When Life Begins Again

Chapter Three

A week goes by and I’m finally able to go out freely as long as I’m back in time to do my show. Everyone loves my performances. Whenever I go on the stage the club gets pack with people. Mostly men. I still haven’t found the man from my vision. I wish I could control them and find out more information. Stepping out of the room I close the door behind me.

Dalia stands outside my door and smiles at me. “Good morning, Annabelle. You did another amazing show last night. All the guys love you and the girl are inspired by you,” she tells me. “If you’re going out to explore, I want you to make sure you’re back here by 5pm to get dressed and ready for tonight.”

I nod my head, staring straight into her eyes and say, “Yes Madam. I’ll be sure to be back here at 5pm and no later. Don’t worry.”

“Good. Go enjoy yourself and don’t get into any trouble,” she told me, tapping me lightly on the arm.

“Okay. I’ll be sure to do that,” I tell her. Then I make my way to the elevator and push the button for the ground floor. I haven’t been outside of this building other than going to the club since I was kidnapped. I’m glad to have some normalcy back in my life. They give me some money to go shopping with but not so much that I can take off running with it.

Some people wave at me as I step off the elevator.

I wave back and head out the door into the street. It’s the middle of summer so it’s warm out and there’s no school in the summer so no one would be suspicious of me being out during the day. I walk over to a small cafe across the street and walk inside. As soon as I step inside it's like deja vu, everything is so familiar that I feel like I’ve been here before. Then it clicks. This is where he was in my vision. Quickly I walk around and find a seat, then I sit down, looking out towards the window.

A woman walks over to me and asks me if I’d like to order something.

I look up at her and say, “I’ll take a minty tea and a carrot muffin if you have one.”

“We do. I’ll go get that stuff for you, then I’ll be back,” she said then she turned and walked over to the counter.

I stared out the window while I waited for my food. Would I find him here? Will I meet him today? Or a long time from now? My thoughts are interrupted by the opening of the door. In walks a man with light brown short straight hair, he’s tall, about 6 feet and well-built as if he works out. His eyes were upturned and dark blue. He looks just like the man from my vision. Could it really be him? Who is he?

The barista walks back over to my table and sets my stuff down. “Here you are miss. That’ll be $5.67. Cash or debit?” She asks me.

I pull out a 10 dollar bill and hand it to her. “Thanks, you can keep the change,” I tell her with a smile.

She takes the bill from me smiles and says, “Thanks a lot. You have a pleasant day.” Then she walks off to the counter.

By now the mystery man’s attention has been brought to me. He’s standing in front of the counter staring at me like a lost puppy.

I look down at my muffin and start unwrapping it from the foil it was in. I haven’t eaten anything yet today so I was kind of hungry. I brought the muffin up to my mouth and took a bite of it.

“May I sit with you?” a deep smooth sounding male voice says to me.

I looked up from my muffin to see the mystery man and nod my head. This was unbelievable. Could this really be happening right now?

“Sorry I'm interrupting your time of solitude. I just saw you sitting her and needed to sit with you. I know I’ve never seen you before. But I can’t shake this feeling that I’m meant to meet with you,” he tells me as he pulls out the chair opposite me and sits down.

“Don’t even worry about it… I am often in company of people I detest so pleasant company like yourself is welcome. I’m Annabelle, may I ask you your name?” I tell him, then take another bite of my muffin.

He smirks at me and says, “It’s a pleasure to meet your acquaintance Annabelle. My name is Daniel. I feel as though I’ve been searching for you all my life. I don’t usually do this kind of thing. And I’m sorry that you’re constantly surrounded by people you can’t stand. I can assure you that I will not be a burden to you.” He picks up his drink and takes a sip.

His eyes just boar into me, I couldn’t stop staring at them. They’re beautiful, he’s gorgeous. His face is shaped like a diamond and he has a slight dimple on his chin. I imagine myself looking like an imbecile in this very moment. A blush crept up on my cheeks and I brought my hands up to my face to cover it.

He reached out his hand to mine and said, “Don’t cover it. I think you’re adorable. Aside from that I think that you’re the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen.”

The moment his hand touched my own I felt my heart race in my chest. This man thought I was adorable and beautiful. And he’s touching me! I take a slow breath and release it. “Sorry. My mind got a bit away with itself. Thank you, for thinking so. I do hear people praise me a lot. But I’m disgusted by those people so it means nothing to me,” I tell him.

He smiles over at me, taking his hand back and says, “I’m glad to hear that I don’t disgust you. Do you mind telling me about your life and why you seem to be stuck in a bad situation?”

I looked down at my hot chocolate and pick it up, running my finger over the rim. I take a sip of it then put it back down. I look back up at Daniel and say, “It’s a bit of a long story. If you have somewhere you need to be I’ll give you the shortened version of it.”

He leans into the table, moving closer to me and says, “I’ve got all the time in the world for you Annabelle.”

I find myself blushing again, looking down at my drink and playing with the rim. Who is this guy? I look back up at him after calming myself down and say, “A week ago I was taken against my will by a group of men. I tried to out run them but one of them knocked me out just as I thought I was going to get away. I woke up to find myself in a room with a bunch of other girls… they killed my parents and I had to abandon my little brother and sister. I didn’t want them to get caught by anyone if I could lead them away… my sister is only 6 years old and my brother is 10. I told him to take care of her if something happened to me.” I paused in my story to take a drink of my hot chocolate. I was starting to feel tears welling up inside of me.

Daniel reaches out for my hand which was resting on the table. He gentle caressed the back of my hand and said, “If what you say is true, then how are you here now? Why aren’t you locked away somewhere?” He stared at me with a concerned look.

“They wanted me and all the other girls that they kidnapped to work for them as dancers and the ones that couldn’t dance would do something else or they would be killed… The lead person in charge of it all appointed me her star. She said I was perfect and took me to get cleaned up. My hair was a mess and my face was all dirty. She brought me to a young girl who worked as a hair and makeup person for them. She was very kind. She got me all cleaned up and fixed my hair then did my makeup. I was shocked when I saw how I looked. I never thought of myself as a beautiful person but at that moment I looked gorgeous.”

“You certainly are. Don’t ever think that you’re anything less than beautiful,” he tells me, rubbing my hand gently.

Ignoring him, I continue telling my story. “Once I was all set to go Dalia took me to another room, she’s the woman in charge of everything… She brought me to the dance instructor and told her to teach me how to dance and that I was her new star. Which told me that there was an old one and something happened to her. I didn’t want anything to happen to me so I did everything she said. I watched and took in all that the instructor said to me and then did them. They were so amazed at what I could do and so quickly that they put me up for my first show that night. Before going to the club she let me rest in a room on the 3rd floor. It’s become my room. Room 32. While I was there I had a vision of you. In this café. You were sitting across from me telling me how you wanted to help me escape. You looked at me as if I was a lost love that you thought you’d never see again.”

“You have visions? And you saw me? But you didn’t know who I was,” he says, skipping over everything else.

“I do. But I don’t know how to control them so they come to me at random. After the vision I fell asleep. I was woken up a couple hours later and taken to the club where I was thrown out onto a stage and was forced to dance for a crowd of men and a few women. I grabbed onto the pole in the middle of the stage and began dancing. All the guys whistled at me and the women stared. I felt like a dirty person… after the dance some guys tried groping me, this happened after every show.” I told him, shivering at the thought of it.

“Nasty men, touching you like that,” he said not looking happy about it.

“After the first show Dalia was so happy with how it went that she wanted me to do some vocal lessons and learn some songs to sing while dancing. Of course I overachieved at that as well and I began singing every night. It brought in more people to the club. After a week of going through this she finally allowed me to go about freely as long as I come back by the time she wants me to be back. Which is 5pm. To give me time to get ready for tonight’s show. I’ll be at Club Dalia, if you want to see the show. I left the building at 9am this morning and decided to come here to this café for my first stop of exploration outside of that place where I was being held captive. As soon as I walked in here I got a feeling like I’d been here before and realized that it was the place where I had my vision,” I told him, finishing my story.

Daniel sat back in his seat and took a drink of his coffee.

I picked up my muffin and took a bite out of it. I was really hungry now.

“I want to help you get out of there. I don’t like the idea of you being forced to do that stuff and deal with those men. Will you meet me again Annabelle? I need to come up with a plan. I already know you’re in that building across the way based on what you said to me just now. I really want to help you escape. I will help you escape I must.” And just like in my vision he stares at me like I’m his long lost love.