The Death Dance ✓

Chapter Seventeen - "It's high time you woke up, don't you think?"

Chapter Seventeen – “It’s high time you woke up, don’t you think?”

 

Jamie felt like she couldn’t breathe as she watched Aaron flickering in front of her and then disappearing. Her hand reached out and met with air as Aaron completely disappeared from view. She heaved in a desperate shaky breath and got up to her feet, closing her eyes and imagining herself back in Kelechi’s house.

She appeared in the sitting room with the signature loud crack and Richard was instantly rushing to her and wrapping her in his arms, “Oh goddess, I was so worried!” he said softly, holding her tightly.

Jamie hugged him back even tighter, inhaling his scent, her heart racing in her chest.

I promise I’ll find you.

Aaron’s words echoed in her head but she didn’t let Richard go. She was scared. She couldn’t leave the man that had brought her up for the past five years. But the more she thought about home – her real home – the more clearly it seemed to come. She could hear her mother’s laughter, her dad’s jokes and her big brother being the over protective soul that he was.

She choked on a soft sob. She had a big brother.

She couldn’t help herself as more memories kept hitting her, the time Brandon broke his arm when he was eleven and she had to laugh because he was being funny about it, the time she fell off her bicycle when Brandon was teaching her how to ride when she was six – her mum getting promoted and them sharing a luxury by going out to dinner together, dad getting promoted so they were able to move from the slumps and into the city. The soft chorus of the happy birthday song in the wee hours of the morning as she, Brandon and her mum snuck into her dad’s room unsuspecting to surprise him – the handmade birthday cards, her drawings and passion to become a fashion designer just like her mother.

God, she missed them.

The only thing holding her back now was the fear. The accident with her mother was hazy in her mind but it was still real. There was no way her mother could have survived – it was a head on collision and besides, she’d heard the doctors.

But her dad, Brandon – they needed her back at home. Aaron was right, she was only dead if she disappeared from Aethereus – the fact that she was still here only meant that back on earth she was in a comatose state.

“Jamie,” Richard whispered.

The finality in his voice made her cringe and hold on to him tighter, burying her face in his neck.

“Aaron’s gone, isn’t he?” Nicholas asked softly from the other side of the room.

She nodded into Richard’s chest and finally, the tears burst free from the dam, soaking into Richard’s shirt.

Richard stroked her hair silently, “Jamie, it’s time.”

“No, I can’t –”

“This isn’t the Jamie I know. The Jamie I know has a motto. Do you want to know what her motto is?”

She sniffed, “what?”

“I can.”

“It’s high time you woke up, don’t you think?” Kelechi said with a soft chuckle and Jamie pulled back from her adopted father’s embrace, staring into his face. His ears twitched at her perusal and she couldn’t help a watery giggle.

“Nice ears,” she said but it came out on a sob.

Richard’s jaw clenched and Jamie knew he was trying to be strong for her and that just made everything better and worse at the same time.