"It's like I'm running away from me,
it's like I've taken the puzzle in me
and left it scrambled for all to see."
__________________________________
When Arden Danvers' parents split when she was eight years old, she moved away with her dad from her...
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"But I'll confess I've just been obsessed, With life and death and emptiness, I guess. Can't you see all of the change in me?"
Empty - PVRIS _____________________________
PROLOGUE.
The world below looked small and harmless from the small window of the plane. Arden watched the lights of the city of Denver fade into the distance, almost wishing she could just stay up there forever, away from the world and the problems she knew she would face when she landed. In the matter of hours, Arden would be back in her home town, in a place she hadn't lived in since she was eight years old.
That was nine years ago. A lot had changed since then.
But her mom was back there, a hardworking nurse at the local hospital, and even though they kept in contact with each other and still had a good relationship, Arden never thought that she'd have to go back to live with her mother after her parents split.
However, tragedy struck, and Arden could no longer live amongst haunting memories and a painful reality. She was suffocating under everything that surrounded her in Colorado. Her dad tried everything he could to make it better, but when nothing worked, he became incredibly worried about her and insisted she get away from it all and go live with her mom. Arden didn't really understand the logic of it all...the guilt of what happened would follow her where ever she went for the rest of her life.
Arden could still see everything like it had happened just yesterday. Images flashed in her mind of the things she could never take back. The whole thing came in a flashing waves...red solo cups with bitter tasting beer, the feeling of music vibrating through the walls, three missed calls, the cool night air as she walked home, the look on her dad's face when she came through the door, her tear soaked pillow, black ink scribbled on a piece of paper.
It all stuck with her, it would all follow her...but she hoped being away from the place where it all happened might give her the chance to start over. Maybe, just maybe, it would be easier there.
So, in a few month's time, Arden found her room packed away in boxes, a plane ticket back to where her mother lived, and an emptiness inside her that she felt like nothing would ever fill.
And no matter how much Arden wanted to stay among the clouds, away from the devastation below her, the reality was that the plane would land and everything she knew would change.
She just didn't know in that moment exactly how much her life would soon change. Or that what was waiting for her back in her hometown was already emerging from the shadows.
