Reaper's Lily

30 (part 1)

(this is a very slight trigger warning for: bullying! enjoy the song i have posted for this part above. it's one of my favorite instrumental pieces. happy reading and thank you for the reads :] )

Liliana's P.O.V:

I opened my eyes to see I was in a bedroom. Slowly, I attempted to sit up but fell back down when I placed my weight on my left shoulder. I grabbed it with my right hand and thick gauze was wrapped around my left shoulder, including around the collar bone. I sat up, seeing that I was in a thin silky black dress. Slowly, I scooted off the mattress then I stood up to look around.

No...

I was in that basement, and I felt my entire body going numb with sorrow. It wasn't sorrowful for the thought of being back here, it was the sorrow of remembering the painful memories. I walked to the broken concrete stair, holding onto my bandaged shoulder with my right hand. Walking up the stairs, my broken heart was in my throat, beating unevenly. I grabbed the doorknob with my left hand, twisting it, and pushed the old slightly broken wooden door open.

There was a bright white light shining in my face as I stepped out the door. I took a step out the door, seeing I was in a field of black flower in the middle of the night. Off in the distance, I saw my father's ranch he owned in Arkansas. The thing that tipped me off was a brown and white spotted cow that he got for me to take care of whenever I visited him. I walked towards my father's ranch, smiling at the thought of seeing him. With each step I took, my left shoulder throbbed slightly less and less in pain. Soon, I found myself running to the front door of the farmhouse.

I knocked on the door, but no one answered.

"Dad?" I called out to my father, knocking on the door one more time, then waited for him.

No one came to the door for a few minutes, then I heard mooing and a young girl screaming. I ran to the fence towards the back, near the field, and stopped as I saw my father helping a little girl who couldn't have been no older than nine or ten up. I opened the fence, hurrying to them. I stopped in mid-run and stared in shock. This was the day that I had met that cow and it had scared me when it mooed at me suddenly while I was petting it.

"Mija, you have to be gentle with this cow," my father cooed, helping younger me up, and started to help me dust off my bottom.

"Daddy, I was careful. This heifer just doesn't like me," the younger me whined.

"Watch your mouth, mija," my father scolded me, and it made me smile. He sighed, adjusting his glasses, then said, "You have to be gentle with these animals."

"Like I have to be gentle with Dan and Ian?" Younger me was still proving how much sass I always had in and that made my smile turn into a smirk. Then younger me pouted more, "Why are you always getting onto me about my temper when Daniel and Ian always get to do what they want?"

"There's a reason for that, mija. I think we can keep this a secret between us," my father crouched down, getting to younger me's eye level. I remembered this as he explained, "You're the only girl for now until your tios have girls of their own. That means you are special to the Soto bloodline."

I felt my eyes getting teary for some reason as younger me's eyes lit up and exclaimed, "You mean I'm not worthless like Mom says!"

My father only placed his hands on younger me's shoulders, and said, "You are a very special girl that will turn into a very strong young lady. You have a certain light about you that your brothers will never have and for that, you will always be the gem in my eyes. Do not listen to what your mother or anyone else tells you. You only need to know for now that you are part of an extraordinary family, and being a woman in this family means you hold something magical inside of you that no one can ever take away from you."