10. Kiaran #3
With Amelie, I imagined this was what those girls felt about me.
Constantly wanting to be near me, smothering me with attention.
Sometimes, it felt like she wanted that from me, but then sometimes it felt like she was still scared.
I was a fish out of water here, this unfamiliar sense of longing for someone.
She came here seeking sanctuary, and I spent everyday wiping the drool from my mouth after panting for her like a dog.
Her face warmed under my touch, and the golden rivers in her eyes flowed crazily. The tingling in my skin faded and the bloomed flowers over my soul had gone back into hiding. As soon as I felt the emptiness, her eyes moved to mine.
“Did it work?” She shot to a sitting position.
“Are you okay? How do you feel?” I asked, not caring to answer her question.
“I’m fine. Great, actually. It didn’t work, did it? My books said I would feel tired and weak after…” She checked over her body as if looking for missing pieces.
“That’s true. I’ve never seen someone have an ounce of energy after an unveiling, either party.”
She settled on her knees and faced me, resting her cheek on the back of the couch.
“So it didn’t work?” A pained look of defeat crossed her face, maybe even confusion.
She was so sure it would work. I’m not sure I wanted her to know that it did.
I didn’t want her to do it again. It seemed she executed the enchantment perfectly, but I was chalking that up to beginner’s luck.
Although I wasn’t sure luck played much of a part in a spell as powerful as this one.
Either way, I wouldn’t let her do it again. So I lied. “No, it didn’t work. It put you to sleep and made my skin tingle, but that was it.” I didn’t want her to lose complete faith in her natural ability.
She bowed her head to her hands and cursed. “Fuck.”
“It’s okay. I told you last night that I appreciated the gesture. You’re forgiven for breaking my hand.” I waved my cast at her. “You shouldn’t have tricked me, Amelie. I trusted you.”
She arched a brow at me. “You’re kidding, right? You knew I was lying. You were just as excited to see if it would work as I was.”
She was so wrong. I gave her a lot of unearned trust for reasons I didn’t understand, and even though I’d spent two centuries looking for a way out, I meant what I said about not being worth the potential risks.
“What I don’t understand is why I saw you lying on the ground outside. Like I was looking through your eyes when you did it. I felt scared for your bones but they didn’t break.”
What. The. Fuck.
That didn’t happen under a veil.
“I don’t know what to tell you. Maybe your mind made you see what you hoped would happen,” I lied, hoping we could drop the issue before she realized she somehow saw exactly what happened.
“Maybe,” she wondered, looking me over and stopping at my broken hand, “but then why is there dirt on your new cast?” Her brows popped, and I think she attempted to wink again.
I pursed my lips and interlocked the tips of my fingers. “Not sure. Guess it’s dirty in here.” I tried to keep my eyes on Amelie and off the immaculately kept cottage. She’s too damn perceptive .
“Now who’s lying to who?”
I rolled my eyes, turning my body away from hers.
“Oh my god! I did it.” She hopped over to my side of the couch and grabbed my face, forcing me to look at her.
She shuffled her hands down my arms, then my chest and legs.
Then she crawled off the couch and picked up my feet, knocking on each boot.
“No broken bones! This is fantastic. Where did you go?”
My idiotic mind wandered as she sat on her knees between my legs.
I batted that fucking thought away, relented to the stubborn woman, and told her the truth.
Because, like I said, if she told me to jump, I would immediately ask how high.
“I didn’t go anywhere. Honestly, I thought you killed yourself.
Fern literally threw me outside, so I got up, and came right back in and waited for you to wake up so I could kick your ass for lying and putting your life on the line for me. ”
“Oh, don’t be so dramatic. I told you I could do it.” Amelie rolled her eyes. “You’re so boring. You didn’t even go to the pond to see the fish? Or the frogs? I almost died for you to touch grass? Bo-ring,” she quipped in a singsongy tone. Then she tried, once again, to wink at me.
“Does that not hurt?” I asked. “You know you’re not winking right?”
“Whatever.” She smacked my shoulder. The slight sting from her palm quickly turned to a garden that I wanted her to keep watering with her touch.
“Promise you won’t do that again. Please. It’s not worth it, Amelie. I’m not worth it.” Pleading with her, I hoped she knew I meant it.
The gold in her eyes sparked. Her gaze unbreakable. Shifting uncomfortably at the attention, I strummed my fingers against my thigh. “Promise me,” I repeated, breaking the silence.
“No. I won’t promise you that because I know how it feels to be trapped.
To be so fucking sick of your life that you have to will yourself daily to keep going.
I know how it feels to be alone with company, to hope that tomorrow will be different but knowing in your heart it won’t be.
We have potentially the rest of my life here together.
I finally feel at peace. I feel happy here.
I’m more at home with a magical house with the frogs, dragonflies, even the little woman I met in the woods and you, Kiaran, than I ever was in Holleberg. ”
Stopping only to breathe, she continued, “You can be a moody bitch all you want. You can refuse to do this with me but I’ll just figure out a spell that will make you do what I want.
But you will leave this cottage. You will find your little piece of heaven in this Forest. I’m going to make sure of it. ”
She rambled those words with such sincerity.
No one had ever spoken to me with such affection.
She only wanted me to find something to light me up, put life back in my soul.
I wasn’t sure how she didn’t see that she did that for me.
I’d felt more alive in the short time I’ve had with her than I had my entire life.
She made me want to do better, be kinder, and do something with this half chance at life I was given.
From what I understood about mortal Heaven and Hell, that was what Heaven was for. The good, the better.
I’ll never make it to Heaven, but Amelie might be the closest I’d ever get.