Chapter One
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The cold air hits me like a basketball in my face, it feels like my face is flat now. I can barely contain my balance as I stumble to my feet.
I'm dizzy, light-headed and I feel greasy. I'm in a backyard, looks like it hasn't been used in quite a while. Dry grass, dead flowers and broken worn-out toys laying around.
Scenes flash through my mind, I can't tell whether they've happened or not, whether they're real or not, whether they're good or bad.
"HELP! Anyone? HELLOOO!? ANYONE OUT THERE?!"
My voice fills every corner of backyard. The house of this yard is of no use to me, it's sealed tighter than old mother Hubbard's cupboard.
Walls that grow out of the ground reach higher than I've seen in a long while.
"HELLO ANYONE?!"
-
(whisper the following word, then read normally as you did before)
"Don't"
I jump out of the sudden occurrence of another voice besides mine.
No. I've heard this voice before, the voice who haunts me.
"Don't what?"
"Don't cry"
"Why not?"
"Don't run"
"Why?"
"Don't speak"
"But why tell my why!"
"Don't"
"Just tell me already! Don't what?"
"Just don't then we won't have a problem"
"What is going on let me go set me free leave me alone don't-"
"Exactly. Don't"
"NO! LET ME GO WHY DO YOU NEED ME FOR WHAT WHY CAN'T I HAVE A NORMAL LIFE!?"
"This is not my choice so shut up"
"Then who's choice is it? Who's choice was it to steal my away from my life and keep me? Huh?"
"Don't"
"Don't What?"
"Don't ask questions"
"Why not?"
"I SAID DON'T!"
"Uughh LET ME GO!"
"Ashlen keep quiet"
"How do you know my name?"
"You told me, don't you remember?"
"No, not really... When?"
"Don't you remember when we were little, we played together in the garden; right over there; I asked your name and you told me-"
"We NEVER played together in any garden, none the less this one"
"Oh Ashlen, but we did. You don't remember that day because ... "
"Because?"
"Do you really wanna know?"
"Yes"
"You sure?"
"It's because no one was there to tell you"
"But I could've remembered it myself, and if I remember correctly, we didn't play together, EVER"
"Oh, silly little Ashlen. You don't understand, do you? See here darling, you were little, you couldn't think for yourself. You did anything I instructed you to do, you followed me, you came with me to my life, you were mine, but, you went back. You didn't stay with me"
"We were little Damian, love doesn't exist at that age, it DOESN'T Damian"
"You tried to escape me, you tried to leave me, but, you didn't succeed. The movement between our worlds were different, and you didn't take note of my warnings. You got lost between our worlds, you kept searching for yours but you were too little so you went anywhere possible as long as you were away from me"
"None of that it true Damian, NONE of it! You are full of shit you're engulfed in your problems and pain Damian stop trying to use me to relieve that because, Damian, it won't ever work"
"Don't Ashlen, DON'T"
"Oh great, here we go again with the don't shit"
"Don't speak Ashlen"
"Tell my why tell me why I'm here tell me why"
"Goodbye Ashlen"
"What?"
"Goodbye, for now"
"Damian? Damian! DAMIAN?! Don't leave me alone Damian don't leave me here Damian Come back! Damian please!"
Tears start flooding my face, the ground beneath me starts to swirl;
"Why am I so dependent on him? Why do I need him? My life doesn't need him! Why do I need him then? Why am I afraid when he's not here? Why? I shouldn't be! I shouldn't be!"
I scream and collapse onto to the ground, it feels like I'm being pulled into the ground, I can't get up.
"Damian leave me alone! DAMIAN!"
~*~
"Ashlen honey, Ashlen? Ashlen! Ashlen honey wake up! Ashlen! Ashlen no no no wake up now Ashlen don't do this to us again ASHLEN!"
Slowly Rocking back and forth turns into me being shaken wildly by my mum trying to wake me up, but even I can't, I can't wake myself up.
I'm alive but only in my mind, my spirit is dead, gone, vanished, faded into time.
Damian sitting on the bench in the garden, playing with his toy cars. He comes running to me to drag me with him for us to play together, but I refuse.
"I don't want to"
His smile fades and his eyes widen,
"You don't want to?"
"I don't want to" I say back to him, barely able to speak correctly as we are both toddlers.
Now all I see in my mind is total darkness, little Damian appearing, sitting on his bench. No garden, no toy cars, no blooming flowers. Darkness.
He is the one controls my awakening, my love, my souls' coming and going. I can be awake and alive happily, but next I can be lost in my mind, running and trying to escape the demons chasing me.
"ASHLEN!"
"Yes mum what?"
"Oh Ashlen honey you're awake! We thought we lost you again, don't ever do that to us, ever again, don't"
"Don't"
The words that haunt me.
I'm older now. We're both older now. Only time I ever see him is when I close my eyes. He is alive, he is walking this Earth, but in another time.
He is not a demon, he is nothing unknown to this planet, in fact the Earth is on his side.
These things I don't understand.
These things change my mind.
These things change me.
"Yes mum"
"Now come on, dinners' ready, you're not staying in this room any longer"
