Asulon: Where Secrets Lie

Chapter Three: Bree

 This chapter also seems super long, but hopefully you read the last chapter and realized that long chapters are not always a bad thing!!! This chapter is crucial to the story because a very important character is introduced!! Thank you so much for reading!! Please comment and vote!!

You should not use accessories and jewelry to make you beautiful. Instead, your beauty should consist of your true inner self, the ageless beauty of a gentle spirit. - 1 Peter 3:3-4

Knock. Knock.

I restlessly shift my bag from one arm to the other as I nervously wait outside the room door. A few seconds pass, and there is still no answer as I stand outside like a goon. I peer down at the slip of paper that reads “room 21”, and then I glance up at the painted number twenty-one, plain as day, on the white door.

Knock. Knock.

After a couple more moments, the soft padding of feet comes from the other side of the doorway. There is a little “click”, and the door opens a smidgen, revealing my roommate.

I know it is impolite to stare, but I honestly do not recognize the girl in front of me. She is absolutely beautiful and could probably be even more so if she did not look so depressed. Her black hair seems to glow as its wavy curls flow down to her elbows, framing her lovely face. Big blue eyes, the color of a cloudless sky, peer at me under long black eyelashes. This is definitely not the sticky, ringlet-haired cousin I use to play with in the sandbox. What is it with people being so attractive here? At school I am considered as one of the prettier girls, but now I feel so… haggard.

“Skye?” the girl asks in a soft, bewildered voice. Obviously she does not recognize me either.

“Uh, hey, Bree.” Her name tastes so foreign on my tongue. I am so used to calling a playful toddler by that name, not a beautiful supermodel.

Brianna opens the door a bit more and shuffles to the side, giving me just enough space to squeeze through.

“Nice,” I say as I step into the bedroom.

My cousin silently closes door behind her and then perches herself on a neatly made bed. “When I first arrived here I was the same way. Well, almost.” A sad smile slips across her perfect lips. “Did Aunt Elizabeth tell you?”

I only nod, not wanting to provoke a gloomy aura in the room with useless sympathy.

“Good.” She stands up from her bed and walks over to a small mirror setting on a dresser. “I guess that’s one less thing I have to explain.”

I quizzically raise my eyebrows, watching my reflection in Bree’s mirror. I am definitely a plain hag compared to my cousin.

“You might want to get ready for dinner,” Brianna suggests, glancing at me in her mirror. “Aunt Elizabeth doesn’t tolerate us being late.”

“Oh, yeah. Sure,” I stutter like a fool. There is something about Brianna that intimidates me, but there is another part of her that almost comforts me, which is strange since people usually do not have that effect on me. She is only a few months older than me, but I still feel like an insignificant other when I am in her presence, like I need to be taken care of or watched over; possibly because of her striking looks.

I make my way over to the vacant bed that I assume is mine. I set my duffel bag down on it and observe as the plush mattress sinks under the bag’s weight. I sit down on the bed, imagining that I am floating on a luscious cloud as I seep into the downy fold of linen sheets.

“Nice. Isn’t it?” My cousin’s voice snaps me out of my luxury. “But if you think that’s awesome just look outside the window.”

I reluctantly stand up from the soft bed and go to the big square window that separates the two beds. Its lace curtains gently flap from the breeze that flows through the open pane. I push them aside and peer out the screen. A huge cluster of green leaves on a thick branch is all I can see.