Chapter 59 #2
“Hold on to Draven’s wrist so that you don’t try to move around,” he says, nodding to where Draven is standing next to me.
I reach out and wrap my hand around his wrist, probably squeezing more than is comfortable for him. But Draven doesn’t say anything about it.
“Ready?” Orion asks.
I nod again.
The sunlit grass and my friends disappear from around me as a tidy but worn kitchen instead takes their place.
Agony stabs through my chest when I recognize the room. It’s my parents’ kitchen. Our kitchen. And I recognize the memory too. It’s the one Orion has shown me many times by now.
However, this time, I’m not in my own body. Instead, Orion has put me inside my mother’s body and made me a spectator in my own memory.
For a few seconds, all I can see is the inside of a drawer as my mother searches for something. Then she casts a distracted glance over her shoulder, and I see myself.
A jolt shoots through me. Goddess, I look so young. In the memory, I’m leaning against the counter on the other side of the kitchen, watching my mother with slightly furrowed brows. It’s so strange to see myself from the outside like this.
My mother, whose eyes I’m still watching this memory through, raises a hand and points towards the cabinet behind the younger version of me.
“Selena, can you check the top shelf?” she says. “I’m sure I put it here.”
The younger version of me turns around and opens the cabinet before reaching towards the top shelf. I’m briefly forced to look down into the drawer again as my mother turns her eyes down to it and continues searching. Beside her, my father is peering into another cabinet.
Then my mother casts another quick glance over her shoulder, and I see the younger version of me standing on tiptoes, reaching for something on the top shelf.
I already know what happens next, because I have seen this memory from my own eyes, so it doesn’t matter that my mother turns back to the drawer.
Because I already know that behind her back, I slip.
Then I yank my arm down to catch myself on the wooden counter, but instead, I smack my hand into the edge of the dish rack.
It flips over, sending the glasses that were drying on it crashing down on the floor.
My mother and father whirl around at the same time as the younger version of me does.
That version of me is staring down at the broken glasses while gasping out, “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”
Since my mother is now looking straight at the younger version of me, I can see the tears that stream down my cheeks as I stare down in panic at those broken glasses.
Then my mother flicks her gaze down at the glasses on the floor, and from seeing this memory from the other direction earlier, I know that my father, who is standing beside her, is doing the same.
I don’t need to see the expression on my face. I already know exactly what is going through my head during those seconds. Panic. Fear. And a terrible conviction that my parents now hate me for ruining the only drinking glasses we had.
Then all three of us look up from the glasses at the same time.
Watching my younger self through my mother’s eyes, I can see that my turquoise and lavender eyes are lined with tears and swirling with intense emotions.
I gasp. The real me. Not any of the people in the memory. Shock clangs inside my skull, and only my tight grip on Draven’s wrist keeps me from staggering backwards from the sheer force of that shock.
Because now, watching this from my mother’s eyes, I see something that I never could before.
The moment that the younger version of me looks up from the broken glasses and meets my parents’ gazes in panic and fear, glowing magic flashes in my eyes.
Digging my fingers into Draven’s wrist, I drag in unsteady breaths as I stare at those glowing turquoise and lavender eyes. My eyes. And there is absolutely no question about it. Magic. I am using magic on my parents.
Panic flashes across my young face, and that version of me begins frantically pleading, “No, no, no, please. Please, don’t hate me. I didn’t mean to… Please, I didn’t mean to—”
Orion pulls me out of the memory.
I draw in a shuddering breath.
For a few seconds, I just stand there on the grass, shellshocked. I feel like I was just hit in the head with a blacksmith’s hammer.
That memory. That memory when I had to watch my parents’ features so clearly and so suddenly transform into hatred when they looked at me… The exact moment it happened, the exact moment they began looking at me with resentment in their eyes, I was unwittingly using my magic on them.
Which can only mean one thing.
A broken sob rips from my lips, and I slap a hand over my mouth. Tears well up in my eyes.
I was using magic.
Oh Goddess above, I accidentally used magic on my parents which made them hate me.
Tears of profound relief stream down my cheeks as I gasp in unsteady breaths. My heart feels like it’s both full of sparkling warmth and a thrashing storm of emotions at the same time.
My parents loved me.
My parents did love me.