Living In Lies | #OnceUponNow

Chapter 19: Dreams

     Then, my eyes opened.

     "You're finally awake,"

     I was laying in a bed, but no ordinary bed, no. This bed was located in none other than a mental hospital, an asylum. What? What is this? It can't be real, can it? Or is it a...

     I looked to my right. In the bed next to me sat a very familiar face: Melody.

     How? What's going on?

     "So, how was your nap? You should probably call Hannah. She wanted to see you once you woke up," this was said by a person to my left. Chelsie...

     I sat up to take in my surroundings better. I soon reach down to my wounds, or where they should have been. They were gone, almost as if it never happened...

     I look around to see everyone. Elizabeth, Symphony, Elaina: patients. Jhane, Heather, Callie, Lillian: assistants. Heather is currently making small talk with Elizabeth, like old times.

     "Ah, so you are awake. I guess the rumors are true," Hannah says as she walks toward me. She is wearing a nurse's uniform. My eyes seem to light up at the sight of her.

     "Hannah! What's going on? Where are we?" I ask, craving answers.

     "Stephanie said you might have minor amnesia after the procedure," Hannah said, speaking more to herself than me.

     That name, Stephanie. It sounded so familiar, yet so new. Who was she?

     "Procedure?"

     "You broke your arm, remember? Maybe climbing up the side of the wall wasn't such a good idea, huh? We had to take you to Stephanie so she could replace the broken bone with metal,"

     Stephanie. Who is she? I must ask.

     "Who... Who is Stephanie?" I plead.

     "Your doctor of course! You really can't remember anything can you?" Hannah says, writing something down on her clipboard, "Hey, speak of the devil,"

     "How are my favorite girls doing today?"

     As soon as she walked in it clicked. I had seen her before. I recognized that brown hair and those hazel eyes...

     Mom.

     My mother was here. Here. Standing right in front of me, alive and well. I soon felt my eyes tear up and began to cry. Not with sadness, no, with joy.

     She walked up next to me looking worried.

     "What's wron-" she begins, but I don't let her finish. I attack her with a bear hug.

     "I-I'm so s-sorry," I stutter, sniffling.

     "You should be..."

     My mother was no longer speaking in her joyful, kind voice. She now spoke in a crude voice, a voice very much unlike her own.

     "And now I will finally get my revenge..." my mother pries herself away from my embrace.

     Her face was full of anger and disappointment. I, however, saw a hint of an unreadable emotion, deep in her eyes. Tears were still streaming down my cheeks, but were no longer of happiness. They were now filed with fear.

     "No... Please... I'm sorry. I truly am..."

     "It's too late for sorry's,"

     My mother then pulls out a gun. A scarily familiar one as well. It was the exact same gun I used to kill father.

     "No..."

     I looked at her hand and saw a very well known ring. A silver snake wrapped around my mother's finger. It's red ruby eyes shimmering in the light. Melody's ring? Where did she get that?

     Two gun shots and everything went to black once again.