I felt like I was falling through an endless void of blackness and I had no idea when I would land. I didn't even know if I would land nor did I know where I was, there was absolutely nothing. I tried looking around to find anything, but there was nothing, just an empty void of inky and endless nothingness. I simply stayed put, waiting for something to happen or to receive some indication of where exactly I was. When I finally was met with something other than blackness in my vision I almost choked.

I was back in the flower shop, the one that my mother and I had managed together on the corner. I hadn't been here in so many years, I had to avoid it, I just couldn't handle confronting what had happened here. I figured I must be in the afterlife, or at least dead, there was no other explanation for why I would be here, this felt far too real to be a dream. Either this was torture or this was a blessing, I suppose I would find out soon enough.

"Avien, did you hear what I said?" Said a voice from above.

When I looked up, I could feel my eyes begin to fill with tears. Standing in front of me was my mother, she was alive and well, smiling down at me. She had on a light blue shirt and blouse with a white apron tied around her waist. She had messy green hair, the same color as mine, tied back in a bun with strands falling down her face on each side. Her eyes were a magnificent turquoise color, I guess it's what my eyes would look like if I didn't have these strange mystic eyes.

I blinked a few times before responding "No, I'm sorry mom, I didn't hear what you said"

She chuckled a bit and rubbed my hair "I asked if you could go get me a bouquet of twelve roses from the back?"

I nodded and quickly turned around, pushing my way through the dark green gate that led to the storage center for our store. Inside of the room there were several tall metal shelves, each holding dozens of bouquets and each labeled with the kind of flowers they had. I turned to my left where we kept all the roses and reached up to the shelf, trying to grab one of the bouquets on the fifth rack. Unfortunately, I couldn't reach it so I went to go get myself the step ladder.

When I unfolded the step ladder, plumes of dust came billowing off of it, it was old and not used very often. I climbed up it to reach the flowers, holding on to the sides to make sure I didn't fall. When I grabbed the bouquet, I winced and almost fell off the ladder, I had gotten pricked by one of the thorns on the roses. My hand had a small cut in it now, bits of blood dripped down my palm, barely reaching my wrist. The cut felt so real, I figured this had to be some kind of afterlife, I had no other explanation.

I made my way back to the front counter where I handed my mother the flowers which she handed to an elderly woman. She waved goodbye and walked out the door, giving me a chance to finally take everything in. The sun shone through the brick-red door as it slowly closed behind the woman. Each beam illuminating the bricks on the floor and the weeds in between where mortar used to be.

The interior of the walls was a white fencing material with several diamond shaped holes dotted every few feet. Behind the fencing, you could see the old bricks that made up the majority of the walls. Outside I knew there were neatly placed green and white alternating siding to make the shop look a bit more appealing. The whole place looked pretty shabby, but I always loved it because of the nature and vegetation growing everywhere. The whole placed felt so warm and welcoming.

In the corner of my vision, in a broken mirror behind the counter, I thought I caught a glimpse of something, it was... purple. I walked closer to the mirror, trying to see if there was anything off with it and hoping it wasn't what I thought. But when I looked in to the mirror the only thing I saw was myself, but much smaller than the last time I had seen myself. Behind myself, I could see my mother working on cleaning off the counter, which was always filthy from the floral transactions.

She turned back to me and smiled, the pointing her finger up, something dawning on her "I almost forgot! Where do you want to go tonight?"

I looked back at her, a bit puzzled "What do you mean, what's special about tonight?"

She chuckled "Do you always have to be so smart with me? It's your birthday of course! A young boy's eighth birthday is no less special than any of his others"

A pit formed in my stomach, it was my eighth birthday. Everything was beginning to make a bit more sense and why this seemed so familiar. I had endured this painful day already, this wasn't just some sanctuary where my mother was still alive and we were managing the shop like old times. This was the worst day of my entire life, I was reliving it. I knew everything that was going to happen, but I had no idea whether or not I had the power to change it, had I really gone back in time or was this some kind of torture?

My mother frowned, I imagine I was making quite the grim expression "Avien, are you alright honey?"

I blinked the fear out of my eyes and tried to gain my composure to give a proper answer "Yes, I'm okay, just thinking about your question..." I had to prevent it, I just had to, somehow. "Why don't we just have dinner at home, I don't mind that."

She frowned, then chuckled "People always told me that children were so difficult, but you are so easy" she ruffled my hair, covering my glasses with strands of green.

I smiled up to her, pushing the hair that was obscuring my vision out of my eyes. We continued business as usual, serving customers flowers and such while also chatting it up. Work always felt more fun when you could talk to the people you were helping, especially when they were always so kind. My mother had the most successful flower shop in the whole city but that didn't matter to her, all she cared about was enjoying herself and making sure she could provide for me.

Once the clock chimed nine, my mother and I exited the shop, flipping the sign on the door over to the closed side. We began walking down the street, shortly reaching the cross walk and stopping at the light. I had managed to push it out of my head for the majority of the day, but now I could stop thinking about it. If I was going to change anything, I would definitely have to act soon, but I couldn't think of a way to divert my mother's course without causing a scene and her thinking I was completely nuts.

As we waited, an idea began to form in my mind: What if I could get us to simply take a different route home? I walked to the left of my mother and tugged on her coat, pointing to the crosswalk left of the one we had planned to take "Mom, can we go this way instead of our usual way?"

I was met with a puzzled from her "Why would we do that? We always go this way"

I had to think of an answer quick, to explain why, then I remembered an advantage I had right now "Please mom, it's my birthday after all"

She frowned, then sighed "Well, I do suppose I can't 0really argue with that" she made her way over to the left crosswalk as we waited for the signal to go.

"You can't save her you know" a familiar voice whispered from behind. I frantically looked around, attempting to find the source, but there was nothing. I sighed turning back to the crosswalk, waiting for the light, it must have been my imagination.

The light changed and we quickly crossed the street, making our way towards the apartment. It was late and the sun had fully set so all the street lights were on, illuminating circles of light on the sidewalk. To our left was a brick wall topped by grey stone slabs, above it was a grassy slope that I would sometimes come to sit on and gaze up at the sky. Seeing all this brought back things I hadn't thought about in years, they were always too painful, but now it didn't feel so bad.

Unfortunately, the nice warm feeling was quickly replaced by dread and terror as I saw something horrific. A man had just walked out of a shadow on a wall about fifty feet ahead of us and was now approaching. My mother had stopped moving clearly, she had seen what the man just did and was not wanting to deal with it.

"Avien, get behind me" Her voice was very stern and forceful, but I could tell she was terrified.

I did as she said, and ducked behind her, peering out from her side so that I could see what was happening. The man continued walking towards us, avoiding the street lights for some reason, for all I know, he could be a vampire. When he was about ten feet away from us, he stopped and looked up, cocking his head sideways to look at me.

"Hello there young man, you are certainly a rare occurrence..." He said, his voice dry and soft, he sounded like he was dead. His eye was glowing and now that I got a good look at it, it was exactly the same as my left eye, he had an eye of the observer. He must have known that I was a direct descendant and was most likely here to kill me or capture me.

"I'm going to have to ask you to come with me, I'm sure I can get quite the bounty on you, even if you are hidden out here" he smiled, showing a blood-stained grin that seemed to be missing a few teeth.

Before I could do anything, my mother interjected with "If you want to take my son, you will have to go through me" her voice was frighteningly forceful.

The man took another step forward, prompting her to take up a defensive stance with my behind her. My heart was racing, I couldn't think straight. All of the sudden, I felt a sharp pain in my hand, but I didn't know what it could be. When I looked down I felt a chill go down my spine, on my hand, drawn crudely with the blood from my earlier cut, was a magic seal.

The seal began to glow blood red, causing my heart to beat even faster and harder, each pound resonating throughout my entire body. The, before I even knew what happened my vision flashed black, then purple, then it was back to normal. There was something different though, in front of me there was nothing except for a completely empty sidewalk, neither my mother nor the attacker was in sight.

I quickly turned around, fretting that I would see the attacker, but instead seeing something much worse. Behind me, sprawled across the ground, was the body of my mother, with a hole right through her chest. I fell to my knees, tears filling my eyes as I crawled over to her. The blood from the wound was spreading across her clothes, staining them a dark maroon color.

"A-Avien" she had to force the words out of her mouth, her voice raspy and hoarse.

"Mom... don't talk, that'll only make it worse" I said, grabbing her hand, not really knowing what else to do.

"Avien, there's no need to cry. I may be gone, but I want you to promise me something..." She said, tears running down her face.

"What is it? Anything, just please don't go, I don't know what to do without you..." I couldn't keep the tears from pouring out.

"Avien... I need you to promise me that even though I'll be gone, you won't allow yourself to be consumed with grief, you will continue to fight on and stay strong, please, can you promise me that?" She said, squeezing my hand tightly.

"Mom, don't talk like that, you're going to be okay, you're going to make it out of this" I couldn't help it, I couldn't deal with this again. When I looked at her face, her eyes were closed and she was smiling, peaceful. "MOM!" My voice pierced the cold night, echoing in to the distance. Tears poured down my face, staining the concrete below me with dark spots. Then, all of the sudden, my vision went completely white, almost blinding me.