13 Dances (A Seventeen Fanfiction)

-3-

I woke up in my bed after another dreamless night. Or whatever they called it here. Sabrina sat in the chair next to my bed. "Was it a nice dance?", she asked. I sat up. "Where is he?", I asked back. "Who?" "Seungkwan?" "I told you I am the keeper of memories, dear, not omniscient. I don't know more than you. Finding him is a task for you", Sabrina told me. I looked at her unamused. "Well, but is he here? In this world?", I continued. "No", she simply answered before getting up and leaving the house. I ran after her. But before I could ask anything again, she cut me to the chase: "How did you sleep by the way?" "That is not sleep", I said salty, "That is existing without being conscious." She tilted her head as she looked at me. "Well, we gotta have patience", she concluded. "For what? What are we waiting for?", I yelled at her. She held up her finger. Discussion over. "Answer me, darn it!", I demanded. She shook her head and walked away. I tried to go after her but in the wilder parts of the vast garden, I simply lost track of her. She was surprisingly fast for someone who didn't run. Frustrated, I sat down in the grass and huffed. Okay. Let's have patience then.

The problem was, I didn't even know what we were waiting for and Sabrina wouldn't tell me. So, I started doing more and more flower crowns. But I soon lost interest and instead focused on drawing the rose arch. Sometimes I even picked a rose, whispered stuff like "Open sesame" to it and waited for it to light up. But it never happened. I varied the methods, whispering to the flower before picking it or not saying anything but instead trying to think of the room. But no matter what I did, it didn't work. So, I started to draw the room from my memory instead.

I sat on the front porch, focusing on the ball room portrait I had almost finished as Sabrina came. A bit annoyed by her not telling me anything, I ignored her. If she could do it, so could I. She sat down next to me and watched me. We sat there in silence as she suddenly sighed satisfied. "Isn't it beautiful here?", she asked me. I huffed. "What? Don't you think so?", she continued amused. "Why am I even here?", I gave back. "Answer my question first and I will answer yours eventually", she told me. I looked up. No way she'd actually tell me. But it was worth a try. "It's nice but I don't want to be here. I wanna go home. To my real home. Plus, as far as I remember I have an important question to answer", I said. She looked at me with such an intense look that I almost broke off the eye contact.

"You're not ready yet", she then shrugged, "That's why you're still here." I blinked confused. "Okay, what do I have to do to get out then?", I investigated. Sabrina was unusually talkative today. "Have patience", she smiled mysteriously and I groaned. "I had patience so long already, can't we do anything?", I complained. "Come", she ordered me and stood up, almost disappearing in the garden before I grasped the situation.

We stood in front of the rose arch again and I looked at Sabrina expectant. "Am I going to the ball room again?", I wanted to know. "Don't disturb me", she gave back and I sulked. She picked a rose and again whispered something to it. I wanted to know what she was saying so badly but I'd rather not asked. Sabrina held the rose towards me. With a slightly nervous feeling inside me, I took it. The arch lit up, the strange liquid appeared again. "Who am I meeting this time?", I asked her. She held her finger up to her lips and then pointed to the arch. Go, see for yourself. Well, okay then, I would. It was better than being here all day. I went through the strange portal and found myself in the ball room again. Nothing had changed but it seemed like my dancing partner still needed time to dress up, so I bravely took some steps forward, looking at all the filigree ornaments and trying to implement them in my head for the picture later. Suddenly the door swung open and someone came in.