Poppy

 

Poppy Lesauvage has always despised fairy tales. She does not care how creative they are or how well they're written, stories like Cinderella or Sleeping freaking Beauty or whatever just irk her. In her mind, they get their princes by literally sitting on their arses all day yet still get their happily ever afters, and life's not like that. Old fancy Prince Charming doesn't just come and sweep you off your feet and ride with you out into the pretty little sunset; reality’s much more painful.

Right here, right now, Poppy’s large, sharp vivid red eyes carry a dark, vacant expression in a bright, crowded room full of balloons, loud bad pop music and sweaty raving people. Usually, being such a sociable person who dreads loneliness of any sort, she would much rather be in this sort of setting, drinking and messing around with her friends, or off with her boyfriend Logan or whatever. But tonight’s different. After tonight, she’s never going to see her boyfriend, her best friend Celia – or her other friends, Whitney, Clarissa and Emily, again. In this chaotic mess that she tries to decipher her life in, she feels inadequate and lost. On a night like this, her heart heaves heavily and carries with it a great burden.

“Hey, Poppy, fancy a drink?” her best friend Celia says as she sways her hips right up to her, and Poppy struggles to hear her over the loud, raging pop music that practically makes her ears bleed. Usually, she would have preferred hanging out with her family and keeping Blaez occupied on a night like this instead, despite her sociability. 

It’s just difficult, she tells herself rather sharply.

To Poppy, Celia is a wonder who stands out from the rest. She looks incredibly conspicuous tonight, wearing black studded creepers, high waist-denim shorts, a black tank top and opaque tights. She flicks her long orange side-fringe out of the way and smiles at Poppy, her small sharp teeth a gleaming white. Her amber eyes glitter and sparkle like diamonds, compared to Poppy’s vacant ones. She is small, shorter than the tall and willowy Poppy, but is still just as full in appearance and she doesn’t let her size faze her. Her long black fingernails, her foxy red lips, the bands on her arm and her wavy ginger locks are what attracts those she likes further. Poppy feels outlandish and inadequate beside her, despite her own fullness of maturity and subtle aristocratic features. Poppy is glad to have been accepted by the likes of a pretty, popular girl like Celia, yet can never disagree with her about the names of the bands on her wristbands, for instance. She can only ever nod and smile, but still Poppy remains forever grateful to her. If it wasn’t for Celia, she would still be friendless, and she hates her past loneliness. She never wants to be that girl again.

“Dom’s hot, isn’t he?” Celia had asked her when she’d first been enticed by Dom. Poppy had taken one look at Dom and had grimaced, as Dom wasn’t her type. First, Dom wasn’t all that tall for a guy – but that didn’t matter because Celia was short anyway. Poppy also didn’t fancy his longer, girly hair, and mentally puked at his big, bird-beak nose. He was also much too muscular, and Poppy thinks that too much muscle is the equivalent of a girl having too much boob – truly nauseating.

“Yeah, yeah he is.” At the time Poppy could have kicked herself for it. Emily and the others had giggled and nudged each other.

“I think you’d be really cute together, Celia!” Whitney had exclaimed.

“Jeez, just ask him out already,” Clarissa had muttered under her breath, hiding a small smile.

“Yeah, yeah you should,” Poppy had imminently agreed with them, and even though she herself didn’t fancy Dom, if Celia wanted him, then why the hell not?

Now, Celia dangles a bottle of Smirnoff right in her front of her, and her eyes never tear themselves from it. It's rare over here, where they are. Still, Poppy reluctantly shakes her head, mirrored by a disappointed expression. She’s been told not to drink tonight, and Poppy promised her dad especially that she would lay off of it, even for good. She’s trying to cut down on the drink.

“I-I, I can’t.” Celia laughs out loud, and rests a hand on her shoulder reassuringly, making Poppy feel diminutive in comparison. Poppy doesn’t like the way her laughter creeps up her skin, and she frowns at her, crossing her arms over her chest. Celia notices, and pouts.

“Aww, c’mon, don’t be boring, have some – you can mix it with lemonade or coke, however you like it...” She lifts her own glass up, as if to prove a point. Poppy gulps back for a moment, unable to outright say no to her best friend. What’s the harm in having a glass or two; she’s sixteen, after all? Who cares about what her dad says? Besides, she hates feeling like such a loser compared to the likes of Celia. She licks her lips, and takes a step towards her.

“I’m no dumbass,” she executes in the exact same manner as Celia did. “I’m gunna have some now, okay?” She swiftly snatches the bottle from Celia – who smirks – and immediately goes to pour a glass, mixing it with lemonade. She prefers lemonade to coke; the taste of lemonade is softer and kinder to her taste buds; not too overwhelming, while coke can sometimes disagree with her. Although Poppy knows she doesn’t need alcohol, to her, it makes the night more…interesting, and to hell with what her dad has to say about that.

She follows Celia to where all their friends are gathered, and Logan greets her with a kiss, promptly putting his arm round her.

“So, what do you think?” Celia asks. She should not be drinking. She should not be drinking at all, but she hasn’t tried this stuff before. She takes an eager sip, laughing lightly afterwards, spluttering alcohol in the process.

Charming, she thinks.

“Um, yeah, it’s nice.” They both laugh a little. The person that she fears knowing about this is her dad. If her dad saw her right now, he’d probably lock her in the house forever and not send her away, probably bar her windows and chain up her door. The isolation would irk her like crazy, but at least she would still be home.

He irks me so, she tells herself.

"Hey, Poppy babe, do you wanna come over with me a sec?"

Logan suddenly tugs on her arm – a little too desperately, Poppy privately adds. He's seventeen, just over a biological year older than Poppy, as his birthday’s in earlier in November than hers. However, he’s technically three years older than her, as their kind, the cheya, age every three years, except Poppy isn’t exactly a cheya. He’s tall and as lean as a bean, with messy dark blond hair and yellow eyes. Poppy enjoys how good his clothes look on him, hardly any muscle at all. Well, until he flexes his arms, that is. And that’s just how she likes them.

"What am I, a pig?" she sarcastically says, gently brushing his arm away, and he raises an eyebrow in confusion at her statement. Clearly, he doesn't get the reference. That's the thing with Poppy, she never feels like she truly belongs anywhere.

However, if there’s one thing that Poppy detests, that’s being called babe by him. She likes to think it’s his attempt to sweet-talk her, and it makes her feel like puking. Additionally, Poppy doesn’t particularly want to think of that sad film, as tears would be the end of her, and even though she’s told him countless times to shut up with that nauseating nickname, he never appears to listen. She isn’t a pig, she is a person. Poppy takes a few steps back from him, taking a proper look at him with concern. She didn’t mean to hurt him.

"You okay?" she lowers her tone of voice this time so it's gentle. He smiles at her before pulling her close to his chest. She automatically wraps her arms round him and the young couple stay like that for a moment, locked in each other's arms, swaying slightly from side-to-side. Poppy buries her head into his chest, enjoying the way he enfolds around her, making her feel warm and protected and loved, before gently pulling away from her. She briefly glances down at the floor and at her empty hands, amazed at how one, intimate moment can end so quickly.

"You all right there?" he asks her, a finger gently lifting up her chin so she’s looking directly into his dark, hazy eyes.

"Yeah, I'm fine," she says, looking at him, then bites her lip at how harsh she just sounded and looked, and makes herself smile reassuringly. Poppy can feel her cheeks burn a little. She truly does care about him, despite his irritating pet name for her.

"Good," he says, before leaning in to claim her cool, full lips with his own. She feels her body press against his and his hands caress her cheeks so very gently. With her arms around his neck, her lips follow his lead like they're waltzing together, quick and passionate, deep and captivating. His hands move downwards, gently stroking her waist. He plants kisses down her neck, and Poppy loves the way his breath feels hot on her neck and the way his lips tickle her skin. His lips come across a particular mark on the left side of her neck – a mark that closely resembles a black hole with blue flames flickering all around it. It strongly resembles something familiar in their world, but Poppy has never known why it’s there. Logan has known about it since he’s known her – and that, coupled with her bright red eyes, makes her an anomaly, even in this world. People even accused her of being an akuma at first, but she doesn’t carry with her the ghastly stench that plagues them, or their foul rotting breath, or their devilish ways, so they let it go. No, she is just…different. She has possessed the red eyes and the mark since she was born, but, unlike in the human world where she had to wear brown eye contacts and grow her hair to impossible lengths to keep the mark hidden, she doesn’t need to hide it here. What bothers her is why she’s got it, but no one else in her family has it? It’s weird.

“Maybe we could have a little fun,” Poppy says as she pulls back, raising a brow at him suggestively, a devilish smile playing on the corners of her lips, dimpling at him. She subtly alters the neckline of her top so it is as low as it can be, and flutters her eyelashes at him. She loves the way his eyes drink her appearance in; she loves feeling wanted. 

“Yeah, let’s go upstairs,” he whispers in her ear. He proceeds to softly nibble on her ear lobe, and Poppy can’t suppress her gasp.

She isn’t all that experienced, but, having been with him for two months now, she isn’t completely innocent, either. And it’s not like she’s not had previous boyfriends beforehand, even if they weren’t serious. But unlike her, Logan is experienced. Poppy remembers the stories she’s been told about it by Celia. Apparently, it shouldn’t hurt if it’s done properly. She can’t deny her leaping heart, her heaving chest, the tingling of her skin and her flushed cheeks, but at the same time her leaping heart is weighed down and the leaps are long and slow, the tingling of her skin is averted by a cold shiver up her spine and her flushed cheeks stand out on her winter skin.

"Oh, c'mon, don't you want a bit of New Years' fun?" Logan says, gently grabbing the low neckline of her top and forcing Poppy forward – back to reality – his lips gently tickling the rim of her ear now, near the piercing there. She giggles, losing herself in the moment, but remains still and stiff against his moving form.

I want this, she convinces herself, pressing herself against him. After another kiss, they rush upstairs together, and she laughs so much that Logan has to hush her to be quiet, in spite of his own hysterics. The young couple end up plummeting into his room, and Logan closes the door shut before his hands encircle her waist from behind, and she stands there immersed in him. She thinks to herself, if he can't hear her heart having to pound like crazy in her chest to ward off the heavy weight in it, she sure as hell can. He should be able to, as their hearing is sharper than a human’s.

“You’re so beautiful, Pops,” he breathes in her ear, and his fingers start caressing her waist. She can hear his heavy breathing, feel his lips linger on her neck with every kiss. It becomes difficult for her to focus properly, what with him touching her all over. At the same time, she lets her eyes close and her lips part slightly. His head stays close to hers, while his lips continue sealing the saturnine wounds on her broken skin. She needs him. She needs his love, how can she resist him? She deserves happiness for once in her life?!

“God, Poppy,” he breathes, his hand creeping down the inside of her jeans.

“I want to Logan, I love you so,” she says, turning in his arms to kiss fervently up his neck. The cologne on his neck sucks her in, and she buries her face into him, her marble lips never leaving his comforting, warm skin once. Her heart fights to keep up and her hands grip his shoulders tightly, scared to let him go.

“Mmm, you smell so good,” she says as the two soon touch skin to skin, with only a few garments separating them now, and the touch sends an exhilarating crackling down the curve of her spine.

Suddenly, the door goes flying open and the two of them break apart immediately, and a girl who Poppy strongly dislikes instantly has the face of someone who knows they should just get the hell out.

“Don’t just stand there!” Logan yells, and Poppy squirms at Logan’s seething glare. She hurriedly yanks her jeans back up properly, even though there’s barely any point, considering this girl’s just seen her nearly naked. She briefly wonders if she should just pull her jeans and knickers down altogether! She covers her mouth, or else she’ll crease up.

 “Oh. My. God,” the girl utters, jaw dropped wide open gormlessly, and Poppy can’t help but smirk a little.

“What’s the matter? You’re so innocent you’ve never done anything like this before?” Poppy says, raising an eyebrow with her arms crossed over her chest, the heat nonetheless building up her face. “Looking at me like you’ve seen a litter of flying pigs; lickle girly, you’ve never even kissed a boy before.” Logan reaches out and puts a hand on my arm. “Poppy, stop.”

“W-well, it’s very nearly midnight, and we’re all going outside,” she says before rushing out, giggling to her pathetic little friends. Ugh, now that’s just really irked me, Poppy grumbles to herself. She hates her.

“Jeez, she just killed it,” Logan says, groaning and adjusting himself.  “But you didn’t have to be like that to her.” She turns to him, frowning at him.

“That sucks,” she says. “And whatever, I don’t care what she has to say.” He smirks at her.

“Really?” He saunters forward towards her. She catches on, and comes closer, too.

“That’s why it’s better when no one’s around.” She winks at him with a widening smile, showing off her dimples. He playfully elbows her.

“You’re the one who suggested it,” he reminds her.

“Don’t pretend you didn’t want to,” she purrs, raising her brow at him. He smirks in embarrassment. “She’s just so weird, nobody wants her here.”

“Wow, that’s harsh, Pops,” he says, playfully elbowing her.

Frustrated, the two trudge along behind the girl who dared to interrupt them to go outside with everyone else. At midnight, the start of the New Year, fireworks seem to brighten up the sky, but Poppy’s eyes stare into the darkness, avoiding all the stars. The heaviness in her heart wins the long, excruciating battle, and with her shoulders slumped, she eventually leans into Logan for comfort and warmth and, hopeless, stares vacantly into the ground, her body trembling for what will come.

•*´¨`*•.¸¸.•*´¨`*•.¸

Poppy’s thoughts drag to her mum. What would she say if she was here right now? What would she think of her grown-up daughter, how she’s turned out to be? If only she could turn back time, and change those last few words she said to her. If she could, she bloody well would. Now, it’s another new year without mum, another full of arguing and shouting. Another year of dying on the inside, and this time, a new year away from home, worrying, guts twisting on the inside whether dad will make it. This will be the last party Poppy will attend for a long time, so she might as well make the most of it. It may be the last time she ever sees her friends again, as her and Blaez may never return depending on whether Rylva crumbles under the extermination of the canine cheya. Screw that, she may never see dad again, and she will never want to stay at the school she is going to. Thus, her and Blaez would be all alone, left to fend for themselves as orphans. Poppy will have to hunt for herself, or resort to stealing to survive. She will well and truly have to be Blaez’s mother, and they will be ostracised on the fringes of society for not being true cheya, and, as Poppy knows, that although she likes the thrill of adventure, she may be too depressed to keep them alive for long if something like that were to happen. While she thinks she would be better off dead, she would never wish the same, cruel fate on Blaez – or anyone else for that matter.

Poppy leans against the wall, squeezing her eyes shut tight. Jog on. She takes a massive gulp of her drink; this is her second glass now, and she swears she’s starting to feel light-headed and dizzy, as if none of this is real. The drink is too strong and it makes her urge, but it’s great nonetheless, and as she drinks more and more, her spirit feels light-hearted and free from restraint and melancholy.

“Faaantastic,” she says before burping out loud. Celia blinks, merely surprised.

“You all right there?” she says, laughing. She cackles manically in response.

Poppy wishes to herself, just for a moment that this isn’t all real. She wishes she could go back and fix things, try to make things right and better with mum before she was killed. Why do things have to be this way?

"Hey, heeey," she clumsily nudges Celia, still laughing. Celia blinks, then stares at her with a bewildered expression. Oh well, she's not the one who's ecstatic right now. Poppy smiles and laughs and carries on in that pattern for a minute or so. Why shouldn’t she liberate herself for even one night?

"P-pass me ano’er drink," she demands, sounding light and merry at the same time. She only just make out Celia’s smirk underneath her tipsy gaze. She sends Poppy creasing, that girl does. 

"You've already got one," she bluntly points out, laughing at her friend a little. "I can get you another one after, if you like, but eat some food or have a drink of water first." Food? Water? Why the hell would she want that for? That would ruin everything. She did say she could have another drink, though.

"Thanks," she says, clumsily taking her drink. Celia laughs even more and promptly snatches it off her. The hell does she think she's doing, putting her drink out of reach?

"What you doing?" Poppy says. "That's mine."

"No, yours is there, silly," she says, pointing to a near-empty glass in front of the crazy girl.

"That's mine, though."

"You'll live."

"I love you." She laughs, playfully slaps her on the cheek, and replies with, "Ily," before she canoodles off upstairs with Dom and leaves Poppy be with Logan and her drinks, and Logan helps her and stops her from getting really drunk by making her drink water between drinks.

At the end of the party, Poppy’s friends crowd around her, and they keep on telling her how much they’re going to miss her. Emily, one of her closest friends – a human – hugs her close and says, “I’ll always be here for you if you want to talk about anything. We’ll always be friends, no matter what.” She has to squeeze her eyes shut tight as she says that, as Poppy cannot cry no matter how much she craves to. “Whatever, sure.”

Like her, Emily is also leaving Rylva, as her family want no part in destroying the canines they live with; the reason they moved to Rylva in the first place was to live among the cheya in peace, not kill them. More importantly to Poppy, Emily’s the only one who seemingly understands her, that girl, even if she is plain to look at and isn’t a whizz of ecstasy like Celia. She’s the only ones who knows much about anything. Celia knows a bit, but never tries to talk to her about it. Poppy thinks that maybe she doesn’t want to make her sad by talking about it all, but there’s a part of her that flinches and shuts out the thought that Celia possesses a cold heart. Emily, on the other hand, has an open ear for Poppy. Even then, she feels she can never truly talk to her, as she often ends up feeling bad because Celia’s her best friend, the one who took her in, the first one to have accepted her.

I mean, I care as much as a lion cares for a baby antelope, she thinks to herself.

“Hey, babes, good luck in Solilica,” Celia murmurs, all of a sudden hugging her in close. Poppy reciprocates, shocked but grateful, and her eyes flicker all over the place, feeling overwhelmed with emotion.

“I’ll miss you so much, Babes,” Celia says, and Poppy squeezes her eyes shut tight before saying, “…I’ll miss you too.” Poppy pulls back to sees the tears in her friend’s eyes. For a moment, a sting from her heart erupts, and she frowns at her a little. If only she could cry like her.

“What?” Celia says, carefully wiping her eyes and smiling. “I’m all right, I’m still smiling aren’t I?” Poppy doesn’t smile, for her only thoughts are that they could all possibly die.

•*´¨`*•.¸¸.•*´¨`*•.¸

Once everyone’s left, Logan helps her sober up with water.

“Does your dad know you’re staying?” Logan says. She grins and sidles up to him, snaking her arms around his neck.

“Who cares about him?” she says, slowly kissing him. “It’s gunna be one of our last nights together, so it better be good.” She’s already got stuff that she’s brought with her so that she can stay over for the night, stuff that she sneaked out with her when she left for the party. In the bright light of his room, he kisses her, touches her and feels her, before he sinks onto his bed and she follows him, struggling to keep up, shedding each other of their clothes. His hands stroke her small waist and cup her breasts and she reaches for him, clinging to him and digging into him. He rubs her, and her body obediently curves into his while his tongue ventures around her mouth. Her hands reach out for the silver packet on his bedside table and she smiles sexily at him before carefully opening it and applying it. His hands stroke her quivering skin and her taunt muscles and their limbs tangle in a passionate, shaky embrace before she bites her lip a little in pain, yelps and he withdraws. He shifts so he’s on his side facing her.

“It’s okay, we don’t have to do this if you don’t want to,” he says, gazing intently at her, stroking her midnight locks that are sprawled out onto the pillow.

“But I want to,” she insists, and the two lock into each other again. Still the pain doesn’t stop, sharp and burning and she groans at the soreness there, her somewhat spent body writhing beneath him, and he quickly rolls onto his side and she leans back into him, gritting her teeth at the pain. She shivers against him, leaning back listlessly into him for warmth. She squeezes her eyes shut tight while he strokes her hair.

“It’s not working,” she says, her mind filled with darkness. What should be happy isn’t happy, and why? Why is it not how she expected? He’s experienced, isn’t he? He should be making it as comfortable for her as possible.

“You’re not a virgin anymore,” he says, kissing her hair.

“I know, and that’s what scary,” she says. “It’s like…I’m not a child anymore. It’s like I’ve entered a big, dark dangerous void out there, all alone.”

“What, just because there’s a civil war?” he says, laughing a little. She turns around in his arms, facing him.

“Yes, but that’s precisely my point! I might never see you again!” she says, practically headbutting him in the chest with the amount of force she uses against him. He sighs and holds her tight, and she hates the way that in this moment, she indulges in the feeling of his arms around her.

“Hey hey hey, don’t talk like that,” he says. “We will see each other again, and it will all be over soon.” Ha, if only he knew. If only he knew about the riots, the fights, the killings – more so in the capital Fangstone. Up here in Kaniy, civil war’s barely spread, but that doesn’t mean gunshots haven’t been heard firing every so often, and that there hasn’t been a cheya – often in animal form – reported dead. There hasn’t been a full on outbreak here yet, but the longer this goes on, the worse things are going to get.

“You don’t understand!” she says, sitting up, keeping the duvet around her to cover her, exposing her bare back. He sits up as well, draping an arm around her.

“We’ve done this now, this, and I don’t know how I’ll cope without you when I leave!” she says. “And dad as well, and little Blaez…how can I be apart from them, as well Logan, them?! If they, you, Celia and everyone else dies then I will have nothing left, nothing!” She abruptly gets up and quickly shoves on her clothes.

“Wait, you’re just making a fuss over something that’s not happened yet,” he says.

“No, no, I’ve got to tell dad that I don’t want to leave!” she says. “Blaez is meant to be going to Solilica too, but he isn’t going to the exact same place as where I’m going! This is gunna tear us apart! But in this civil war that is spreading to Kaniy, I have to leave you! It’ll be easier this way, Logan!” She can’t face anymore hurt, and she can’t ever let her true feelings show no matter how much she wants to. She quickly packs some of her stuff that is lying on the floor, purposely blocking out Logan’s heartbroken face from view, opens his bedroom window and leaps from there to the tree, climbing her way down it safely to the ground.

She sprints off all the way back home, which is only about a ten minute walk away. She stops running after a while and begins to walk, and briefly considers what it would be like to completely run away, to sleep rough on the streets in order to escape being shoved off to Solilica, to some new strange place where she’ll be all alone – even if she is going with her cousins – and will leave her friends and family behind, whom of which she may never see again. If she ran away, right here, right now, she could survive, couldn’t she? She could survive on rodents and stuff, as she can sort-of hunt, and she could slip undetected in the shadows?

A gunshot rings out, and with a frightened squeal, she propels herself forward, as she quickly realises it’s humans, as it can’t be anything else. Her heart races, beads of sweat drip from her skin and the adrenaline floods her system, providing her with newfound energy, making her legs hurry along faster. She briefly thinks about what it would be like, to smash into the ground, dead from one single, lethal shot. She wonders what it would be like for dad to find out, or – even possibly – find her, as there’s no doubt he would go looking for if she was missing. And it wouldn’t be hard for him to find her, either. She slips into the shadows and stays out of the street lights, which would light her up easily.

A yelp is heard and she quickly stops, turns and begins to back into the wall as two people come forward and take their latest victim. A large, brown wolf. Her eyes widen at the pool of blood rapidly blooming from under it and she can clearly see the messy, exit wound in its back. She lets out a frightened gasp, her body trembling, and one of the men looks up at her.

Horrified, she runs like a bat out of hell around the corner and to her house, shaking and breathing horribly. Is there anything she could have done? Should she have done something? She couldn’t have just let that happen, could she? On New Years’ Eve, especially? Now some family will be looking for their loved one, and she will carry with her the horror of witnessing that person’s death, and the fact that they’ll never get to bury them if the humans take their body away, probably to bury somewhere themselves. At least for her, mum was buried.

For a moment she stands there, and her hands clench into fists and tremor with lethality. Where’s the justice in it? In these times, she can see why people are so mad at Queen Lupa for letting them in, but she used to live with humans in the Earth realm. She has half a mind to go back there and beat them to bloody pulps, but is possessed by fear herself.

She collapses through the door, desperately squeezing her eyes shut tight, panting, and with the palms of her hands sweating, chucks her bag in with her.

“Poppy!” dad comes rushing in from the living room and catches the exhausted girl just before she collapses. “Are you all right? I heard the gunshots, was it you they were after?!”

He is biologically thirty-eight years old, and that is because cheya like him age every three years. Chronologically, he’s over a hundred. He was fairly young when Poppy was born. Poppy has his dark complexion, but has more of her late mum's facial features. Dad has a long nose and broad lips. His eyes are not as large or sharp as Poppy’s are. He's very tall, and has a healthy build, relatively muscular, but isn’t naturally big-built, so to speak. In fact, without his muscles, he would be positively skinny. Although he has broad shoulders, they aren’t that broad. He often wears a sports cap.

At the moment, dad has a job in a supermarket. It’s an all right job, but he doesn’t get much money. He’s been struggling to find a better job to keep the family, and fixes cars in his spare time for extra money. He’s good with mechanics.

“Dad, p-p-please, I-I’m fine, it wasn’t me they were after,” she says, her voice shaky, shrugging him off and shakily stepping towards the stairs. A lump forms in her throat and she forcefully swallows it back, wiping her eyes, smudging her make-up even further. She feels all horrible and sweaty and she hates it, after having literally just witnessed a cheya’s murder. She’s going to have to shower, but not now; she’s too tired.

“Pops, are you sure you’re”-

“I’m fine, dad!” she says, spinning round to face him, fists clenched, chest heaving, before turning back around to rush upstairs, still squeezing her eyes shut tight as she hears dad’s hefty, “We’ll talk about this in the morning.” To hell they will.

She doesn’t want to go. She doesn’t want to go to Solilica at all, to a new school out of the millions she’s been to back in the Earth realm. She detests the thought of having to make new friends somewhere else when she has finally gained friends at where she is now – the first group of friends she’s ever had, even if they don’t know the real her, even if she can never disagree with what they say. As she lays shaking in bed, peeking out from her covers to make sure nothing’s going to get her in the dark, she can’t turn her brain off. She tosses and turns and clings to her duvet, trying to block out the sound of the gunshots in her head, and swallow back her guilt for her abruptly leaving Logan, and for the dead cheya. How could she? How could she do that? She loves him, doesn’t she? Her mind tries to search desperately for the right answer, but there is none. And what about the dead cheya? Her body goes cold with the thought of its death, and she has to huddle up further for the blankets. She glances at the photo of her and mum on her bedside table. Someone’s lost a son, daughter, sibling, father or mother tonight.

I don’t even know what to feel anymore, she tells herself. I don’t want to feel anymore. It’s all so bloody confusing and I don’t know how to deal with it. And it’s not just because it wasn’t as good as she thought it would be. No, she just feels weird, defiled even. What would her friends say if they knew she’d finally stripped herself of her cursed virginity? Celia would probably congratulate her, but would the others? She’s only been with Logan for two months, and now they’re about to be torn apart. What is she to do? Was it a good idea?

I was scared, she convinces herself. There’s a civil war going on and I was scared and I’m scared of never seeing him, or anyone of them, again. They could die, and I might never see dad again. That means tonight could have been like a stab in the heart. Those gunshots were real; humans killed someone tonight, a cheya, someone who has probably done nothing at all, and they got killed just because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. I mean, I have lived with them for the majority of my life back in the Earth realm, and I have human ancestry. What the hell am I gunna do? That means civil war has truly spread to Kaniy. I’ve already lost mum; I can’t lose anyone else, too. Why doesn’t dad just take us back to the Earth realm again, where me and Blaez were born? I want to run away, far, far away. That’s what I truly want, isn’t it?