lost it.”
Natalie stands up too. “I can understand that, but as your Headmistress, Spencer Wheaton, you’re suspended for the remainder of the six week semester.”
I’m About 2 Break
8/20/04
JG Marie
I’m breaking
I’ve lost my mind
I grasp at straws
I’m drowning in the sea of bullshit
All of which I’ve echoed
I have lost my way
I wanted something pure
Our love was tainted
Take it away
I don’t care anymore
It seems the farther I fall
The more welcoming the ground
The words on the tip of my tongue
Lost in the rumblings of my mind
Haphazard thoughts rush through me
How is it the world has turned its back on me
I’ve turned into the leper that I once was
Humble me
A funny thing happened to me on the way here
I lost my mind
What was left of it
Now I seek what I’ll never find
as now reached over 900,000 reads -