Chapter One
Fantasies have been a way of escaping the truth for centuries - the truth of sorrow, of pain, of every sour feeling that will ever be felt in the world. Fantasies are the gateway into one's life, into seeing who someone is when they are left to explore their innermost desires and dreams. And, in a way, fantasies have kept people sane throughout the course of history.
Or so Lilia believed firmly in her heart. Lilia lost herself in fantasies every waking moment of her life, every fantasy of fictional characters taking her away from her problems, of perfect scenarios that even she knew would never happen. Today was no different - a Tuesday afternoon, one of the afternoons where the sky is a perfect shade of blue with sparsely any clouds in sight. The sunlight from the sky shone brightly against the green grass, the lush trees, and the nice park of the small town where she lived.
It really was a small town, with no more than 5,000 people living there, and surrounding the town were fields upon fields, either lined with tractors preparing for the seasonal planting of crops, or filled with cows and their newborns. For all of Lilia's life, all she knew was the countryside - she lived in a town, of course, but many of her friends were the daughters and sons of farmers in the outskirts.
Of course, living in a small town comes with troubles - gossip spreads fast, people are rude, and know each other, and there's the fact that there's more animals than people themselves. But, with the cons, came the perks - Lilia knew how to milk a cow, to prepare a sheep for shearing, how to properly cook a chicken, and many other things she couldn't have learned elsewhere.
Her parents weren't farmers, however, and were both professors at a university nearby - Lilia hardly spoke with them since they both had a tendency to be extremely busy, and since they weren't even her own parents.
When Lilia was younger - a baby - she had been abandoned on the side of the road 30 miles from where she resided then. No one knew where she came from, or who was responsible for the neglect, but only that when she was found she had been the strangest child anyone had ever seen, and the only thing she had was a tattered blanket wrapped around her and a red bound book tucked tightly on top of her chest with the name 'Lilia' written on the opening page. And to this day, that was what Lilia remained to be - a strange, different girl who dreamt of fantasies about tall castles filled with a court of strange creatures, all ruled by a powerful king.
". . . Miss Aberture, pay attention!" Lilia jumped, tearing her glare from the window as she met eyes with her least favorite teacher, Mr. Hamilton. Her eyes went wide as his glare focused solely on her, the class snickering as they all turned to see who had gotten in trouble. Mr. Hamilton was famous for being the teacher to hand out the most detentions in one day. "If I have to tell you one more time today, you'll be staying after class. Understand?"
She nodded, then sighed with red cheeks as she felt the eyes of her classmates on her as Mr. Hamilton turned to continue writing on the board.
Instead of turning her gaze to the window, Lilia focused more on the notebook in front of her as a small smirk came over her lips. Beside the notes she had taken for her English class were doodles - doodles of realistic butterflies, of creatures that hadn't been dreamed up, and of characters she had seen in her dreams.
"Do you need to borrow my notes after class?" Kaylee, Lilia's best friend, whispered while still taking notes. Lilia looked up with a small smile, and noticed the one that had been pulling at Kaylee's lips.
"Yes please," she whispered back, adding darkness to the side of a character's face, "How's it look?"
For once, Kaylee looked over with her brown bangs hanging just a bit over her brown eyes.
"Looks great. Why is it all the kooky kids are good artists?" she asked, and then mumbled, "I can't draw for shit."
Lilia let out a quiet laugh before the bell ring, everyone hopping up from their spots in the classroom to head home after the last class of the day. Lilia picked up her books with one hand, the other tugging her bag up her shoulder.
"I'll see you tomorrow, yeah?" Lilia asked, Kaylee grabbing her things as she nodded.
"Yeah. Don't forget to bring my Bowie CD, too." She sent Lilia a small smile, which was returned in the same fashion.
"I know, I know. I just . . . I really needed something to listen to after he . . ." Lilia went quiet and let out a small sigh, recalling the previous night when she had spent hours just silently letting tears slip.
"I did the same, trust me. Well, bye." Kaylee left the room, Lilia following shortly after with her nose buried in a book to avoid meeting any unwanted gazes as she walked home. She ignored the conversations around her - mixes of greetings and farewells, of plans that were for the weekend. She ignored each and every one until she found herself outside, following the other 15 year-old kids that decided to walk home rather than take the giant yellow bus.
Lilia lived on the far edge of town, five miles from the school - she didn't mind walking to and from, however, because walking calmed her whenever she was upset, and because it gave her a chance to think of things in a serene way.
When the crowd thinned out and she was finally left to walk alone, she tucked her headphones into her ears, listening to the album she had borrowed from Kaylee - the whole soundtrack to her favorite movie, Labyrinth, and listened to it as loud as she could.
Ever since she was little, her favorite movie had been Labyrinth - something about the mystical plot, the sense of wonder it gave her, caused her to never grow weary of it. In fact, the movie proved to be one of the main sources of her inspiration and creativity, since most of the paintings she created were about the magical tale. Her favorite character happened to be Ludo, the giant creature that summoned rocks with his screams. He always seemed like a giant dog who could walk to Lilia, which is why she had always wanted to see him in anything but her imagination.
She hummed lightly to herself, a pep in her step as she walked down the sidewalk to the fairly large house where she lived with her adoptive parents.
The outside was panelled with cream-colored siding, the roof covered with rough shingles that had been recently replaced just two years ago. The porch wrapped around the entire house, the windows were tall, and the door was wide enough to fit two people through. It was the perfect house for a southern Illinois setting - the perfect house for the state.
"Anyone home?" Lilia shouted, stepping into the house and becoming greeted with the high-pitched barks of her mother's dog, Jasper. "Sh, it's just me."
The little white dog ran up to Lilia, its tail wagging and tongue lolling from the side of its mouth as it greeted her with gentle kisses to her exposed ankles. Lilia let out a small laugh before stepping around the dog, then making her way up the stairs to her room. As soon as she had stepped inside, the first thing she did was flop down on the bed despite having worn a long skirt that day - she sighed, glad that the day was over, and simply stared at the ceiling as she thought about the English paper she had due next week.
"I don't want to do it," she sung in a high pitched voice, letting out a loud breath as she did so. She turned her gaze away from the ceiling to look over at the vanity, staring at her reflection in the mirror.
Her face was thin, and always had been - her chin was pointed softly, as well as her cheekbones. Her nose was long and thin, ending a few inches above her pink lips. The skin of her whole face was smooth and softly glowing in the natural light, with help from the pale tint that had always been on her skin. But, if anything, the most prominent feature she held were her eyes - although they were both bright blue, they had a mutation - a beautiful mutation - that left them looking stranger than anyone else. While the pupil on the left eye was rather small, showing nearly all of the color, the pupil on her right eye was so big that it almost looked as if she had no color in the eye. Sometimes the right eye scared Lilia when she had forgotten it was there, but other times she saw it as a beautiful thing - something that made her feel connected to David Bowie, because their eyes were the same.
On top of her facial features, and the hauntingly beautiful look she held, her hair was light brown, so light it was nearly blonde. It was always either straight or curled gently - Lilia rarely did much with it, because of the length; her hair was so long that she sometimes caught herself sitting on it accidentally.
Lilia sighed, taking in her face one more time before looking back to the ceiling, a glint of sadness and hope still lingering in her eyes as she thought about her favorite fantasy - one where she would meet her real parents.