Its kind of short but I hope you like it!
Chapter Four
“The cruelest lies are often told in silence.”
-Robert Lois Stevenson
This is the best way to come to my world, calmly and in my sleep. On rare occasions my “gift” lets me have a good moment, where I go into my world and not be cut off or in the middle of a conversation in the real one. I open my eyes and realize that I am back in the room that James’ dad made up for me. I’m wondering if he is still here. I have some beef to pick with him. I get up because I am surprisingly sore. I realize that all my stuff is here from our hut, even my guitar signed by none other than Bon Jovi. I don’t really play guitar but I love Bon Jovi so I called him to my world a while back. I had him sign it then let him continue on with whatever he was dreaming about. It was legendary, yet not the most exciting thing to happen to me in here, but that is for later. I continue scanning the room and suddenly hear a knock. I hope it isn’t James because I am not prepared to talk to him yet. It isn’t. Instead I see a girl walk in. She doesn’t look more than ten maybe eleven years old. She bows her head at me and starts to talk.
“Hello. Is there anything you need?”
She gives me the sweetest smile ever but she has no teeth. That’s right, she is all gums. How is she even talking? Who is she anyway?
“No thanks. I’m sorry, but who are you again?”
She just laughs.
“Oh I am sorry. I am Lily Tamely Hamtation. I am here to help you in whatever way possible.”
She walked across the room to a wall. She clapped her hands twice and a wardrobe appeared out of it. This house is crazy, it has so many secrets. Good thing that I am not planning on staying here. She picked up a blue dress and laid it on a chest in front of the mirror. Then she picked out a t-shirt that said “Only in America” that had a man yelling at McDonalds with a coffee in his hand and his tongues bright red, and jeans.
“Take your pick Ms. Luber.”
She turned back to the wardrobe and closed it. It didn’t disappear, rather than just stay there.
“What’s the occasion?”
She looked at me. She was quite beautiful for such a little girl. She had blonde hair with little streaks of purple and blue eyes that looked a lot like James’, dark and mysterious. I wonder if they are related because I apparently I don’t know anything about my boyfriend of three years.
“Breakfast, silly and I don’t think you wanna go in that.”
I looked at myself and realized for the first time what I was wearing, nothing. Well, I wasn’t completely naked but if I took off my underwear and bra I would have been. I tried covering up myself with a sheet but she just assured me that it was fine.
“It’s not like it’s something I have never seen.”
She motioned to herself. I smiled. She was so sweet which made me wonder even more why she was here, in a dream world, MY dream world. She excused herself and I got dressed, obviously picking the jeans and t-shirt. I looked and the mirror. I had no idea what James saw in me. I mean, I wasn’t ugly but I wasn’t the prettiest girl in the world either, maybe it was the fact that I was the only girl in this world. I think it was made me seem so blech. I was extremely tall and had no curves whatsoever. I am pretty sure that even Mason had more hips than me. My mom had told me that it was genetics and I just got the bad part of the gene pool and that an upside was that I could become a model. I looked at my cheek. Due to the fact that I am not a full angel, I didn’t have the full angel mark. It was pretty much a little swirl that looked like a pig’s tail. It wasn’t fully gold either, instead, only the two ends were and the middle was a metallic blue color. I finally stopped scrutinizing myself and left the room. I wasn’t sure where to go but I just followed the noise and ended up in a kitchen. There were only two people there: Lily and some guy. He looked like he was about 40 or some years old and had grease all over his shirt. I smiled. Lily rushed to my side. She was so tiny. Like a little pixie, except with long hair.
“Oh, Ms. Luber, forgive me. I meant to lead you to the dining room but Ravi was telling me a hilarious joke.”
She started to chuckle but then straightened herself out.
“Of course, that is no excuse.”
She bowed her head and I was so confused. She didn’t do anything wrong. I picked her head up and made her look at me.
“Don’t sweat it. I’m good.”
She seemed relieved and then turned to Ravi.
“Ravi, meet Jessica Luber. Ms. Luber, meet Ravi Trontisky, our chef.”
I went to go shake his hand but then thought better of it; they were all greasy and probably dirty from the food.
“Nice to meet you, Jessica.”
“Ditto.”
Out of the corner of my eye I saw Lily bow her head and shake it. I looked at her.
“What?’
She looked at me and realized I had seen her.
“Oh, excuse my brother, Ms. Luber; he doesn’t know the meaning of manners. Also, he apparently doesn’t know his place in this household.”
She looked daggers at her supposed brother. Funny, they didn’t look anything alike. All he did was shrug and go back to cooking.
“Why should I call her Ms. Luber when her name is Jessica and she is younger than me? I don’t see her calling me Mr. Trontisky.”
Lily stuck her nose in the air and huffed.
“Follow me, Ms. Luber; I will take you to the dining room.”
She left and I followed.
“You know he doesn’t have to call me Ms. Luber. I actually prefer Jessica or Jessie.”
She looked at me and stopped.
“Does that mean that I have offended you by calling you Ms. Luber?”
She looked so hurt; as if I had just told her Santa wasn’t real for the first time.
“No! Of course not! The point is that you guys can call me whatever you want.”
She nodded her head and continued walking.
“Hey Lily?”
She didn’t look at me, but I know she heard me because she answered,
“Yea?”
“How is he your brother is you guys have different last names?”
“Different fathers.”
That made total sense. We continued the rest of the way in silence, which was good because it let me think. I don’t know what I am supposed to say to James. I wanted to confront him about what his father said but on the other hand, I didn’t feel like fighting with him, ever. I had butterflies in my stomach the whole time to there. We continued down a hallway that seemed like it took forever and finally stopped. We stopped by a door that had a weird mark on it. It looked like a tree at first but once you got closer, it morphed into a dragon looking thing with big teeth and small hands. Lily opened the door to a big dining room with a table in the center. I wondered why it was such a small table for such a big room. Lily led me to the table where Neil was sitting, alone. He looked up from a newspaper and saw me. He looked at Lily and waved her away with his hand. She left us, alone in this big room. I had no idea what to do, so I just sat. There was an amazing spread, so I started with a blueberry bagel with jelly and cream cheese. I looked up at Neil and realized that he was still reading his stupid newspaper.
“Dream World Times?”
He looked up and chuckled. He set his newspaper down and took a sip of his orange juice.
“You failed to create anything entertaining in this world so I had to come up with something. Of course, it only works in this world.”
I grabbed the newspaper and looked at it. It looked like a normal one except it had stories that weren’t even plausible and mostly about none other than Neil, himself. There was one about him being a hero and another about fifty women lining up to meet him.
“You made this?”
He grabbed it back and set it down on the floor.
“Is it really any of your business?”
I shrugged.
“Guess not.”
We continued eating but I couldn’t take it anymore. I couldn’t just ignore the fact that James wasn’t here.
“Where is James?”
Neil looked at me, confused.
“Can’t you see in your world?”
I rolled my eyes.
“Not what’s in this stupid house.”
He chuckled, which sounded so much like James’ it wasn’t even funny.
“Oh yes well, I forgot. He isn’t here.”
“Like not in the house?”
He shook his head while taking another sip of his juice.
“Like not in this world.”
My stomach dropped. James wasn’t here? Had he finally woken up for good in reality and left me here all alone?
“What do you mean not here? Where is he?”
“Where everyone goes when they leave here; reality.”
“So, is he gone for good?”
I asked this question, dreading the answer. Thank G-D Neil shook his head.
“I thought he told you that sometimes he gets pulled back in reality, just long enough to let them know to keep him plugged in.”
“He did but he said that it doesn’t take him that long. He should be back by now.”
Neil just shrugged and went on eating his breakfast but I wasn’t done with the questions.
“You know, don’t you?”
He looked up.
“Know what?”
I looked at him and wondered if he was just asking to annoy me or because he actually didn’t know what I was talking about. Either way, I wanted answers and wasn’t in the mood for games.
“That I was going to leave when I did last time?”
He nodded.
“I had an idea. I just got lucky but you never did answer my question.”
I looked at him and really pondered the idea of him being James’ dad. I mean they looked a lot alike but were complete opposites. James was sweet and caring while Neil didn’t really care about anything and was a real jerk.
“That’s because I don’t know the answer.”
He shrugged again.
“Too bad. I really want to know.”
He looked down at his hands and started playing with them. If I didn’t know him any better, I would have thought he was nervous.
“So, what’s with Lily and Ravi?”
He looked up and looked genuinely confused. Then, realization swept across his face.
“Ah, yes the maid and cook. They are employees.”
“Obviously if they work here but of who?”
“Me, of course”
“What are they doing here?”
“Lily asked me for help and I helped her. If she works for me in here, I have someone pay her in reality. If her brother works here, they get paid double.”
“How do you know them?”
I realized that I was asking a lot of questions but I wanted a lot of answers. He didn’t seem to notice, though.
“They are my sister’s children.”
That is why Lily looked so much like James. I guess their genes run strong.
“Don’t you think it’s kind of cruel to make a little girl work for you? I mean she doesn’t look more than eleven years old.”
He laughed.
“Wow, you must really think I am evil.”
I shrugged.
“Just saying it what I see.”
“In real life, she is actually about your age. I just changed her in here because her favorite age was ten. She asked me to do it.”
He again went back to playing with his fingernails and eating his cereal little by little. I was done asking questions so I started picking at my bagel. I hear the door open and I look up to see Neil staring at the person behind me. He gets up, making an awful screeching sound with his chair, and walks toward whoever came in.
“Speak of the devil.”
I am guessing that it is Lily, so I turn around and…………………………..
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