The Curse of Once Upon a Time

Chapter XVIII: I Wish

Serenity had wanted to go back to sleep, but she hadn't been able to. She couldn't remember much of what had happened. She knew that she'd had trouble breathing, but the rest went blank and then she had woken up in the hospital to Eryx.

Where was everybody else? She was assuming that if she had been in such a terrible condition that she'd wound up in the hospital, her parents would have been called. Eryx had gotten her there, but he wasn't her family and nowhere near a legal guardian. She was pretty sure that the hospital would have had to call somebody that took care of her and let them know what had happened.

Having nothing else to do, Serenity took the time to get out of her bed. She knew that it wasn't the best idea for her to be moving around, but she didn't feel anything hooked up to her. She had machines around her, but none of them kept her breathing. All she had was the nasal cannula, but it could move around with her.

Often, when she was bored, she would resort to reading the Book of Tellers. It had taken a few minutes, but peering into the darkness of her room, she found that her bags were resting on the floor. Normally, when she was in the hospital, she was allowed to keep some of her things, but only if she was going to be staying there for a few days. She was praying that she wasn't going to be there for days. She'd spent enough time in the hospital.

Serenity searched through her satchel, thankful that it was still in there. If somebody else had gotten a hold of it, she didn't know what she would do. She wanted to figure out what it meant and the only way to do it was by trying to untangle all the passages. So she flipped to a random page, opened up her notebook, and started to translate it.

Once she finished writing all of it down, she tapped her pen against the page and read it over again. It seemed almost like the passage was a monologue with the lesson right at the very end. She was beginning to believe more and more that each passage had been written by a different Teller. They all seemed to be a different style of writing paired with a different message. It was interesting and annoyingly confusing.

Compared to the last one that she had read, she thought the monologue and lesson was easier to understand. She still didn't understand what the last one had meant. She had half of a guess to it, but she couldn't understand the rest. Maybe if she could ever find Saige again, Saige would be able to tell her what it meant.

By the end of the passage she'd read, it left one clear message. Receiving nothing is the same as receiving a sign. It was like a relationship. If people were going to commit to a relationship, they both had to put effort into it. Both sides had to be working together to get a good result.

If one side did nothing, then they weren't willing to keep up the relationship. If they stopped trying to make things work, it was a sign that they were done and things weren't going to work out. There would be no reason to keep putting into something that was already dead.

She sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. It took a while to sort through all of the symbols. She wasn't sure that she wanted to do another. She was tired, her head was drooping, and her eyes felt as though they could glue shut, but she still wasn't sure that she would be able to fall asleep. Her stomach still rumbled and ached with curiosity.

"I wouldn't rest just yet."

"Holy shit." Serenity slammed the book shut, looking over her shoulder to Saige. "Would you give me some sort of warning? You appear out of thin air."

"I apologize. I was looking for you." Saige said. "You're aware that once you're out of here, you'll go back to your family and judging off your arm, your experience the next time won't be so fun."

"It has never been fun to interact with my family." Serenity grumbled. "Whatever. There's nothing I can do about it anymore. It's the end of the road. I knew I would get there, I just didn't know that it would be like this."