Chapter XIV: One by One

3 0 0
                                        

Serenity had wanted to argue against Eryx. She had wanted to tell him that she didn't need his help and that she could do it on her own, but the sad truth became that she couldn't. She couldn't do it on her own. There was far more risk if she did it on her own. She wanted help and it seemed like the best way she was going to get help was through Eryx.

"You alright?" Eryx asked, nudging Serenity's shoulder. They'd had almost no idea where they were going. Serenity just said they needed to go. It wasn't a great plan, but she hoped that with some of the time she had spent figuring out hotels that she would be able to find out where she was going soon.

After about two hours of driving, Eryx had stopped at a hotel. They'd gotten a room for one night. They had one night to figure out what they were going to do. There was not enough money to stay at a hotel for much longer. Eryx's father had been nice about what had been going on, but he didn't know how long they would be gone. Eryx had kept out the mention about Serenity's arm being cut by Daphne.

As far as alright went, Serenity was the farthest thing possible. She didn't know how to describe it. She didn't want to talk about it. It was impossible. She still hadn't processed what had happened. She didn't know what had happened in the house. She hadn't even thought about it until she had been sitting passenger in the car with her arm bandaged up.

What had happened?

"Serenity, are you okay?" Eryx repeated. "Come on, I know things aren't that great, but please talk to me. Tell me how you're feeling, even if you're not feeling good."

Serenity shook her head. "Eryx, I get that you're trying to help me, but I really do not want to talk about it." She whispered, wiping her eyes before she started crying. "I just want to go to sleep."

Eryx sighed, shutting his eyes. "You're never going to get anywhere trying to keep your feelings bottled up."

"I know, but it's easier to keep them bottled up than it is to talk about it." Serenity said. "I just can't talk about it right now. I don't even understand what happened. I'm not in the mood to talk about it at all."

"Okay." Eryx muttered. "I'm going to go pick up some food. Please stay out of trouble until I get back."

Serenity wished that she'd had the energy to make some sort of remark back at him, but she just watched him leave the room in defeat. She was too tired to do anything. She felt like it was the end of the road. Before, she'd had hoped that she would know what to do, but when it got down to it, she was lost and she didn't know where to go anymore.

She would have tried to go to sleep, but she knew that she was too stressed out to just go to sleep. Serenity thought that with the pressure of school being gone, she might get the chance to sleep more. She felt deathly tired, but her mind didn't want to rest. She was busy thinking.

There was too much to think about. She couldn't go on her phone either. She didn't want to see all the texts from her family wondering where she was. She knew that she couldn't have trusted Salvadore, but she felt bad seeing how concerned he was.

Despite never truly knowing if she could have trusted him or not, she could tell that he was really worried. But she didn't think that she could respond. She didn't want to risk it. It was better to keep her head down and keep moving.

Without her phone or sleeping as an option, she thought that the best alternative was to read the book. She was interested in it. The book was a magnet to her thoughts. It was almost all that she could think about. So when her attempts to do something else failed, she took her notebook and the old book from her satchel and sat down on the floor to start reading.

She took a couple of minutes to redo the entire alphabet in her notebook so that she'd be able to translate everything. It made her angry every time she thought about Daphne ripping that page out of her book. She had no right.

The Curse of Once Upon a TimeWhere stories live. Discover now