Thank Goddess he told me, so I can be sensitive when talking to Meg. I haven’t seen her a lot. She is more introverted and keeps to herself, but she sometimes joins Tori and Aurelia when they are alone.
“Gwen, how is Faye coping?” Aurelia asks me.
“So-so,” I admit. “She is clinging to her mom a lot, which was to be expected.”
“Arden told me that Marius will visit later,” Aurelia says. “He is coming early to spend a bit of time with Faye.”
“That’s awesome,” I exclaim. “It will be so good for her, and she really seems to like Celine and Marius.”
“Right?” Aurelia also looks happy. “Marius sometimes comes off as a sarcastic person, but he truly is so helpful and sensitive.”
Felix looks at me. “This means we could try… You know?”
I instantly know what he is talking about. “Yes!” When the others look at us curiously, I hurry to explain. “Felix is going to try using his gift on Marina.”
“Oh!” Aurelia nods. “Not a bad idea. Her mind might just be more at ease that way.”
She could feel safe in her last living days. That’s the goal.
“Man,” Lion mutters. “Whoever fucked her up needs to have his ass kicked, and I am not talking about the slap-on-the-wrist type of ass kicking.”
“Absolutely,” Aurelia agrees.
For a moment, silence hangs heavy around us. “It’s beyond me how someone can treat another person that way,” Tori says into the silence. She looks sad.
Lion immediately reaches out his arm to put it around her shoulders. He doesn’t say anything, but the wordless gesture shows how much he cares.
“Are you ready?” Felix asks. Right after lunch, we decided to seek out Marina and check on her.
“Yes, I am.” To my surprise, I reallyam. It seems like voicing my darkest thoughts to Felix has helped me come to terms with them. I feel I am strong enough now.
Faye, fortunately, isn’t here as Marius has picked her up. It gives us some time to be with Marina and focus on her without scaring Faye.
Felix and I both sit down on a chair next to Marina’s bed. She hasn’t been awake for twenty-four hours now. While I take her hand into mine, worried at how cold her skin feels, Felix doesn’t touch her at all. “You need to tell me when I am doing too much,” he says.
“How do I know?”
“When you get a little too... ecstatic,” he says. “Or when you feel like you are on a drug trip.” When I blink at him, he blushes.“I almost started an orgy once because I didn’t have it under control.”
I let him do his thing, trying not to interrupt with questions. The air around me seems to get lighter, my skin warms up like the sun is shining onto it, and for a while, I find myself daydreaming, imagining myself riding a horse over a meadow, feeling the wind in my hair.
Then, a moment later, I am sitting on my terrace, cuddled up against Felix. It’s snowing, but we aren’t cold because he has a blanket wrapped tightly around us.
Maybe this will be us in the future.
I blink my eyes, trying to wake up from my daydreaming. Marina’s hand doesn’t feel as cold anymore, and the expression on her face is calm. It looks like she is sleeping, but instead of being caught in a nightmare, she looks peaceful.
“It worked,” I whisper. “I think it worked.”
Felix looks exhausted, but his eyes light up. “I did not overdo it, did I?”
“Not at all!” I soothe him. I gently put Marina’s hand to rest beside her body before pulling the blanket over her arm. “She looks...“ I hesitate. “Betteris the wrong word, but a bit more at peace. At least that’s what I want to believe.”
“Let’s hope she can sleep a little more peacefully tonight,” Felix says.
“Thank you for doing this.”
“It was nothing!” he says. “I was happy to do something, even if it only helped a little.”
