Amaranthine

21: A Long Journey

THE YEARS FOLLOWING MY DEATH AS FREYA BURRELL ALL PASSED BY AS A BLUR. When I woke up in 1920 as a 16 year old girl, my past life felt like yesterday. And for me, it was. Though 32 years had passed since I'd died as Freya, it had all gone by in the blink of an eye for me. I found myself out of touch with the world. It wasn't that I lacked knowledge. No, I could simply search the memory of my host for that. It was because of Dio.

Leaving him had left a void within me. The world felt like it had lost its magic, but maybe it never had any in the first place. Maybe it was just Dio who'd made me think the world was so bright. Everything had gone back to normal. No vampires, no zombies. But it was so . . . boring. I couldn't let him go even as more years passed. I'd still dream of the events that led to my death and rebirth. I would dream of Andrew with his head fused to a dog's body. His eyes haunted me. And so did the words of Beatrice, who'd asked me to die for her simply because I could. It was hard to tell myself that not everyone thought like her. It was also hard for me to believe that in trying to avoid my own death, I'd managed to unknowingly speed it up by using hamon while my body was under the effects of vampire venom. Sometimes, my dreams would end differently. I'd wake up a vampire. I'd get to see Dio again. But no matter how different my dreams were from reality, I always opened my eyes to the same ending. The real ending. Life wasn't just some fantasy where everything ended happily. Life was painful.

At first, I wanted to search for Dio. Maybe find those hamon masters so I could learn to control my power. And if Dio was alive, Zeppeli was certainly hunting after him, so maybe I'd be able to see him again. But the people who could help me were who-knows-where and I had no way to contact them. So I gave up. I didn't look for Dio on my own. He had told me once that he would live forever as a vampire by hiding in the shadows, and I believed him. But even if he was still alive, it would be near impossible to find him, especially in a new body.

But the real reason was because I was afraid of facing the people I used to know. I was scared they might not believe me or recognize me. And the thing that scared me the most was the idea of Dio not recognizing me. He was everything to me, and most people were nothing to him. Getting back into his life would be complicated as someone else. And I still worried what he might think of my immortality.

So for years, I didn't even try searching for anyone from my past. Instead, I just walked wherever the path of my new life was leading me. I hated it, but I told myself it was for the best. I immersed myself in the world around me in the hopes I might drown in it. Only then could I forget about Dio and all the regrets I held. But the past caught up to me as it always did. I was shocked to see a familiar face on a winter's day in New York a couple years after I awoke in my new body.

There hadn't been many people outside in the snow as I'd walked and there were even fewer people who wanted flowers at this time of year, so I hadn't expected to bump into the woman exiting the flower shop as I was trying to enter. Apparently the woman I bumped into had thought similarly and was equally surprised to find resistance when leaving.

The middle-aged woman gasped. "I'm sorry!" She exclaimed. "I wasn't paying attention."

When she looked at me, her eyes widened a bit at the sight of the scar on my face that stretched from the side of my jaw up the left corner of my mouth and halfway up my cheek. My eyes widened too, a pang of emotion striking me suddenly and making me grimace at its strength. The woman quickly schooled her expression and smiled in a soft, unspoken apology. But the reason I'd grimaced was not because of her reaction to my scars. It was because I hadn't seen her face in so long.

My throat was dry. "I . . . I wasn't looking either," I admitted, choosing not to speak the words I truly wanted to. It was easier just to pretend I had no idea who was standing in front of me. "Sorry." I forced my eyes away from the woman, glancing at the bouquet of yellow roses in her hands. It was a nice bouquet, but what really caught my attention was the ring on her left ring finger. So she'd gotten married. I'd have to get used to calling her Erina Joestar, then. Ah, not that we'd be talking much. My heart sank at the thought. It was for the better, though. I smiled softly and stepped aside so the woman could leave.