'𝓓𝓪𝓷𝓬𝓮 𝓜𝓪𝓬𝓪𝓫𝓻𝓮'

ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ 16

   The drive back to her home was long and unbearable. April had to resist at every moment not to turn around, but then again why would she? They were a bunch of demons and were nothing compared to family and God. Totally..

   Pulling into her parents driveway, she took a small breath and parked her car just to keep her hands on the steering wheel, unsure on if she wanted to actually go in and be confronted. Why would she want that of all things? Back at the ministry.. No. No comparing.

   April got out of her car, having not even closed the door yet before seeing that both her parents and sister were out on the front porch. Her heart dropped but she kept a brave stance, closing her door and grabbing her luggage. 'Why me..?' She wondered as she did the walk of shame up to her front porch.

    Standing in front of her family, she kept her eyes trained on her shoes until she felt the warm embrace of her sister. "Roxanne!" April heard her father say but Lorainne chimed in,"It's okay, Doug. She's here now and that's what matters." She nodded and looked at her daughter with a warm smile. "You made the right choice." April listened as she was led to her old room. They said how they kept it perfect and tidy, waiting for the moment their daughter came back to their arms.

   Opening the door to the small bedroom that was painted in light pink with a twin-sized bed in the corner and a dresser across from it with a. TV on top. The walls were covered in memorabilia from previous birthdays, all the way up to her 11th birthday. After that she had gotten into things her parents weren't the happiest on. Like Monster High and Pokémon. There were pictures of her friends from all the way up to senior year of highschool taped to her white vanity mirror.

Behind her, her parents stood with bright smiles,"Just how you left it!" Her mother said proudly. April nodded and walked into the room, her suitcase rolling on the hardwood floor loudly. "Well, we'll let you get settled in darling." Lorainne hummed, going to close the door behind the girl as April gently sat on her bed. It felt so much softer than his.

April laid back on the bed, glancing out the window that was next to her night stand. It was growing dark and all she could think about was how cold she felt in her smaller room. How did they expect her to fall asleep in this conditions? Did they always keep the house this freezing or was it just because she's back? Her thoughts swarmed but to settle herself, she grabbed her wired earbuds from the front of her suitcase and plugged it into her phone.

Going to YouTube, she scrolled and scrolled to find anything to take away her worries. April hadn't said a single thing since getting home and truthfully she was unsure what to say. 'Hey mom, love you, let me go back.' She thought, clicking on a video that caught her eye.

The sound of wolves howling then men talking sounded through her earbuds. She skipped forward until she heard drums and guitar fill her ears, with instruments slowly piling on top as she closed her eyes. Dance Macabre. She listened to the voice of the singer, thinking about the band behind it all.

'Just wanna be- I wanna bewitch you all night..' she hummed, forgetting all about her freezing circumstances. Slowly April dozed off, cuddling into her pillow tiredly and letting herself fall asleep to the music she grew to enjoy.

——————𖤐𖤐𖤐——————

In the morning April woke up to the empty sound of the room. No music, no birds, no snoring. She couldn't even hear anything coming from the rest of the house. Turning onto her side, she realized there was a blanket covering her, yet still it was oddly cold.

   A knock at the door was the first sound she heard that indicated there was at least some life in the house. Getting up from her bed, April opened her door to see Roxanne at her door, looking up at her while holding a plate of pancakes with bacon. "I made this to welcome you back home.. you haven't really said much so I wanted to see if you're alright." The younger girl offered the plate to which April took then let her little sister inside.

Closing the door behind Roxie, April sat at her vanity eating at the pancakes that she absolutely loved, occasionally nibbling off at the bacon. "So.. What's wrong?" Roxanne asked softly, sitting on her sister's bed with her hands folded in her lap. April finished chewing her bite, thinking of what to say. What was wrong? "I'm not sure.. Mom came to the place where I'm doing research and decided to tell me how much she dislikes my choices, not to mention my friends." She started, unsure where to go from there.

"What did you expect? Your friends wear pentagrams and stay in the church everyone assumes to be for satan." Roxanne let out a dry chuckle."I know! But.. I guess I miss them. One in particular. I'm not even sure if he'd still wanna see me even if I did go back." April frowned, stuffing her mouth with pancakes to drown out her sorrows.

   Roxanne moved her hair out of her face, taking a deep breath. "Alright, Tell me about it." She said, offering her sister an ear. "I hated him. He was always so flirty and gave off the impression of a playboy who was always in it for sex.. but he was so.. sweet. He respected my boundaries.. mostly.." she spoke with her mouth full of food, starting to tear up as she recalled small moments of him being caring towards her.

   Roxanne made a disgusted face, ignoring it for now. "Babe.. you've only known them for like.. a week!" She pointed out. April set the empty plate down on the vanity and hung her head in shame. "I know.. but they treated me so much better than here. No offense to you, but he took me out on a date. Before I left.. he.. he kissed me!" April defended herself, ignoring the fact that they had kissed plenty of times before.

   "You kissed a man?!" Roxanne exclaimed in shock. Yes her sister is an adult, but if her mom were to find out all hell would break loose. Kind of ironic. April put a finger to her lips, hushing quickly so as not to let anyone hear but it was too late. Lorainne barged into the room, an angry look upon her face,"April Marie White!" She yelled, moving so Roxanne could get out. "Not only have you been rampaging with those horrid demonic beings, but you're making out with them too?!" Lorainne screamed at her daughter, the disgust evident on her face if her tone wasn't enough.

"I'm— I'm sorry, Mom. I'm so sorry." April muttered, looking down at her hands. She felt like a child again, getting in trouble for hugging the neighbor boy, or wanting to go to a party at least once. She wasn't even allowed to have school projects with boys. "It's okay! This Sunday you are getting washed away of your sins and be forgiven in the eyes of the lord!" Her mom said sternly, causing April to flinch as her mom stomped her foot.

With that she grabbed the door handle and went to leave,"You're grounded until then!" Lorainne said finally, slamming the door behind her. April let her tears flow. 'I should've just stayed at the church.' Moving to lay on her bed, she wiped her tears and curled her knees into her chest.

April felt so incredibly childish, she was being treated like a child and like a child she was thinking of running away. The girl was sheltered all of her life, so no matter what she always felt she was under her parents control. Always under control of the "Merciless God".. but he was also called Merciful God? When April had realized the contradictory statements, that was the beginning of her questioning.

In High School she was known for her deep roots in the Christian Religion, but she had decided to actually look into the religion she was following instead of following blindly behind her parents. So in College she took religious studies in hopes her questions would be answered only to be met with more harsh truths. Reading the bible front to back just to find out that the God they worshiped was nothing of what they were told about. He had killed millions despite it being said he forgives all. He flooded a whole city for no reason, but deemed it fine because he basically promised not to do it again.

The part that stood out the most was that the Devil was talked about so much, but he played such a minimal part in the bible. He killed fewer than 10, and even then he was ordered by God himself to kill them. What were they listening to? When she was assigned the Satanic Church, April may have seemed upset by it, but it was her chance to figure out what the devil was really about.

In the end, she has a book in her suitcase about Ghouls and what they're all about, just waiting to be read. That could wait though, for now, April laid in her bed and dozed off to sleep, not wanting to worry about her problems any longer. She would figure out what she would do next later, no longer thinking it was such a bad idea to get disowned.