Prologue

"Lilly, come back here!"

I bent down to tie the laces of my pink converse. My mom, or more precisely my stepmom, stormed to my side and grabbed my arm pulling me back. I staggered back at the sudden force she used on me.

"Where do you think you're going?" She hissed, her hand that was still clutching onto my arm tightened making me wince in pain.

I glared at her, and if looks could kill she would be ten feet underground "Away from this hell hole like you and dad told me to! Not even sure if I should call him that anymore!" I pulled my arm away from her grasp and rushed to the door. "Don't try to stop me because trust me when I say that I'm still going to leave."

She narrowed her eyes at me "I pity your mom for giving birth to such an ungrateful brat. Get out but keep this in mind, you won't ever enter this house again!" I could feel my blood boiling at her words. Ignore her, she's dumb.

I turned my head around and gave her the sweetest smile I could muster "I pity your mom for giving birth to a woman like you."  As soon as I saw her walking towards the door I lifted my middle finger up and left the house, slamming the door on her face, well not literally but I wish I did.

I could hear her screaming inside the house which caused a smirk to make its way onto my face. Leaving the house was probably one of the greatest mistakes I've made since I was officially homeless starting today. It didn't really matter, I was probably going to get kicked out of the house soon.

I looked down at my wrist to check the current time, 21:23, if I'm not mistaken I'm pretty sure that means 9:23.

Well done Lilly, you managed to get kicked out of the house at 9 pm with no money on yourself, well done.

A slight shiver ran down my spine as I looked around our neighborhood, cigar butts all around the pavements, some drunk men coming out of the bar that was two blocks away from where I currently was. Let's just say I didn't exactly live in the safest neighborhood. The paranoia suddenly all swept into mind as the men in front of the bar switched their attention from whatever to me.

"Hey wanna have some fun." I turned to my right only to see the same group of drunk men that had left the bar standing, or at least they were trying, in what looked like a circle. My nose scrunched up in disgust at the smell reeking off of them, I brought my fingers up to my nose and pinched it close.

Do not respond Lilly it's 9 and you're all alone. Don't say anything.

"I would like to have some fun but I'm pretty sure I don't want you to be involved in the fun so no thanks." Ah, there goes the mouth that got me kicked out of the house.

They erupted into roars of laughter, some of them even started to whistle, for what reason? I had no idea. The man who had spoken up before staggered towards me slurring words that I could not interpret. My feet automatically took a few steps back as the man took a few steps forward.

"Don't worry we won't hurt you, we just want to have some fun if you know what I mean." Oh yes I knew what he meant. The last thing I had expected today was to be offered to have some 'fun' with drunk men. Not gonna lie, was pretty funny but not safe.

"Sorry sir it seems I won't be able to have some fun with you, my husband would have my head!" A couple of them sniggered at my response and as for the man I was talking to, he growled and grabbed my wrist. My knees started to tremble a little, I squirmed uncomfortably trying to bring my hand back to my side. "Um... do you mind letting go of my hand?" I was 99.9% sure that me asking kindly wasn't going to work but oh well there was still 0.1% left.

I could tell from the look on his face that he wasn't planning on letting go of my wrist. The man ignored my question and his friends started to come a little too close to my side. My breath quickened and my palms started to get sweaty. I've been in such encounters before but it still seemed to shake me to the core.

Only one thing left to do Lilly.

Gaining some courage I raised my leg and kicked him hard where the sun doesn't shine. The mans tight hold on me weakened, he let out a loud groan and clenched his legs together in hope that it would ease the pain. I highly doubt that'll help in any way whatsoever. I used that as an opportunity to snatch my arm back to my side. The other men that were with him rushed to the side while the others stopped their snickering and muttered some profanities under their breath while giving me a nasty and terrifying glare.

"You bitch!" One of his friends sneered at me and started stomping towards me at an extremely fast pace. My heart pounded through my chest as fear coursed my body.

Run!

I turned towards the other direction and went on a full sprint, I could hear one of the guy cursing and fastening his pace.

Ah, how beautiful the world is, grown men chasing young girls, so beautiful.

I didn't know where I was going I just ran wherever my legs took me. My legs were starting to feel pretty sore and my throat was soon going to be as dry as the Sahara. The throbbing pain that traveled down my legs only increased, I never was an athletic person. Even if my footsteps had been quiet I was sure that my panting would give away where I was so I didn't think to stop.

Eventually, after a couple of minutes, I stopped running. My chest heaved up and down as I tried to regain my strength. It felt like someone had just sat down on my lungs and expected me to not collapse. The challenge sure was an awesome idea since I had not yet collapsed from exhaustion.

Since I had not detected any sound that resembled footsteps I was pretty sure that the man who had been chasing me had stopped as well or they simply passed out, they were drunk after all.

I frantically looked around me trying to find a place to hide for today. I didn't want to be invited to have some fun by some guys, except this time I wouldn't have the chance to reject or accept.

Thankfully God decided to give mercy and luck was on my side this time. There was some old looking gate in front of me, it was big and had some fancy designs on it. The gate towered in front of me and was covered with vines and different designs of spirals on it. It looked magnificent and even someone as dumb as I could tell that this was once irresistibly bewitching.

Despite the beauty of the gate, it looked old, like someone had not been taking care of it for a long time. The vines on it looked like they had the life sucked out of them and the golden color I assumed it had been became a rusty looking bronze color.

Don't go in there Lilly, god knows what's in there.

As always, I decided to ignore the more logical and rational side of my brain and did the exact opposite. I had nothing to lose anyway.

A shiver ran down my spine and before you ask I wasn't scared, it was more like a shiver of excitement. I eagerly looked beyond the gate and the shiver that traveled down my spine disappeared almost as fast as it had appeared. My excited grin turned into a slight pout as I examined the place I had found. A garden.

I suppose I thought it would have been something more than that. Perhaps some fancy statues and a fountain? Maybe my expectations were just high? The garden in front of me was not necessarily ugly. It was just plain? Even though my expectations had not been fulfilled the place was still astounding. It was large, possibly bigger than my 2 bedroom house, well old house right now, I had no home at the moment.

The flowers in the garden seemed to be withering away in the cold weather. It had no-one that cared for them, kinda like me. I giggled to myself at my silly thoughts of comparing myself to a flower, even though they were withering they were still beautiful beyond words. I doubt I could be like that. My eyes traveled around more and all that occupied my eyesight was flowers. This large land had been occupied with only flowers and a couple of benches that had vines covering them.

I let out a slight huff of frustration and made my way to the middle of the garden by following a pathway. The place truly was gorgeous, the withering roses all looked colorful in my eyes. Some were red, others white, and the rest were light pink.

My teeth chattered and I quickly brought my arms to my sides in hopes that it would give me some kind of source of heat. I shut my eyes tight and prayed that I wasn't going to freeze to death this night.

My legs took me to the bench that was not so far away from where I had been standing, it was placed on the right side of the garden with some bushes surrounding it. I placed my bag on top of the bench and proceeded to sit there. It looked to be the only bench that didn't have vines covering it.

Pretty weird, why would someone bother building such a beautiful garden in such a disgusting neighborhood and why is it my first time seeing this place. That wasn't even the weirdest part, I had to say the fact that this huge garden only consisted of one flower was even weirder. Whoever this place belonged to probably must have loved roses or something. But then again if they really did love this place it wouldn't be such an agonizingly beautiful mess.

I sighed and took my arms out of the sleeves of my shirt and proceeded to stick them to my skin underneath the shirt. Oh well, who cares about this garden I just found a possible shelter for the week.

Guess I'll be staying in a rose garden.

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