Graymere

Chapter 8: About an anti-paradox

There was heartache in his eyes as he looked at her, and something else: tears. The rest of me was warm but my toes were freezing. He had never let his daughter see him cry before; she never considered that it was possible for him to cry before. He kissed her forehead whispered I love you, my darling. Everything was blurry and my eyes ached to be held open. Even as a child, she understood what was going on. They were taking her father away from her. There was a noise coming from something near me. She tried to respond, to tell him that she loved him too, more than anything in the world. That she needed him. Why was my hair dripping water into my face? Instead she mumbled okay.

My eyes flashed open to see a woman standing to my right. Why was I in a bed? What was going on? Who was this woman? Why did my father have to go? He was mad. Not in the sense that he was angry, but in the sense that he was crazy. Her father—my father—was being taken to an insane asylum.

“Miss Redwood,” the woman said to me, jerking me away from my thoughts. “I’m glad you’re awake. Drink this.” My eyes focused on the woman—a kind face with slight wrinkles around the mouth and eyes, hair pulled back into a neat bun and a dull looking brown dress—and then the glass of clear looking liquid that she held out to me.

Was I in a hospital? There was a bandage on my shoulder from where the monster bit me, so that much wasn’t a dream. Redwood, she called me Redwood. That was the name I gave to Sapphire. Ophelia Redwood, from Hamlet and-

My eyes widened in realization. Luka. His last name was Redwood.

Wait. Luka’s last name was Redwood. And you can have it anytime you like.

(Why did I not realize that before?) Somehow he knew I would be in this situation. Perhaps that’s why he had been so excited to see me, that he had already met me in my own future.

I took the glass offered to me and slowly drank what I thought was water. It was a bit sweeter.

“How do you feel, Miss Redwood?” The woman asked me.

“Who are you? What’s going on? Why-” I tried to ask more questions, but she hushed me with the serenity of a mother.

“You may call me Carm. Now lie back down.” Already I could feel my eyelids getting heavy, and I started to suspect that there wasn’t just water in the glass. “You need your rest.”

The next time I regained consciousness, the two children were arguing.

“Art, we can’t just let her die,” Sapphire was saying.

“I didn’t say that, but why do we need to treat her like she’s some honored guest?”

“She has valuable information.”

“Which you were trying to torture out of her just a few days ago! So why can’t-”

“I said, NO.”

He gave a scoff and probably a teenage glare.

It seemed like Fire was in charge, which by the sound of it, was good for me. First I was attacked by a vampire like beast and now I was resting in the pseudo-hospital in their house. What made her change her mind? Or was this the plan from the beginning? Did she have that argument because she knew I was awake? It seemed unlikely, but one could never be too sure.

One thing I was pretty sure about was that I was getting out of here. At some point future me has to go meet past Luka so that I can tell him to tell past me to use his name in the future.

It’s weird to put into words, but not that uncommon of a situation where I come from. An anti-paradox.