❝I'm overwhelmingly human. Sorry to disappoint.❞
Luna Flores hasn't had an easy life. And after moving to Beacon Hills, it isn't about to get any easier.
Forced to uproot her family's life in Arizona, Luna hopes to find respite in the unknown, quie...
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"It makes me tremble. To think back. I remember exactly how I thought life would be." — Anne Carson
LUNA FLORES COULDN'T sleep, which seemed to be the usual lately.
Her heart felt as though it was going to burst and she stared up at the kitchen ceiling, grappling with the fact that every night she would find herself waking at ungodly hours, eyes red and blankets tangled from all those moments of tossing and turning. Tonight was yet another night to add among the others, an invisible tally mark adding itself into the mix, etched in dark pen. She brought a cup of coffee to her lips, full of cream and sugar and oat milk, and continued sitting by herself at her kitchen island, staring out the window over the sink that peered out into the backyard.
The backyard seemed as nothing more but a mere border between her house and the woods, filled with piles of dead leaves from the large white oak tree that resided close enough to her upstairs bedroom window that if she ever desired, she could slip right out and secure herself to branch, hanging two stories off the ground without ever having to worry about falling.
Normally she sat out there, bringing out one of her many mythology books and reading under the moonlight in an attempt to live out something that felt even vaguely poetic. And she would read out there for hours until she saw the curve of light peaking out behind roofs and pine trees and horizon. Then, she'd clamber back inside her bedroom, always always always knocking a few things over, and lie in bed until her eyes forced themselves closed, and when her mother, already knowing the answer, would ask what time she went to bed, she'd look away and lie. Though, the bags underneath her eyes gave the real truth away.
Tonight, however, she was feeling antsy and restless and bored. Her insomnia often affected her this way, resulting in her pacing around her room or her backyard or making sudden collages or trying to solve the JonBenét -Ramsey case at three in the morning once she had hyper focused on the activity. Coffee was helping her prepare for the latest stupid idea, which was going for a walk in the woods. For most, caffeine made insomnia worse, the sugar attacking everything at once, but for Luna Flores, whose ADHD seemed to grow worse and worse by the second, she knew that once she got home from her little trek in the forest, she'd lay her head down on her multitude of pillows and slip away into the loudest snoring fest of her life.
It always started out with a jittery haze that would slowly slip into dreamless drowsiness, soon to be interrupted a couple hours later when her mother shook her awake.
She had only been wearing a sweatshirt. A blue one, with the name of a band she didn't really listen to, draping down until it hit her mid-thigh, a pair of baggy sweatpants underneath it. Inside her pockets was nothing but bear spray (a birthday gift) and a Swiss Army knife (a souvenir at a tourist trap gift shop not too far down the road). Northern California winters were cold, sure, but still much warmer than she'd expected, which meant that she could roll right out into the open in her pajamas for at least an hour without freezing to death. (She hoped.)
