A Deceptive Beauty

Chapter Six

Kaiden woke up with his head pounding. He was slumped against an object. His cheek was pressed against something cool. A groan came from the back of his throat. Carefully, he opened one eye and saw that he was leaning against a toilet.

His eyes widened and he quickly jerked back.

"He left me on the toilet!" he exclaimed in disgust to himself. Internally, he thought that perhaps the Beast left him there on purpose.

Kaiden angrily swore that he would get rid of the beast and his obnoxious ways. Both annoyance and anger filled his thoughts. He needed to calm down, otherwise his anger would raise the risk of him switching back.

After calming down a little, he slowly got up so that he could adjust to his surroundings. After switching back, he would feel disoriented. This time was no different. Also, he did eventually learn that he shouldn't get up too quickly.

Kaiden put his hands on the counter and leaned against it with his head hung. His head still ached. Closing his eyes, he waited for it to go away. After it did, he quickly washed his face, which was necessary after sleeping on a toilet with his face.

The cold water splashing on his face made him wide awake. Awake enough to remember that the Beast had taken control the night before.

"What happened?" Kaiden asked himself quietly. The last thing he remembered was that he was talking to Blue about roses. Roses that he thought the Beast had destroyed during one of his rampages.

He tried to clear up the blank memory in which the Beast had taken charge. But despite the digging, no images came up in his head. Kaiden clenched his fists in annoyance. He tried again for a few more minutes before giving up.

Sighing, he decided to get out of the bathroom to see what time of day it was. After he entered the room that the bathroom was connected to, he went to draw the curtains. Sunshine hit his face and made him quickly retreat back into the darker area. He let out another sigh and then sat on the padded chair in the corner of the room.

Suddenly, voices appeared in his head. He stiffened but listened to the mysterious whispers. It was a conversation between two people. He couldn't make out most of the words they were saying but he did catch a few words and the sound of their voices.

There was a low, deep voice and the other voice had a higher pitch. After hearing it a little longer, he figured that it was between a woman and a man. He realized that the man's voice was his own. The woman's sounded familiar...

He listened intently, struggling to figure out who the woman was. Luckily for him, the conversation replayed in his head, over and over. But the only exception was that he only heard the same parts over and over; the other parts were blocked from his memory. After the third time listening to it, he realized that it was a memory.

It wasn't until the fourth time before he paid attention to what they were saying and tried to figure out the pieces.

"Your...stop referring...name?" Kaiden heard himself say. He realized that he was asking the woman what her name was. He wondered where the conversation was happening.

Listening to the quiet whispers required a lot of focus and attention. But even then, it was hard to catch everything that was said. The woman's first answer was too soft to hear but she answered again later.

"Annabelle," he caught from the whispers. It had been so soft that he barely heard it. Annabelle, he thought to himself. It must be the woman's name. But who was she? And why was that name so familiar?

After pondering for a little bit, he didn't realize that the inner conversation was still going on. When he found that out, he quickly tuned back in.