Haligh, Haligh, a Lie, Haligh

The phone rings, and I end up receiving news from my very self.

Haligh's dead, in more ways than one.

This morning, she was attacked by some other woman in an alleyway. No one told me this, I just know. She was stabbed, and then someone pushed their hands into her chest...and took out her Key.

She was destroyed instantly from the separation. Her existence failed.

I found myself at a funeral later. I had a black ribbon on my arm and everything. There were other people at the funeral, and they kept giving me weird looks. What was wrong with me? Why were they looking at me like this?

Why wasn't I crying?

But I think I understood, deep down. I had known the answer all along, after seeing her in the mirror instead of me.

Haligh,
Haligh,
a lie.
Haligh.

She had never existed. I had wished she existed. She was never there. And I was never fully here either.

It was my Key granting that wish, that wish to keep the Darkness out, to keep the Monsters away.

But they couldn't have me escaping. No, of course not. So they smashed the Mirror representing Haligh.

Haligh was behind Arienette having a new life...Haligh had seen Arienette as a threat, and needed her out of the way, so she sent her out of my life, with some guy.
I had sent Arienette away accidentally by creating this Mirror.

Reality bends to make room for The Key every day.

The funeral is some stranger's. I leave silently, but inside, I'm screaming out in torment.
"Our love would never die...."
Well, hahaha.

The childhood memories are fake. The morning spent with you, walking down South Street to school alongside you...that never happened. 

You said you hate my suffering
And you understood
And you'd take care of me
You'd always be there
Well where are you now?

Arienette is the Fever, Haligh is the Mirror.

I look into the mirror, and Padriac lurks there. He grins, and says,

Choices were given
Now you must live them
Or just not live; ...but do you want that? 

 Now the Darkness is free to take me...unless I can tip the Scales and realize that I need to fix myself.

But to do that, I need to be able to talk to myself.

When the Curious Girl Realizes She Is Under Glass

Reality breaks like a mirror in front of me, and time splits into different directions like cracks in the glass.

I'm a kid again, laying in my small bed. I am looking across the room to my youngest brother, Padriac, and I think to myself about taking him to the lake where we sailed with our father so long ago. Maybe we'll conquer Padriac's Fear of the water this time.

The cracked glass pieces begin to fall out of the wooden frame and fall to the ground.

I can't die yet, I can't give up yet. All these mirrors are trying to show me the true way, the true me. They're trying to tell me that the Darkness is resting inside of me.

The mirror pieces hit against the floor, and scratch against it.
Sounds from the past echo from these tiny collisions.

I'm writing a letter to my old counselor, Ruba, down in Florida; I'm only a teenager this time. My mother wanted me to keep in touch with her through letters for some reason. I remember Ruba telling me to never underestimate the power of a mirror....I don't know why she told me that.

I look into these tiny pieces of glass, and see that Haligh is hiding inside each and every one.
I take the opportunity to examine each piece, and each side of Haligh.
I see that Haligh is more than just connected to me.

I hear someone singing the following lines:

"Time take us forward, relief from this longing
They can land that plane on my heart, I don't care
Just give me November, the warmth of a whisper
In the freezing darkness of my room"

 It's me, wishing for someone to save me from the Darkness.

I made a Wish, I wished upon myself, floating in the dark like a fucking star without anyone to catch me.

I'm popping pills left and right, I'm looking around and seeing lies everywhere.

Haligh realizes that she is under glass.

The Scales are starting to tip.

Arienette

She's back, she's back, goddammit, she's coming back.

Arienette's found herself back into my dreams. I was doing so good! Haligh and I are almost there, almost to the compound back West where the group I intend to join are located. We stopped in one of the houses I grew up in during my childhood, the one I spent many times in with Haligh.

Arienette's back, and the strings are accompanying her fully this time.

I awoke to find myself in a canyon, just like the canyon I was trapped in a year and a half ago. Only this time, there was no snow. It was deathly cold there, and yet inside me, The Fevers kept me warm...too warm.

I heard the Monsters gather around to watch me. They were Wolves. Now that I was fully alone, with Haligh far away in reality, they were ready to swoop down and consume me.

The darkness grew and the deathwatches began to tick.

 Arienette appears at this moment. She offers her hand, and says that I'd be safe in her entangled embrace.

I try getting up and running away, to get away from her, but a light shines off the rough exterior of her locket, and catches my eye. I see Arienette, with her tears falling down upon the strings grabbing onto her.

"Please don't leave...I realize that I need you, and I wondered if I could come home."

she says.

At this moment, Haligh shakes me away from my Fever dream. She's sitting above me, and tells me that I'm deathly pale; the Sun spies us from behind her head, from behind the car window, from behind reality.

Don't leave me here, so that the mirrors are always watching me.

Don't leave me in this cold house, with all these painful old memories.

Stay with me Arienette, until the wolves are away.