Her eyes flickered open slowly and she prayed that they wouldn’t close again, She could see a burred version of the room that had become her world. She had to wait a while before her eyes adjusted to being awake again. She stumbled out of her bed and walked dreamily over to her calendar that her mother marked on the days she rested. She saw 10 drawings of a sleeping cartoon and a note in her mother’s cursive writing.
“ Please wake up soon my darling , we all miss your beautiful smiling face”
A tear fell slowly down her cheek as she thought of her family and spoke quietly to herself.
“I slept for ten days… how could I sleep for that long again?”
I guess you could call her a sleeping beauty, her name was Aurora, she had long blonde shimmering hair that spent most of the time looking like she hadn’t brushed it for months, and big green eyes that showed her every emotion on the odd occasion that they were open, she was beautiful but Aurora was born with a curse, every time she fell asleep, she risked staying that way for days on end.
Her whole life was taken away from her, but things were okay in Aurora’s mind because since she was a little girl she had learned that she could create a new life for herself in her dreams. She had made an entire world for herself, one where she never had to sleep and never missed anything. Every time she ventured into this world she felt safer and more content than she ever did while she was awake. She dreamed that there was a knight in shining armour who had come and saved her from the evil curse that kept her sleeping. He had then became the centre of her dreams, he was there at all the parties she went to , and would always make sure that the curse didn’t try to haunt her again, but every time she woke up and looked at her calendar she was reminded that the curse was still there.
She walked through to the living room to see her mother and father watching Saturday morning cartoons with her little brother, she could smell the fresh bacon and pancakes that her mother made every morning for them and she wished she was there every time she made them. She stood in the doorway for a while before she lost her balance and knocked an ornament that was stood on a table.
“Darling , you’re awake.” Her mother ran across the room to embrace Aurora.
“Hey mum.”
“Do you want some pancakes sweetie, I made extras for you just in case.”
“Yes please.” She said while flopping onto the sofa next to her Dad.
Even though she had already slept for 10 whole days she still felt restless. She wondered if this was the curse’s way of drawing her into it, maybe it made sure that she didn’t get any energy from the sleep so that it could take a hold of her more often.
“Do I have school today Dad?”
“Yeah, if you’re alright to go.”
“I’m fine, just happy to be awake.”
Her Dad who had never been good with words just nodded and turned back to the T.V.
When she got to school that day she could feel everybody’s eyes burning into the back of her head as she walked into her councillor’s office.
“Hey Mrs Duncan.”
“Hello Aurora, take a seat” She said waiting for Aurora to sit down. “We’re glad to have you back in school, but you’ve missed the exams for every subject. There’s no point in you even coming, there isn’t a chance of you retaking them, we’ve tried talking to all the exam boards about your situation but they’re just not sympathetic, there’s nothing we can do… I’m so sorry”
“But miss… there has to be something, I need my A-level to get into Newcastle university.”
“I’m sorry, you are free to go home.”
“Thanks for trying.” Aurora said bitterly as she slammed the door behind her, fresh tears stung in the back of her eyes and she fought them back further. She didn’t want to let them out until she was back home, then she could sob all day about her future that seemed to be a pipe dream now.
She almost ran the whole way home, both of her parents were at work and her brother was at school so she knew she’d have the entire house to herself. She darted to her room and leaped face first onto her pillow and let all of the tears out of her eyes. She laid there crying for most of the day until she remembered the one thing that always made her life seem better, she got off the bed , jumped into the shower and then got her pyjamas on, she slipped into her soft quilt and closed her eyes slowly, for once in her life she talked to the curse.
“I hate you but this time, I’m begging you to take me away and never ever let me go.”
She knew the curse wouldn’t listen to her, the only reason it ever let her go in the first place was so it could taunt her with the life she was missing and could never have. It showed her snippets of her friends enjoying their lives and her family living their lives like she didn’t exist, she knew that if it wanted to it could keep her in it’s grasp but it got a sick kick out of torturing her and not letting her have anything she wanted, but this time she had faith that the curse might be kind to her and let her sleep and be with her dream prince for the rest of her life.