BOOK 3 of the ORPHIC Series
CHURLISH
/ˈCHərliSH/
marked by a lack of civility.
~~~~~
Lucille 'Lucy' Opal Baker finds herself in the 21 century sporting the title of Aunt while lugging along h...
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"The only real prison is fear. And the only real freedom is freedom from fear."
Wakanda, East Africa October, 2016
IT HAD TO BE SENTIENT.
Time, that is.
It moved faster or slower whenever it liked, and made no room for people to control. Time was evanescent, but it also wasn't. It was constant yet it somehow fluctuated from the mind's eye. When someone does something they enjoy, hours pass by like minutes. But when one doesn't do something they enjoy, the hours feel like grueling days, lasting for far too long. They had nothing to do but stare at a clock and watch the seconds tick by.
Lucy knew what it felt like to count the seconds that passed. There had never been a clock in their cells, so she'd always have to think about the time, and somehow, with all of the pain, time would move slower, agonizingly. Her time of torture somehow doubled with HYDRA.
But, she also knew what it felt like to have hours turn into minutes. When she sat and watched a movie with the team, time flew by. When she sat besides James as they talked over cups of hot chocolate, time was nonexistent. During those occasions, time moved faster than a bullet train. Yet those small, tiny moments, made the bad so much more tolerable.
She guessed she should have been less concerned about the amount of time which passed. Because the past few months wouldn't have been grueling, wouldn't have been as debilitating as they became. Lucy pulled herself out of bed everyday just to continue living, climbing back into her cushions once she acquired enough sustenance.
A part of her knew she shouldn't be acting so depressing when she had so much good in her life. But James was all the way across the country and Lucy felt so painfully guilty, because it was really all her fault–all of this.
If she'd gotten James somehow up the mountain and left herself in the ditch, all they would have had was her. HYDRA wouldn't have ever been able to get their hands on James. If she'd listened to them, then maybe–maybe they wouldn't have kept James.
That's why she had to ask.
"You know that's bullshit, Lucy." Henry sighed from across the room. "They would have kept him anyway."
Her phone blared from beside her bed, sitting on her bedside table. Henry was sitting on a couch, a book in his hand. She snuggled into her blanket, wrapping the fabric tight around her shoulders. She lay on her side, looking down at the fabric of her bedsheets.
