Beauty And The Beast: The Classic Fantasy Fairy Tale With A Twist
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Chapter One
The Dream
For the few moments the dream lingered within her mind like starlight near day's twilight, Jane didn't know if her mind fancy had been a long forgotten memory that recently returned to her when she entered her teens or if the dream was only a wishful hope and yet a horrible reminder of the life she existed in. Even through the first part of her adult life and into her early thirties, the dream remained the same and never differed, and each time she dreamed the occurrence, she experienced each moment as if it was for the first time, and she never remembered what was coming until she was swept into it.
It always began with herself as a young child walking through a scary forest she didn't recognize. She wore blue shorts and a black t-shirt with a pretty white swan on it. Jane never remembered how she happened to be in the forest or why she was alone at such a young age. The dense forest was frighteningly dark with only glimmers of light here and there along with large fireflies the size of her fists that seemed to crackle with blue lightning. She felt so lost as creatures angrily squawked or roared around her. She slowly made her way through the thick underbrush for what seemed like a long time and then she began to feel isolated and deeply alone. Despair seized her and wrapped her up in its cold embrace, and it would have dragged her even deeper into hopelessness and made her give up on ever finding her way out, if a bright light hadn't of broken through the dark canopy. The sunbeam beckoned her to it, so Jane climbed her way over roots and pushed her way through shrubs and bushes until she broke free of the forest and came upon a bright sunny clearing. There was a small pond, and she saw herself in its reflection. Dirt and leaves covered her and made her appear like a little mud elf with pointed ears, but she didn't care. She was free of the creepy trees.
Voices drew her over a hill and into a small meadow valley where a boy and a girl played. Jane was a little younger than the two children who looked to be about five, and for some reason, Jane got the impression the two weren't siblings. The boy and the girl turned to Jane as she stood on the hill above them near tears. They peered at her for a long time, and Jane was afraid they might run away or even worse, pretend she wasn't even there. The blond boy seemed like some sort of prince from a fairy tale with the purple garb and the gold crown he wore. Jane noticed a medallion around his neck of some sort of beastly creature. The girl with long black hair was beautiful like a princess, she had on a flurry white dress with red roses vining all over it, and there was a blue birth mark under her left eye in the shape of a double lightning bolt. Jane stared back at them as curiously as they peered up at her. She looked down at herself, remembered how dirty she had gotten in the forest, and wondered what she must look like to them. Jane wanted to run to them and grab hold of them as if they had been friends for years, but she was afraid to move because for some reason she fear if she did, they would disappear.
The boy and the girl looked to each other, and then they both held out their hand for her to come join them. A tear of extreme joy trickled down her cheek as she ran to them and grabbed their hands. The next part of the dream was a little fuzzy. Jane did get a sense that the boy and the girl accepted her and that they played for a long time together in the meadow. She wished with all her heart she could stay in those joyous and yet unclear moments forever. Jane experienced feelings she lacked in her normal life, and she didn't want to let go, not of the family she always longed for. She wasn't sure what the feelings she experienced were, but she wanted more of them.
Later that day, the dream became clearer as the children found a patch of wild flowers, and they were unlike any plants Jane had seen. The wild flowers pranced under the sun like little river dancers and if one of the children tapped the head of the bloom, a bloom smaller than the host plant fell into their palm. The girls giggled and played with the plants as the boy mostly chase the girls around. After some time, the three of them sat for a while to rest from their play, and the girl gathered some of the tiny blooms from a rainbow of different colored flowers and began twisting the stems together. When she finished, the girl whispered something to the item in her hand, blue sparks shot up from her palm, then she gently took Jane's hand, and put a tiny flower loop on her finger. Jane peered at the friendship ring as the circlet made from nature went from one of green and rainbow to one of harden silver. The magical silver ring sealed the bond between the two girls deep within Jane's heart, and then she hugged the girl in return. The boy felt left out and came over and stole a kiss from Jane's lips, expressing his own feelings towards her. Jane blushed and her heart fluttered, then she looked at her new friends and knew the bond they had could never be broken by time or distance. Their love and affection poured into her so much, Jane thought her chest would explode.
Storm clouds moved in and forced the children to seek shelter in an old temple like structure a short distance from the meadow in a not so scary woods. Torches lit up the all white structure. Statues of different monsters decorated the vast room within, and Jane and the other children walked around looking at each. In the center of the temple, one statue was set apart. The statue was of a man in armor wielding a shield and sword. Awed and mesmerized by the hero, Jane read the inscription below the statue. Monster Slayer.
There was a wall behind the statue of the hero with words on it that Jane didn't recognize. The boy and girl seemed to be able to read it, then the boy and the girl shrunk from the statue of the hero, and Jane wasn't sure why. They moved to a different part of the temple, exploring as they went, but there was nothing else to find.
The storm outside increased its furiousness as its winds kicked up and lighting blazed across the sky. Jane wasn't scared because the other two were with her, but the girl was, and when one of the bolts struck the ground outside, the girl backed up into one of the smaller monster statues and teetered it. The statue rocked back and forth, and then it fell forward. Jane, the girl, and the boy ran as the statue crashed to the ground, and Jane tripped and fell. She looked back and saw no one else got hurt, so she stood and brushed dirt off of herself. Her knee stung, so Jane glanced down to see she scuffed it up, and it slightly bled. A trickle of red plasma ran down her leg.
The air around the temple seemed to change as if the structure itself gasped. The love and affection she felt before vanished as Jane lifted her gaze. She saw the boy and girl's terrified faces. She thought maybe the statue crashing or the storm raging outside was what made them afraid, but when she took a step toward them, they both backed up from her as if she wanted to devour them. Jane thought they were playing some sort of trick on her, and she laughed as they pretended to be afraid of her. The girl grabbed the boy's hand and squeezed it as she took another step away from Jane. The boy moved forward as if to defend the girl, then Jane realized their fear was real and that it was directed at her, and a little part of her died at that very moment.
Tears rolled from her eyes, spawned from a deep seeded ache like the pain of abandonment, and they were also spawned from the painful act of betrayal as the bond they shared broke apart. This world was just like the world she had come from. The boy turned and dragged the girl after him as they fled the temple. Jane ran after them as far as the exit and then she watched heart-sick as they disappeared into the storm. She put a hand to her little chest as the muscle that had been ready to explode with childlike delight, broke and shattered into tiny pieces as the world she had grown accustomed to, invaded the realm of her dreams. Jane went into a corner of the temple and sat down as she bawled. She cried for a long time and as the storm settled outside, she realized what the feelings she experienced before had been, the ones she never wanted to let go, the ones that had been stolen from her. They were a sense of belonging. The kind of belonging where people knew and remembered you, and where they would never turn their backs on you.
The dream faded, and Jane woke to her life as an adult. There was heartache and pain within the dream, but there was also joy and friendship, a
nd Jane longed to return to that world even with its suffering as long as she was allowed to relive the fun and happy moments with her friends.
As the mind fancy faded from her memory once again, she was left with a sense that something had been taken away from her. Jane laid back in bed and stared up at the ceiling of her small cottage. She knew she had a dream, but no matter how hard she tried to remember even just fragments of it, it was no good.
The only consolation Jane had was that she thought that day was the first day she dreamed the dream. It might have been maddening to repeat the mind fancy each night and remember every part of it only to have it taken away again.
Jane gazed at her ceiling, relinquishing her attempt to drag the memories from her mind. She thought about her real life, and it seemed at times, optimism was the only thing that belonged to her. She knew she could change her life. Jane just needed to press forward and not give up.