Author's Note: Ah I am really sorry for taking so long to update! School has been keeping me way too busy since it's almost the end of the year and writing inspiration hasn't been my friend lately :/ I hope you enjoy this chapter, although it is short...enjoy :)


Flynn's POV

Flashback-8 years prior

Beep. Beep. Beep.

I've been listening to the monotonous, static drones of the heart rate machine for over two hours, clutching my mother's pale fingers and rubbing my thumb over her knobbly knuckles. The spotless white walls of the hospital drowned out the noises of the city and with it, my dwindling hopes that my mother would make it. Her eyelids have remained closed, stiff and tinged with grey. Her head is perfectly smooth, like the side of a polished boiled egg. I remember when she used to have long, thick brown hair and cheeks flushed with color. Now she was as lifeless as a corpse, her life hanging by a thread and her face void of emotion.

Staring at her motionless body and listening to her ragged breathing, I realize I never imagined her unexplained sickness would go uncured. I always thought one day she'd be healed and the dark blue pills would disappear from her cabinet and she'd start smiling again, just like she'd been when I was a little kid. I miss her motherly kindness when she would read me my favorite story, "The Tales of Flynnigan Rider." I miss her warm hugs and her cheesy jokes and how she would tell stories of my father and her before he was taken from our lives when I was just an infant.

"Eugene?"

I'm jolted from my thoughts, my brown eyes meeting hers. "Mom?"

"I know I won't be here for much longer, but there's something you must hear."

"Yes?" I swallow hard against the lump in my throat, trying to be brave in front of her. I'm not going to cry; I'm fifteen years old, not a weepy five year old.

When she speaks, her voice is steadier than it has been for years, and I find my chest gripped with overwhelming sadness.

"Don't let my passing let you from living your life. Live out your dreams. Fall in love with a nice girl and treat her right. Even though I'll be gone soon, I'll forever be in your heart. I love you, my adventurous one." She squeezes my fingers with weakening strength, the ghost of her familiar smile flitting across her lips.

I reassuringly squeeze them back. "I love you too, Mom."

She looks at me one last time before closing her eyes and exhaling slowly, as if relieved of a great burden. The machine won't stop beeping.


Everyday, I lose a part of myself to the temptations of popular girls at my school whose large breasts and curvy waists offer a welcome distraction from the reality of my mother's death. I start hanging out with guys I otherwise would've avoided and ignore the warnings of my childhood friends. I sink into a pit hole of depression and begin acting like the thief from the storybook I'd so loved as a child as a means of coping; arrogant and manipulative, charming the fawning girls with my convincing façade. My grades are dropping and I find myself caring more and more about the shallow opinions of others.

Kind-hearted Eugene Fitzherbert is no longer allowed in the harsh cliques of the high school and must be hidden behind the cocky Flynn Rider, the guy who has no regard for others and breaks women's hearts without a thought. He has a new girl draped around his shoulders every week, his smirk taunting those who dare to think they can tame him. Respect is a thing of the past, replaced with carelessness and insulting remarks to the teachers who will soon despise the sight of his face and send him to detention for "reckless behavior" and "lackadaisical work."

He's grown comfortable behind the mask of Flynn Rider; he's forgotten all about poor orphan Eugene Fitzherbert-until a fiery blonde named Rapunzel comes along and unknowingly has made him regret pretending to be someone he isn't.


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