Total pages in book: 151
Estimated words: 147649 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 738(@200wpm)___ 591(@250wpm)___ 492(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 147649 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 738(@200wpm)___ 591(@250wpm)___ 492(@300wpm)
For a moment, I’m sure she’s talking to me. But then a man is stepping through me, like I’m just a ghost or an apparition. “You don’t need to yell at her, Lisa.” His voice is calm, and deep, and soothing. He pushes past her, into the bathroom, and then kneels down in front of little me.
I am sitting on the edge of the bathtub, just like I remember it. But everything aside from that is new and unfamiliar.
For one, I’m wearing a red and yellow tartan uniform. Something a child might wear to a private school and not the short, sexy kind one puts on for Halloween.
But it’s not any kind of school uniform I’ve ever seen. The skirt is very long and pleated. Like if little-girl me were to stand up, the skirt would fall all the way down to my ankles. On my feet are a pair of brown leather boots, like the ones in my memory, but also very different. They are too big, that’s true, and my feet are slipping in and out of them. But they are square. And for a moment I wonder if the legs underneath that skirt are covered in fur and the feet inside the boots are actually hooves.
But no. My toes appear. And even though I am not the little-girl me, I can feel her wonder every time the toes poke up from the dark boot and wiggle. She is… amazed by them. Even in the midst of all this yelling and stress, she is fascinated by her own toes.
The skirt and boots aren’t the only things wrong with this uniform. There is a sash across my chest made of deep scarlet leather. And there are little medals on the sash, like something from a Girl Scout uniform, except they’re not crudely sewn patches. They are made of gold, and silver, and maybe bronze. And they are cast, or carved, or something, with tiny illustrated details and words printed in another language around the edges. There are ribbons, too. Gold and red satin. And tassels on my shoulders. My blonde hair is nearly white and it has been painstakingly plaited in a very elaborate way with glittering gold and red threads woven into the hair so that even in this dingy room with gross fluorescent light, my hair sparkles with the slightest movement of my head.
The braids fall down on either side of my body, almost to my waist, and the ends are decorated with a red satin hair tie accentuated with a gold lion medallion.
There is a cape made of a deep-red velvet covering one half of my upper body and a gold clasp that cinches it to my uniform at the shoulders.
I blink, stunned at the little girl who is me. Because I don’t remember this. I don’t remember any of it. In my memory it was my mother—the yeller—and me. And we did stay here in this hotel, but I don’t remember this man.
And I don’t remember my outfit being so… regal.
No. Royal. Royal is the right word.
Suddenly, I switch places. I am no longer a grown woman watching like some unaffiliated third party. I am the small, stolen princess sitting on the edge of the bathtub holding a soft, warm, squirming Pia in my palms.
I look up at the man in front of me and gasp.
“There, there, Pie.” The name comes out Pahhhhh. Because his accent isn’t Philly. It’s Western PA hick. And he has the greenest eyes I will ever see. He is Russ Roth, but not the Russ Roth from Granite Springs. He is the doppelganger from Savage Falls.
He is the devil.
With the same handsome face, and the same deep, soothing voice, and the same power of attraction. With a gentle sweep, he slides the back of his hand down my cheek, dragging my tears along for the ride. My stomach feels like it’s flipping upside down and doing somersaults. But at the same time, his touch turns my fear and sadness into something else.
It becomes… acceptance, maybe. Or… surrender. That might be a better word.
“It’s OK, darling. It’s all gonna be OK. All we need are answers, little sweetheart. Then you can go home. Wouldn’t you like to go home? Hmm? Spend Christmas with your family? Doesn’t that sound nice?”
I look back down at Pia and she says, “Where are we, Pie?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know what? You little brat!” My mother—who is obviously not my mother—thinks I’m talking to her, not Pia.
“What does he want to know?” Pia squeaks.
“I don’t know.”
“See!” The woman is pointing at me, but she is talking to the devil. “She’s a moron. A retard, or something.”
“Don’t call her that!” The devil stands up when he barks these words out, his green eyes flashing with anger. “How many fuckin’ times have I told you not to call her that!”