Beyond the Broken Angel

CHAPTER THIRTY

— what is to come —

August 8th, 2018

GISELLE WAS CALLED back two days after finding out that she would get to experience something no one else beside Selene ever could—the ability to live out World War II in real time despite being born decades after it.

Only Selene and Dorothy were home when she felt the tree call her, so she quickly bid them goodbye before grabbing her suitcase and heading towards the door, hellbent on going home and researching all that she could about what is to come.

Selene grabbed her wrist before she could leave.

"Don't look him up," Selene had told her, her eyes hard and unmoving from Giselle's. "Don't look any of them up."

"Huh?"

"Don't look up and see if Will dies in the war or not," she explained, her expression deadly serious. "Just don't. I got curious decades ago and looked up to see when everyone died. I saw my husband's death date, and Will's parent's death dates." Something dark and haunted took over her features as she looked off. "I thought I could prevent them—but I couldn't." Her eyes shot back to Giselle. "I don't want you to think the same thing. You can't cheat death, Giselle. You can't play God."

Giselle's stomach dipped. She hadn't even thought about looking that up. "I won't," she said breathlessly. Selene stared at her for a few extra seconds before bowing her head and letting her go.

The journey back was uneventful—if you call traveling forward eighty years into the future uneventful.

As soon as she walked into Hester's house, she spared the woman no greeting. Instead, she trudged straight up the stairs to her room and grabbed her phone from where she had left it charging on her bed.

There were a few notifications, mainly her parents and Ajay trying to contact her and then asking if she was back yet. She assumed they took her long silence as a no.

She didn't bother replying to them, immediately clicking onto the internet icon on her phone to begin researching. She spent the next hour finding out everything she could about World War II in Great Britain.

With each new fact she acquired, the prickly feeling in her abdomen worsened, especially when she found out that Gentilly would be hit with stray bombs during the air raids due to its proximity to Frobisher, a large industrial city. She assumed Dare Manor was spared from it all, but couldn't find any information to support her assumption.

To stop thinking about the bombings, she made the mistake of starting a documentary about the British Army during the war. Her stomach violently contracted when she watched a scene that panned over a line of fallen soldiers laid out on a dirt path. She scanned over the faces to see if any of them were Will, blowing out a breath when she couldn't find those hooded eyes and dark hair.

The idea to look up his name started to entice her, but she shot it down immediately.

She shut her phone off after that and laid down flat on her bed, staring up at the ceiling. She decided lock all thoughts of World War II away in a vault in her brain. She labeled it "To be opened one month before September 1st, 1939."

She'd deal with her troublesome thoughts then, but one troublesome thought pushed to the forefront of her mind.

It was the thought of Will dying.

Her body physically reacted to that thought, bile shooting up her throat as her heart plummeted in her chest. Her blood ran cold as she bolted to the bathroom attached to her room. She grabbed onto the ledge of the sink as a wave of nausea seized her.

Her blue eyes found themselves in the mirror, and as tears dripped down her cheeks, she realized something.

I'd rather it be me facing death than him.

I'd rather die than to live through him dying.

She had never thought such a thing before, not with any of her past flames or crushes. It was completely new and absolutely terrifying.

"Oh my gosh," she breathed out, feeling as if a bolt of lightning sizzled through her body in realization. "I'm in love with him." She stared at herself in the mirror, sharing her secret with her reflection. "I'm really, really in love with him."

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Words: 730.

Question: Are you mad that this is a short chapter?

I originally intended for this chapter to be longer, but somehow it just naturally stopped were it did and I didn't want to force it to go on any longer.

But don't worry, the next chapter makes up for this one's short length. ;)

PLEASE VOTE AND COMMENT TO MAKE ME SMILE!!!