The Curse of Once Upon a Time

Chapter XI: Under the Bleachers

As somebody who had experience in hiding from people during lunch, the first place that Serenity thought for her and Salvadore to meet was under the bleachers. It was the perfect hiding spot for her. People rarely went down there and they would get the chance to talk to each other.

She had spent some time thinking about it. While it was true that Salvadore hadn't given her a reason to distrust him, he hadn't given her reasons to trust him either. He had answered one question and he hadn't even been very specific about it. Maybe it was just Daphne trying to get her to trust him.

Her plan was to see how specific he would get with her. If she could get him to tell her something that was really private about what Daphne had been talking about, then she was guessing she could trust him. She just had to pinpoint which parts Daphne wouldn't want them to know. She couldn't give him points if it was easy.

If she knew that she could trust him, she'd be able to pivot from there. She was hoping that it wouldn't be too hard to trust him. She really wanted to believe that he was on her side and he had just made a mistake. Whether it was proof that her brother was a human capable of making mistakes or that he loved her and had been trying to think fast, it would feel nice to know if he had made just a silly mistake.

Once Serenity knew that she could trust him, they would be able to create a plan from there. She just didn't know if there would be time to determine if she could trust him though. There needed to be a way to figure out if what he was telling her was private or not.

She ducked her head under, peeking around to check if Salvadore was around. She pulled her phone out from her pocket to double check that they were still meeting there. If he chickened out of talking to her, then it was obvious that he was hiding something.

She would need the chance to talk to him so they could create their plan. They couldn't dive in headfirst without a plan. It would all fall apart if they tried to. They needed some order.

She was glad that it wasn't long before Salvadore ducked under the bleachers. "Hey." He said. "Are you feeling alright?"

After discovering that she had a demon living inside of her, Serenity wasn't sure that alright was the best word to describe the way that she was feeling. She was still alive and she was trying to ignore it, but it wasn't easy to ignore.

There was something living inside of her that was working to make her life a train wreck. That was never a good thing to hear. She just couldn't tell that to Salvadore. To explain how she was feeling, she had to explain the demon. If she explained the demon, she'd been telling him too much before she knew if she could trust him.

"I'm fine, I guess." Serenity said. "Before we start trying to make a plan, I want to ask a few questions."

"Okay. Go ahead."

Serenity wanted so badly to just ask what he thought Daphne wouldn't want her knowing, but it would get her nowhere. She needed to ask somewhat specific questions, but enough that he wouldn't know what she was doing. It was a fine line.

"Why does Grandmother think that there's a demon living inside of me?"

"She thinks that you're cursed and she thinks the demon is the reason for that." Salvadore said. "So she thinks that by getting rid of the demon, she'll be able to get rid of your curse."

Serenity frowned. She had overheard that part, so she knew at least that he was telling the truth. Daphne had definitely thought that when Serenity had been listening. She thought that Serenity was cursed and she wanted to get rid of it.

What else could she ask that she wanted to know? She wanted to know a million things, but she couldn't ask about the Tellers. As far as she was concerned, nobody else knew what the Tellers were or that they existed at all, so that was out of the question. What was still on the table?