A/N: You have no idea how much I enjoy writing this. Since I plan nothing, I switched POVs and changed the plotline drastically, though you won't be informed of it until later. Note that this story won't be all blood and violence—I'm throwing some romance in there, too, and officially one of my new favourite pairings. For any upcoming misunderstandings, Meryl was twelve in chapter one.
I love you for reviewing. I don't think anyone noticed, but the bolded letters in the title in chapter one, spelled roses. Try to find this one, too, though it won't be very hard. Lastly, I apologize for crappy html and format. My laptop is unable to access documents via ffNet, so that sucks. Read on.
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Four Years
Four years is not as long as it seems.
Sure, pick it apart as much as you want, twist the words to your liking, shift them around until it doesn't sound as bad—forty-eight months, whatever number of days, I don't know, you do the math. If you got past the monotony of the actual experience of living that length of time and got over yourself and the stupid grieving, then you'd be able to endure those four years…like I had.
It's not impossible. It shouldn't be impossible. Sure, it would obviously be hard at the beginning to continue on, pretending to mesh into the rest of the unchanged population—okay, maybe not so hard at the very beginning. The very beginning was just pain and numbness. But after the very beginning, maybe a few days or a week later, then reality would settle in, and the precedent aching would be nothing compared to what would settle in.
After all, sometimes there was a drastic difference between real pain and illusion pain, the latter, which you created for yourself. Either way, no matter what cause or category, it was pain that gnawed at your body all the same.
I still had the scars—they stayed with me through the months and years, like birthmarks. There was a fading, long, but also long-closed slit on my left forearm; you could barely see it, unless it was under the dimmest of lights. A tiny, splinteresque scar claimed territory on my right calf, closer to my ankle. A couple of unhealing scratches on my knees were left behind, since I fell on them often, even in the present. But the worst one—the deepest, the most painful wound—was where nobody could see it, thankfully: a contorted, miscoloured bruise that started from the higher planes of my back and twisted around my body, stopping abruptly just before my bellybutton. It was one of those wounds that, no matter how old, you would wince upon looking at, even when you were prepared to see it. It was a shock, a fear that never went away. What's strange is that this wound never faded—the pain never subsided. While the other scars eventually paled to match my natural skin tone and settled to smoothen my skin's couture, this one stayed unchanged. It was laced with a dark black, and it stung to caress with anything sharper than the material of silk.
There was a light knock on the door. I knew, four years ago, that whoever was at the other side of the door—and I was almost sure I already knew—that knocking wouldn't be required. They could have just walked in.
But that was then, and this…is now.
"Come in, Ronald," I murmured, referring to my uncle, who had taken me in ever since I'd moved to Flower Bud Village when I was too young to remember. I sat up in my bed and yanked down my shirt, which I had been adjusting to stare at my scars.
The door creaked open, as if warily. "Meryl?" he said, looking around the room even though I was right in front of him in my closet of a room. His thick mustache and eyebrows were prominent against his chestnut-coloured skin, where early wrinkles showed signs of approaching.
"Hey," I greeted him shortly. "What's up?"
"Uh…" He hesitated. It had been like this ever since that incident four years ago—didn't he get that I was over it now? "There's someone I'd like you to meet; I'm sure you'll like him."
I quirked up a brow, inputting before he could ramble on. "Another new farmer?" I guessed. There had been an onslaught of new farmers arriving lately—I suppose two wasn't a very big number, but for an outdated and remote town like Flower Bud, it definitely seemed like one. As far as I knew, the last newcomer before the farmers was Ronald, and that was years ago.
"No, no…we have enough competition already," I thought I heard him add under his breath in a muted mumble. Then he brightened again, not that he'd looked very cheery to begin with. "We have a new worker."
Ronald and I lived in a rather spacious building, which was surrounded by a bit more than a dozen trees that he liked to refer to as an orchard. Hence, came the name and business, 'Paradise Orchard.' It was a rather cheesy name, but my uncle was a bit cheesy as well, and my pride was the last thing I could care about.
"That's great, Ronald," I said.
He looked at me, studied me, as if being careful not to blink. I realized he'd expected me to meet this new worker—of course. I got up slowly, biting back a groan as my back bumped against the wall. "Where is he?"
"In the guestroom, unpacking."
My mouth stretched open, but I was unsure of how wide it was. Although it must not have been wide enough, since my uncle didn't seem fazed in the least.
"He's moving in?" I demanded, more irritated than shocked by the abruptness of the situation. "I haven't even met him, and he's going to live with me now?"
"Now, now," –and they said adults understood a child's feelings through experience— "you'll get to know him. Come on, now, I'd like to give him some time to adjust." And he left in haste, as if to get away from anymore questions or complaints I held inside.
I sat on my bed, still, resisting the urge to fall against it again and punch the mattress until it squealed behind me. But the walls were thin, and how was I supposed to make a good impression by throwing a tantrum?
Again, not that pride was something I really cared about anymore.
I trudged down the hall, and as expected, Ronald was waiting for me. He urged me to the guestroom, which was only a little further down the hall. He knocked and I stared at the floor.
The door swung open jovially, and it was as if a second sun had been placed in the room. "Oh, hi!" I heard a man with a voice, not low and rich but not exactly high and girly, say. It irritated me further that he seemed surprised—I mean, I lived here, after all.
Ronald started talking. I assume he was introducing me since I heard my name, which I was thankful for. I continued to look at nothing but his legs and feet, which were clothed with plain white socks and cut-off jeans. His shins were dark and muscular.
Curiosity got the better of me, and slowly, my gaze rose. I was irked to find that another pair of eyes had been waiting for me. They were a deep shade of blue—so dark and deep they almost appeared violet. The man had a messy head of hair, pulled back in a faded red bandana in a futile attempt to keep his long bangs back. They spilled out of loose openings and nearly touched his long, straight nose. His lips were pulled up in a smile, all his straight white teeth showing—a friendly smile.
I tried to return the gesture, but it seemed like I was only baring my teeth at him. I quickly closed my mouth in case he found anything else in it.
"…So hopefully you two will get better acquainted soon, but I'm sure Dan would like to get his things sorted out first and have a good night's rest. Don't you think, Meryl…Meryl?"
I blinked myself back into reality. One instant I was looking into Dan's amused eyes, and next I was staring into my uncle's blabbering and concerned face. "Yeah, okay," I muttered, my gloomy tone out of place.
"Good, good. Have a nice night—oh, yes, thank you. You too. Great. See you in the morning." I couldn't focus enough to hear both sides of the conversation, so I let Ronald lead me out of the new worker's room and back to mine.
"Night," I murmured briefly, and moved to lightly shut the door.
Ronald caught it before I could end my movement. He stared at me with worry. "Meryl? Are you okay?"
I choked down the urge to grit my teeth and snarl in his face, do-I-look-okay? Instead, I put on an ugly smiley face and touched his shoulder. "Of course I am, I'm just tired. See you tomorrow morning."
He noticed my finality and bid me goodnight, allowing me to shut the door. I could tell he wasn't convinced, but I wasn't so sure that I cared.
I took a quick shower, brushed my teeth, changed into my pyjamas and climbed into bed. It had begun to rain outside and a storm brewed, the sky growling at me, and thunder snapping and crackling against nature's soft whistles and hums. The racket didn't bother me at all, and I found my eyes sliding swiftly shut, and my mind taking off and drifting into slumber.
Not long later, when darkness engulfed me, I suppose it decided that it was bored. My unconscious mind lit up and I was living one of those surreal experiences where I already knew it was a dream, but I couldn't come to enough to wake myself up.
The trees were straight, perfect, lined up around me. It was too neat…too arranged and tidy. It obviously wasn't real.
The grass below me, and it was funny, because I was somehow watching myself from a third-person perspective—was much too green. Not even the shining emerald jewels I'd seen fresh from the mines could do them justice. The green, glimmering grass was so beautiful it was almost ugly. It didn't move at all. The wind seemed to elude it completely.
And then I saw the boy. The boy whose name I'd tried to block from my memory. I saw his face, and the very face I'd been hurting to forget. It all came back, hard and swift as smacking face-first into a brick wall. I couldn't look away, that damn dream—and my eyes were already closed, in the literal sense. The boy stared at me, an odd smile on his face, and I was so thankful no sound came out when he opened his mouth to speak.
However, what I did hear was a piercing scream, that same banshee's shriek that had wounded me so greatly four years ago. It was crystal clear, like I was reliving the moment—and I hated every second of it. Though it was only my illusion self that fell to the ground, clutching her sides and soundless screams escaping me, my real body ached as well. I could feel the falling sensation in my abdomen, the tightening of my limbs as they pressed together, the burning scar that would never fade on my stomach and back…
And then I woke up, both my knuckles shoved into my mouth, holding in my gasps of terror. I sat up, the wound burning.
It had been four years since it hurt this badly.