Sorrow's Promise

Chapter 1

Welcome!  I've been posting this story on fanfiction.com for a while now, but I realized I could be sharing it here, too.  A little bit of information that you should know:

1. I will be posting new chapters of this fic twice a week, on Mondays and Thursdays.

2. This fic is rated T for violence only. No sex or language.

3. There is a Trigger Warning for Domestic Violence. Verbal and physical, nothing sexual. I will mark each affected chapter (there are several, ranging from a couple of sentences to an entire chapter) with the trigger warning, and will also include a censored version of the chapter below the original. If you prefer to read the censored version, just keep scrolling down until you see the double line. That's where the chapter will begin again. The censored versions will include brief, non-detailed summaries in italics, in place of the potentially triggering moments.

Hope you enjoy!

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TRIGGER WARNING FOR THIS CHAPTER. SEE CENSORED VERSION BELOW THE DOUBLE LINES.

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It was happening again.

Waking with a start and a deep gulp of air, I blinked against the early morning light that was slanting through the bare window beside my bed. The dreams were back. The ones about the two boys, and the girl who looked just like me, but wasn't me. Those same dreams that I had been having off and on for as long as I could remember – which, granted, wasn't very long.

Somehow, though, something was different this time. I rubbed my eyelids with the heels of my hands, trying to connect the pieces before I was too awake and they slipped away. The kids were older again, aging with me just like they always had. Their early days of playing on the beach were long gone. But that wasn't the only change. Finally it clicked in my mind – they weren't together anymore. It had been a long time since I had last seen those three in my dreams, but in the past, they had always been together. Despite the fact that I knew they were just a product of my overactive imagination, they had always felt so real to me, which meant that the sadness I had felt from them in the dream was leaving me with a lingering sense of melancholy.

Glancing at the bedside clock, I yawned and stretched my arms up over my head. This was much earlier than I usually woke up. I was definitely going to need some coffee. Rolling gracelessly off the bed, I staggered the few steps to the kitchenette and grabbed the coffee pot to fill with water. Snippets of the dream still played through my mind as I punched the power button and heard the device gurgle to life.

Before long, a mug of hot coffee was in my hand, and I leaned up against the metal window frame to sip it, looking out over the street below. Apartments like mine didn't come with a great view of the city like those swanky, high-rise places. The only things to see here were cars whizzing by, the windows of the office building across the street, and occasionally a person walking down the sidewalk. It was still a nice distraction, though, especially if I could people watch. I found it amusing to come up with names and potential destinations for any pedestrians I spotted. It was one of those things that I wouldn't ever tell anyone else about, because they would probably think it was stupid, but I had been doing it since I was a kid.

It didn't seem to be quite enough to shake off the heaviness I was still feeling this morning, though. Maybe I needed to take a walk, instead. Yanking the baggy t-shirt I had slept in up over my head, I tossed it onto the bed and pried open the rickety closet door to pull out jeans, a tank top, and a lightweight hoodie. Once dressed, I ran my fingers through the longer portion of my asymmetrical purple hair, slipped on my flip-flops, refilled my coffee mug, and left the apartment, locking the door behind me.