Time After Time

By: ML Mowry

Chapter One ~ Diamonds

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Satine Devoire was a star, if only in the bedroom. She looked, talked, and even moved, like a star. And that was her passion, to act. But not just a movie star. No, a Broadway star! Music was all that made her life bearable, and she wanted to share that. She didn't have a half-bad voice, either. But it wasn't cheap to get out of Los Angeles, and New York was a whole country away. So her dreams must wait.

At least for now, they would. But one day she would leave this world. This underworld of sordid sex and powerful drugs. This was her hell, and she had been born here. Born the beautiful daughter of a crack-addicted prostitute and a drug-dealer who'd been killed before she was born. Then, as fate always had in store for the underlings like her, her mother died in childbirth. Which was expectable, when you gave birth on a dirty floor in an old warehouse scheduled for demolition.

Now, though, she was twenty-eight, and felt the beginning of the end coming. Most prostitutes at the club she worked at 'retired' at thirty or thirty-five, and it was unheard of to work past fourty. And of course, when one retired, one was thrown out on the street to find food however one might. She shook her head just thinking about it. She would not end up like that, she would be free from this world.

That was why she was dressing now in her best gown. She was going to the club tonight to meet with an investor. The investor would pay the club's owner for improvements. But in return, Satine would have to become his mistress. That would mean a plane ticket to New York. She went out to wait for Marie to pick her up.

Marie was the club owner's wife, a former prostitute, and a mother figure to Satine. Satine sat down on a patio chair on the front lawn of the apartment complex she lived in. She began to hum. Then a moment later the song became full blown.

I

Some bright morning when this life is o'er

I will fly away

To a home on God's celestial shore

I will fly away

I will fly away oh glory

I will fly away

When I die Hallelujah by and by

I will fly away

When the shadows of this life have gone

I will fly away

Like a bird from these prison walls I'll fly

I will fly away

I will fly away oh glory

I will fly away

When I die Hallelujah by and by

I will fly away



Oh how glad and happy when we meet

I will fly away

No more cold iron shackles on my feet

I will fly away

I will fly away oh glory

I will fly away

When I die Hallelujah by and by

I will fly away

Just a few more weary days and then

I will fly away

To a land where joys will never end

I will fly away

I will fly away oh glory

I will fly away

When I die Hallelujah by and by

I will fly away

/I