Chapter I
Mnemosyne:
This is a dream, I know, because I'm seeing this woman again, with her curly long toffee-colored hair and her light olive skin and the freckles on her face with her different eye colors, like mine, one is as green as the leaf with its morning dew, and the other is as blue as the sky in the summer, she looks like a goddess, every dream I have of her she always looked at me like I am to care of, she has a loving look in her eyes and warm hands that held my cheeks into her palms, who is this woman and why is she always in my dreams.
this time this dream is the strangest, she talked to me, with her voice so calm like a music to lullaby a young child to sleep, without her lip's moving at all, she said, "If one from the ocean asks you to come with them, don't go, however, if you found a man with an eyes as blue as a calm sea, go forth and hide from the bad ruler of the ocean." she then smiled at me and kissed my cheeks "Farewell my child, You are as precious as a gold pearl under the sea." Then I woke up.
since I was a child I have those dreams of mine, I can't even remember the lady in my dreams but I do remember her warmth I don't know who she is but she feels like something familiar to me. I shrugged off these thoughts and start waking myself up.
I sat up and looked at the clock in my room, it's almost 7 in the morning, I still need to get up and do my chores in the foster home, well, yes, I don't have a family nor a home, I'm living in this shelter for all of my life without any idea who my parents are. no one wants to adopt me because when they see the different eye colors they thought I'll bring bad luck to them, I grew up in this foster home with the sisters, I don't like the people here, they looked at us like we're some aliens that were thrown out of our planet, without anyone at all, they made us do everything here from washing their clothes to cleaning every corner of the house, from my 17 years in the foster home I've never felt like I have any family at all even when they always told us that we are, this feels more like working or even slavery. they will only just be good to you if you are 14 years old below because that is the age the childless parents wanting to have children but cannot have one wants if you are 14 above? you are just a slave to them and even you have to work for your food. this is why I have to work as a barista in a coffee shop just to have money of my own and never ask anything from the sisters. I'll be 18 in a month, ill be going to a university and live the hell out of these homes, the sisters are so excited for me to go, I'm just a freeloader for them.
Someone knocked at the door of my small room, my room is just a wooden shack in the backyard of the foster home, I opened my wooden door and saw Fred, my best friend in this foster home, I've known him since he was here as the same time my parents drop me off this hell home, Fred smiled at me and scruffled his blond hair and said "Can you switch chores with me? I need you to switch with me, I don't want to be tasked to buy some fishes today, I don't feel like the oceans." I rolled my eyes and he pouted his thin red lips to me and did a puppy eyes with his caramel colored eyes, "hey syne, (pronounced like sign) please I really want to be tasked in the kitchen today, aria is there to help with the cooking." aria is fred's long time love of his life, well he can't even tell her what he feels, aria has this beautiful olive skin and weird tattoo marking in her face and I dont know what that is for but she won't tell me, she has this long hair that has been colored with green, she really looked like an egyptian girl or indian maybe, she has never been adopted because of the tattoos, same as fred who has tattoos growing up, fred has a tattoo scattered all over his hands and chest and I dont know how but it's still adding up through years. "you know what, you owe me this one, you should change tasks with me when I'm on morning duty at the coffee shop." I told him and he smiled widely and hang his muscular arm around me. "oh yes, of course, we wouldn't want the sisters to know about you working, they will become the beast of the oceans." we both laugh and stop because the sisters called us to do our chores and we immediately go but with a smirk on our faces.
the ocean is so windy today, some of the fish stands are close, but some of them even when it's windy, they still sell. I like the ocean very much, I like how it sounds and how peacefully it smells and looked. I remember when we are kids, Fred, aria and I will always sneak outside to go to the ocean and swim there until the sisters will catch us and together we will be punished with standing straight with heavy books in our hands, we would look at each other and we will giggle uncontrollably because even getting punished, we still had the best time of our lives, I really love that thought of our differences we still found each other without family and homes.
I looked at the oceans and feel and smell the breeze of it, like the waves crashing at the shore and tiny droplets of the ocean splashes into my skin. I just closed my eyes and feel the music of the waves. then I remembered my dream, why would the woman ask me to not go to the ocean, and the ocean king? I feel so ridiculous trying to think my dreams to be real. I snapped out of my thoughts and go straight to one stall that sells freshly caught fish.
"Maybe there's a storm coming, the wind is blowing hard and we caught only a handful of fish. the gods maybe are angry at us." I overheard one of the fishermen said to his wife that is having a worried face in her.
"Stop making up stories with gods, Isiah, but maybe there will be storms, sales will be low if that happens."
the gods they say, I laughed from that thoughts, it's the 20th century and they still believe in myths, I remember Fred believing in those as well and always tell me about the books he read, but I doubt that he would rather play games on his cellphone rather than read books.
I bought some fishes the sisters listed in the paper, but some of them I didn't buy which is bad because the sisters will be angry with me as well, but because of the condition of the sea, there may be a storm to come.
I was walking home when this old lady, wearing a linen scarf over her head stopped me and said: "D-do you know the way to the city of Atlantis?" I looked at her, she is old with tattoos on her face too like what aria has but different patterns, "Grandma, I don't know what you're talking about, there is no such thing as a city of Atlantis, that is just a myth the internet is believing." I said smiling at the old lady trying not to laugh, she shook her heads and insisting of Atlantis, that she was a servant there and she was thrown here at the age of 15 and she wants to go back. she even said that she can't find it visible anymore. Well, weird to say this but this old lady thinks she is from this mythical land under the sea.
"Nana!" a man called the old lady, this mas has the same tattoo as her in the face, he is tall and has dark skin with crazily sky blue eyes, he looked at me in surprise, I know that surprised look, he saw my different colored eyes. and he shook his head "I'm sorry for my nana, she's too old now trying to say things, my name is Adriel and thanks for not. getting mad at my nana." I smiled at him and just nods at him, they were walking away until the old lady and looked straight into my eyes and shock is written on her eyes. "Goddess Gaia!" but Adriel forced her to go home without even trying to let her come to me again.
goddess Gaia? Isn't that one the greek gods? well I know that because I love reading, maybe that's the thing that calms my mind, I have mild autism, words spiral into my mind and I get the hardest anxiety even when I'm in distress, the ocean always calms me down. However, I get too distracted because of my autism, and here right now I got distracted with my thoughts and the sisters will kill me if I come home late. I immediately walked home as the word Gaia tries to invade my autistic thoughts.
one of the sisters is now shouting at me for being late and being so always distracted at all things that made me late at all times, it's not my fault that I was born with autism and not my fault that I have to go through all of it without anyone with me by my side, maybe it's all those foster parents that doesn't want me when I was a kid, if they could just give me a chance I could have been good, well it's all my parent's fault, if they'd just stop themselves and don't fall in love at all, I wouldn't be here, suffering from no one at all.
I went inside my room and just pushed all the things inside my head aside because I have to prepare myself and go to work, I get my work bag with my uniform inside it out and I started taking a long hot shower,
Goddess Gaia. why would that tattooed old lady call me Gaia? maybe i'm Gaia? in my old life? Reincarnation? the sisters always tells us about that.
what the heck, why do i even think those are real? if they are real, maybe the earth would be as clean as day, but no, the earth is dying and the people who believed in God is the one that is ruining it.
I step out of the shower and looked at myself in the mirror, my eyes, like the lady in my dreams, one is as green as the bottle of mountain dew and the other is blue as that Slurpee bubble gum, I hated my eyes even though I know it's beautiful, because maybe because of that my parents don't want me like the other parents that almost wants to adopt me but when they saw my eyes, they got really scared about it.
one time the sisters force me to put contact lense on it just so I could get adopted, but my eyes got infected during the interview revealing the two different colored eyes. and immediately they run out of the foster home, that is why I'm now living in the outdoor shack at the backyard of the foster home, they don't want me to scare the parents who want to adopt.
I went outside the communal bathroom and went straight to my room, which Fred is there, "what are you doing here?"
he smiled and said, "Sister Vaness is so angry at you when you got late, and I'm sorry, I know it's my fault."
"it's not your fault." Fred is always like this, looking like he is some kind of trouble maker because of the tattoos on his arms but the truth is he is just a small pup inside.
his hand went through his hair that is so magically blond, Fred is good looking, not like what you think, Fred has this beautiful eyes that are colored like a caramel and his thin lips and red also is so beautiful, if I'm a girl I would love to be with him, well Aria I think don't like Fred that way, well it's weird that aria is always looking after Fred, Fred is doing hard things like if he is washing the plate, aria would go in and take over, like she is a slave to Fred, I mean i know that one is weird but maybe, I don't know.
I sat next to Fred and I scruffle his hair and he pouts his lips at me like a little puppy, "stop ruining my hair! I've worked on that for hours!"
"What? you have somewhere to go or something?" I laughed
he stopped and looked at me "ah, I don't have anywhere to go, now you are late for your work, go syne! I will act like you under this blanket when the sisters visit you in this lair of yours." laughing nervously he said.
I look at my clock and yes, I am really late now, I stood up and smiled at Fred, as I went out I saw aria waiting for Fred outside, well, I know where Fred is going, maybe I'm wrong, maybe they both like each other, i smiled as I went outside.
I work at a cafe as a barista, I like being here because the manager is a good person and he lets me study here when I still have time before going to school and even give me coffee. I love coffee, it's the sense of being hot and cold, creamy or not, with syrup in any flavors, or even if, without anything at all, coffee is just so good. and I love taking people's order, I love how different and the same people are, other's would ask me to double the sugar and some is just so metal and drink their coffee without any sugar or anything just straight to the coffee machine to their cups and done they go to their working sipping at the hot black americano coffee, I love how they all have this grumpy face and then when they sip unto their coffee's they have this smile of ease, and safeness that they have coffee today and next? the world. I wish I have that tho, I feel like the world has been ganging up to me all this time, maybe my coffee is to know who I really am. I don't know who I am without knowing who my parents are, are they rich? poor? Gay? or if they are dead now. I just want to know everything about who I am because every day I have a piece of me that even coffee doesn't mend.
"One black coffee, nothing on it. " i looked and saw this man, long white hair, with beard and a muscular body, his eyes tho, it's as blue as a clean and calm ocean, I cannot stop looking at them, they are so beautiful, his face is so manly and his body is so built like a god. he looked at me and I turned red, he has a shock into his eyes, oh no, maybe he is uncomfortable with men looking at him, oh shit, I messed up.
"My love?"
wait what did he said? "Wha—?"
"My love, Gaia, is that you." Gaia again? I looked at him confusedly. "Sir, I'm not Gaia. your order would be 3$." but he held my arms and pulling me close, I was on the other side of the counter and you know how uncomfy a hug is with this position. "Sir, sir? Please let me go."
"Gaia, you're alive."
"Mr. I am not Gaia, my name is Mnemosyne, I'm a male and I don't know who you are, can you please let me go because we are catching some attention and I don't like that." he immediately let go and I run into the inside room and ask for my manager for me to take a break, that I'm getting my anxiety attack and he obliged and I went inside the staff room and I cried there,
Why? well that's how anxiety works, I felt so stress out there, with that man hugging me and all, I felt so invaded and I don't know what to do, I held my phone and swipe it up, and call Fred, "Fred, please someone is hugging me calling me name that I don't know and I feel so i don't know, can you please get me here?"
"What did he call you? ill be right there don't turn off this phone so you can hear me and you will calm down."
"he called me GAIA."
it went silent, I can only hear he breathes. "what does this man look like?" he said nervously, and I described this man to him and he breathed "atlas."
"Atlas? Huh?" I stopped and get so confused about what Fred is acting up now, I don't know what's going on. "I'm outside, let's go."
wait how? that's fast, I shrug the thought off and went outside as my manager told me to take a rest, Fred is outside with aria, with bags and also my bags full of stuff in it. "we have to go."
"go where?"
"Away, away from here, away from Atlas, away from any hints of Atlantis, your mother told me to protect you at all cost and this is me doing what I have to do." Mother? my mother?? Fred knows who my mother is? "aria, get the car and we have to go. quick."
"yes master." aria bowed and run towards a car.
"Wait! what mother? what atlas? who is that man? and who are you?" I was screaming at them, people are looking and i don't care, I have to know, I have to know what's happening because I don't want to be in this situation right now, knowing Fred, my only friend, knows who my mother is.
"Syne, you have to trust me, you don't want to know." he said calmly and trying to touch my hands, I moved it away and looked at him angrily "TELL ME OR IM NOT COMING WITH YOU."
"I will tell you but right now, because right now, I need you away from here, from anyone from Atlantis."
"WHY?" I said sternly. he sighs knowing I won't go until he told me what is up with all this scene.
"Your mother is alive, her name? is the goddess of earth, the mother of earth, GAIA."
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First story here on webnovel 😍
yours truly, Karina Figueras 🖤