Lumen (Fyren Trilogy #1)

Part 1

HOME

Arella took the last of her boxes up to her room, the stairs creaking under her weight as she made her way up. It will be some time before she got use to these creaky new stairs.

She nudged open her bedroom door with her foot, and shut it as gently as she could. The lights in her room were off, and she left it that way as she waited for her eyes to get use to the dark. She maneuvered her way carefully among the various boxes, packages and the odd bundle to an empty spot in a corner of her room and dumped it on the floor gratefully, glad that her stuff had been sorted out from all the other stuff left in the living room. She gave a tired sigh and fell on her bed, her eyes making out the faint outlines of the lamp on her ceiling, her mind going back to the events that had happened in the past weeks.

It had been a rush as she had to move to this new town with her parents. Correction, she thought to herself, moved with her FATHER, as tears slowly welled up in her eyes. She wiped her wet eyes and tried to quell her feelings, not wanting to cry on the first night in a new place. Her parents had an argument, a terrible one. Her mother had screamed at her dad, calling him a useless person, for her dad still did not have a job at that time. Arella knew her mother was in one of her bad moods again, and did not actually mean what she said, but her dad had taken it seriously. He said he had enough of her looking down at him, and that he worked hard keeping the house in order while she worked outside.

Her dad had stormed out, not returning for the night. The next morning, her dad had returned and announced that he had applied for a divorce, and that he was taking her under his custody. Her mother was shocked, not knowing that her words had affected him so much, and had disagreed to it strongly. Arella had hoped fervently that it would not happen, it was just a nightmare, and that her mum would fight for her. But somehow, without any job, her dad had pulled it off, and taken her into custody. It was only after her parents' divorce that her dad had revealed to her, he has a job; he was a writer, and quite a good one. That was how he could support himself and her as well. He already started it for a few months, and kept it a secret from both her and her mother.

They had moved back to her dad's hometown, Redwater. Ronald Curtis spent most of his early years there until her grandparents, his parents, passed away in a car accident, so Redwater held a lot of memories and inspirations for him. They found this house after a short time, and had moved their stuff from her mum's house and moved out a week after her parents' divorce. Her mum was allowed to visit them once a month, but Arella knew that her busy work would not allow her much time to visit them.

Arella sat up slowly and walked to her window, pulling apart the curtains and looking outside. Her window overlooked the neighborhood, and gave her a great view of the night sky as well, the millions of stars that light up the sky every night since they were here. Most of her neighbors were already asleep, their houses shrouded in darkness, with only streetlights lighting up the road in front of her house and the occasional light from a window. Someone was working overtime again. She could see the city centre in the distance, where the lights never seemed to dim, where action never stops, people never seemed to sleep.

I don't really hate living here, Arella thought quietly, although it's a big difference from the cramped apartment they lived in the big city previously. It's much more peaceful here, quieter, a place where her thoughts can be free without it being interrupted by sounds in the night. It's just that.... it's all too sudden, I'm just not used to it yet, she said to herself. 'Miss you, mum,' she whispered quietly, and a tear slid down her cheek silently, and this time she let it stay there, the teardrop shining like a diamond. She hugged herself as a gust of wind blew in from a crack somewhere in the wooden structure of the house, the chilly wind adding to her loneliness.