Thanks to Karen and Alexis!! Wonderful Betas!!

Chapter Two: Mirror

"I'm broken hearted, seems like we never started…"

She had an 'A' tattooed on her left hip in a deep black handwritten print. Every time she stared at the loopy script, she thought that it must have been very important to her before everything happened. It just had one letter, which held so much meaning, written in someone else's handwriting. It was the most frustrating thing that Spencer has encountered through out the past years. It was permanently written onto her milky skin for a reason, and it was a reason that she didn't remember. She decided not to ask her mother, or her father, or her brother and his wife. She figured that it being in such an intimate place for such a vital reason nobody would have previously known about it.

Spencer stood in front of the mirror in her bedroom naked. She had dropped her pink Victoria's Secret robe at her feet to examine the odd tattoo once again. It was almost like a ritual for her. She would take a long hot shower, rinsing her body of the constant dirtiness she would feel. She pretended she was a Princess lost in the jungles of India. She would finally step out of the shower (a man made waterfall in the jungle), and walk into her bedroom to stand in front of the mirror. It was finally when she made her way to the mirror, staring at her reflection, that she stepped into the real world. It used to be the only way she would know that reality existed and that she really had been lost somewhere deep inside her mind.

She remembered how the doctors discovered this little piece of information. After being lost for so long deep inside the labyrinths of her brain, they found that when she passed one of the nurses' windows that had just been cleaned, she caught eye of her reflection. They found out that when she came out of the long bout of self-induced psychosis, she went into a deep panic. She didn't remember who she was before that and refused to look in a mirror any time after that. It was only those rare cases the doctors would pull out a hand mirror to show her that her pretend worlds were just false security blankets and she really was the pained figure staring back at herself.

Spencer stood there, tracing her pinky along the black print soothingly. She felt the area around it would tingle in some sort of unusual satisfaction lately. She understood that it was a good satisfaction, one that told her that things were moving at the rate they were supposed to. It told her that maybe, just maybe, she'll understand the true meaning of the 'A' on her hipbone.

For a while after she came out of her Psychosis, and after it had been explained to her who exactly her perpetrator was, she was fearful that the 'A' represented his name. It was the name of someone who caused her to retreat back into the childish world of her imagination. The name of someone who took away her past and locked it away. The name of someone who caused her to remember only his face, the way he smells, and how it felt when he did those repulsive, explicit things to her. Spencer never really sees herself there though, or at least the part of her that counts in her memory. She sees a hollow shell; someone who took over her spot and the memories of him was just left over residue of her past.

Instead of indulging herself in such memories, she decided to pull her finger away and go into her closet to get dressed. The best thing about her over-active memory was the ability to throw it onto paper or canvas. She wrote many books and painted many masterpieces depicting her wonderful worlds and, in a vague sense, the comfort they bring her. She started the writing two months after she came out of her psychosis and the paintings not long after.

First, the therapists saw it as a way for her to express herself a little bit better than her over-analytical words. Then, they decided to show her parents. They thought it was a good idea to let the Carlins inside her brain. Afterwards, her parents decided that they could sell her stories and hang her paintings in galleries. First they got a story published, a children's book about a young blonde girl trying to find the way out of a never ending labyrinth. It sold millions of copies. Children fell in love with the little girl while adults fell in love with the morbid humor. The money they got back from that was put away, for Spencer, while a little was spent to rent a space to showcase her art. They figured that when she became 'their' Spencer again she would appreciate her dreams of becoming a writer accomplished and enough money held back for her to live off of.

Instead 'their' Spencer never came back.

"I've been confused outta' my mind lately..."

Spencer finished putting on some skinny jeans and a red tank top. She combed a hand through her blond tussles and grabbed her keys before making her way out of her apartment. She took the stairs down to the first floor, which had deep brown wooden flooring that all the apartments had. There was one red door across from the stairs with a gold plate that had 'Office' inscribed in it. Next to the red door were the mailboxes and a few bikes. She had already memorized it all. They were perfectly written down and filed away in her brain.

"Look Mama! It's her again!" A loud squeal yelled back to her mother as she came burling down the stairs to come to a quick stop in front of Spencer. Her unruly blondish brown hair was pulled up into a high bun and she had large black designer sun glasses resting on top of her head. She beamed up at Spencer with a large nose crinkling smile.

The sides of Spencer's mouth twitched but a smile had yet to form. It had been the fourth day running into the small family. It was so hard to walk away from the three figures each and every day that she had previously ran into them. Spencer thought that after the third time the little girl wishfully asked her to join them for a play at the park and her mother looking at her with searching eyes, she would have given in. Instead, Spencer held her ground and replied to the pouty little girl with a stern 'no' and left for her apartment.

But here she stood, like a tall and important Princess, in front of the child. Today she couldn't really run to her apartment. She was already on her way out to the park herself. She needed the fresh air and a walk on the beach. So, it would be rude to leave the little girl standing there in disappointment. And, what if they saw her on their trip to the park? "Wouldn't that be damaging in some way?" Spencer thought to herself. She didn't understand where the empathy for the child's feelings came from, but she didn't question it.

Her gaze turned to the older woman holding the hand of the little boy, his eyes hooded by the shaggy brownish blonde hair. He had a shy expression as he maneuvered his small body behind the woman, clutching onto her hand. Spencer's gaze followed the top of his head, up the woman's tanned arms, to her gorgeous face. It was a face that always surprised Spencer. It was inspiring, the face of so many new sketches in her book. Spencer swore that in her make believe world the young mother would be a Goddess. The Goddess of the Earth who Spencer would worship her entire life. Maybe, this was a new idea for a book or a painting. It would be a collection about leaving the labyrinth and finding a heart of gold at the end.

"Hello," the woman half sang softly as she came to the last step. She was so close to Spencer, almost too close, but at the same time the distance in Spencer's eyes kept her so far away. She held out her free hand and called out for her small daughter, "Ofy, Princess, leave the woman alone."

The little girl met her mother's eyes and pouted, "But Mama, idn't she' ssso 'retty. Con't she play wit usss?"

This childish broken language and slight lisp caused the smile to appear on Spencer's lips. She found the small, but almost demanding voice of the little girl adorable and couldn't see how she had denied her of something so small the last couple days. She felt the little girl's strong hope fly through the air and seep into her pale skin. She wasn't used to such pure emotion.

The little girl took the offered hand and the young mother bent down to kiss her forehead. "Yes, she is very pretty but I think she doesn't want to play. Princess, she doesn't even know us."

The little girl's shoulders fell and the pout grew into her green eyes as disappointment spread through her little body. She looked over at the blonde who had kept still during this whole ordeal. With a couple small steps, Ofelia let go of her mother's hand and walked over to Spencer. She held out a small sun kissed hand, "'M Ofelia Kei Davies an' 'm fourah. Dat's meh brother, Pan, and dat's meh mama."

Spencer grinned at the child and reached out to take her small hand in her larger one. Her world shifting to allow the child access into it freely where she became the Princess her mother had already dubbed her. Spencer looked at the little boy who had peaked his head around and then up into brown hue eyes. Her blue orbs went back to the small green ones in front of her as she got down on her knee. With a soft voice, she answer, "Well hello Ofelia Davies, it just so happens we have the same middle name. I am Spencer Kei Carlin."

Spencer could feel the heat from the eyes on her back. She could feel the older woman watching the interaction with such interest. Spencer threw it off as just a mother making sure her child was safe. Yet, all the interaction she has witnessed before between mothers and children didn't seem like what the woman was feeling. Instead, when Spencer got to her feet and let go of Ofelia's hand, she met the eyes of Ofelia's mama. She saw there was something etched into them like it was a secret language she was missing out on.

The brunette held out her hand to Spencer. Spencer looked from the hand to the face offering it. She wondered if she took this woman's hand would she be pulling her into her make believe land like she had Ofelia, or would the woman be pulling her into the real world like the mirrors. Letting it slip off her lips like she had said it to Spencer once before, she smiled and whispered, "Ashley Davies."

Automatically Spencer felt as if she was taken aback to a different world. It was a world of teenage thinking and shy smiles. She reached for Ashley's hand, "Spencer Carlin."

She felt the finger's of the older girl's hand slide off her hand, over her fingers, before letting go of touch altogether. Ashley's eyes were brighter, and more intensified with the secret language that Spencer didn't remember how to speak. Ashley put her free hand on Ofelia's head and smiled lightly at Spencer. Her nose crinkling as she asked, "Would you please join us at the park?"

Spencer was still processing her hand being touched by the woman. The woman she clearly didn't know if she existed or not. She looked down at her head for a moment and then back into clear brown eyes. She was scared and felt like everything around her was shattering into tiny fragments. Was she being pulled into the real world? Or was she opening the timeless doors to her world for Ashley?

Spencer opened her mouth to answer.

" Please drop the past and be true.
Don't think we're okay, just because I'm here...…"

Playlists. (songs in order by chapter)

0.Almost Lover by The Fine Frenzy
1.Ex Lover is Dead by Stars
2.Warwick Avenue by Duffy