Fayre

Chapter VII - I'm Not Crazy, You Are

I wake up from the dream, gasping in pain again but this time I wake up with my hand clutching the pendant at my chest.

The heart shape feels wrong - the weight, the energy, the memory.

I slowly drag myself out of the bed to stand by the window and stare out into the night. The moon is bright but the lake is covered by thick fog. It looks just like in my dream.

A little sliver of memory from the dream flickers in my mind and I try to hold on to it. I want to keep it. I play it over and over in my mind so that I won't lose it.

He slips a shiny, star-shaped copper pendant that hangs from a black leather string around her neck. One side is carved with the image of the sun while another is a crescent moon.

The girl's hand flutters over it. Touching it excitedly. "It's beautiful, Ciarán. I've always liked it."

"I know," he says. A tiny smile curves the corners of his lips.

Slowly, I trace the shape of the pendant in my hand - wrong shape, wrong weight, and wrong feel. My heart craves for another.

A lonely tear runs from the corner of my eye slowly down to my chin. I'm sad. I've been sad for a long time.

Something moves in the foggy shadows outside but I don't hide or cower away like I usually did. I know something is down there. It's not just my imagination.

I spend the rest of the night lying in bed, thinking. Remembering. I lie in bed till the morning sunlight dances around my room, chasing the shadows away.

Today, I'm weaker than yesterday but I'm eager to start my day. I have a purpose. I have something to do.

After I shower and dress, I walk purposely into Luella's room. She's already downstairs having breakfast just as I expected.

I hear the sound of mom's voice floated from downstairs, so I stop on the threshold, a little surprised and a little anxious. I look back, to make sure that nobody's coming before I go in further. I haven't been in her room for years. I thought her room would look at least a little like mine but now I see that it's not.

Mom had her interior decorator friend decorated my room. Everything is professionally planned- from the neutral dove grey walls to each piece of the furniture, from the funky, colorful pillows on top of my white ruffled bedsheet to the glittering chandelier above my bed.

I think Luella gets to decorate her own room. The walls are painted light blue with posters everywhere. The furniture doesn't match but I know they're exactly her taste. There are pictures of herself with Jesse and a few of her other friends taped to the mirror of her vanity. Fairy lights are hanging above her bed which is at a far end corner away from the wall of windows. The bedding is red with canary yellow and white flowers. There are red bean bags in another corner. Her study table is by the window with her laptop lays open. There is no theme or rhyme and reason to the way it is decorated but it shows her personality.

She has a big, wooden jewelry box on top of her dresser. I rummage through it, careful not to make too much noise. There is a lot of jewelry in there but not the one I'm looking for; a star-shaped copper necklace with a black leather string. The one with one side carved with the image of the sun while another, a crescent moon. The one from my dream, the same one mom gave to Luella years ago after she took it from me and replace it with the one I'm wearing now.

When I can't find it in there, I look in a smaller jewelry box on top of her vanity. Then I go through her drawers. Still nothing.

"What are you doing?"