The rattle was exactly the sort of thing Maleficent would give her baby, Lily thought as her hand closed around it, sitting on her bed in her hotel room at Granny's. Designed like a miniature of Maleficent's staff, with a little purple orb on the end, it was smaller than the palm of Lily's hand.
She had known for years now that her mother was Maleficent, but finally meeting her was not what Lily had expected. Instead of the cartoon villain she had imagined, her mother was a … well, a person. A real woman wanting to reconnect with her lost child, and to tell the truth, that scared Lily a lot more than the "scary dragon bitch" she had imagined.
No matter what Maleficent said, she knew better. She would screw things up, just like she always did, and her mother – her mother who was so much less like a villain than Lily had ever expected – would realize what everyone else she had cared about figured out sooner or later. Lily wasn't worth it.
But what if?
What if Maleficent meant what she said? What if there was a chance – just a chance – that things would be different this time? What if she could finally find a home, a family, after all these years?
No. Don't be silly. Don't set yourself up for disappointment, she told herself. Happy endings were for people like Emma and her precious little family of hypocrites who called themselves heroes. Lily was too full of darkness to ever be happy.
But she remembered Maleficent's words: "I don't mind a little darkness".
The rattle was too small for her now. She wasn't a baby anymore and never would be again. But maybe …
A knock on the door startled her. She set the rattle down on her nightstand and turned to answer it. Maleficent stood in the entrance, dressed in a pale purple suit, long blonde hair hanging loose down her back. Lily couldn't help but notice how not evil she looked.
"Hey, um … can I help you?"
Maleficent's smile wavered.
"What would you say to lunch at Granny's?" she said. "I'm sure you must have lots of questions. We can talk about … well, everything."
Lily hesitated. But she had agreed to stay for a reason, and she knew Maleficent – her mom, hard as that was to accept – wanted to get to know her.
"Okay," she said.
It was awkward. Lily couldn't imagine it would ever not be awkward, sitting across the table from her long lost mother and trying to form this relationship that she wasn't even sure was possible. But it was something. It was a start.
