Who Am I?

Chapter One

*BEEP BEEP*

I jumped at the sound of my alarm; I ran over to my easel and prepped my paint. Ever since I was sixteen, I would dream about a girl named Luna, we were small children when yhe dreams started, and we would play dolls and dragons. As I got older the dreams weren't as often, Prince Ryan never showed up in my dreams before though. As we grew in the dreams Luna would always talk about a prince and how he was the most handsome man ever.

My dreams however were not normal. When I woke up in the mornings and ended the dream, When I fell back asleep it would start again where it left off. Nobody ever believed me about them, they just assumed it was a side effect if the amnesia. So, I took painting classes to take my mind off of them and ended up painting every person I saw in my dreams. My grandma loved them so much she would hang them on her walls, this time there were five new faces to add to her collection.

The first person I painted was the former Queen Peggy, she was an easy one to draw. Her short dirty blonde hair framed her round face, her blue eyes had crows feet on the sides as her inviting smile beamed on her face. She was on the tall side, and her maroon dress fit her body figure perfectly, she was a chubby woman which made me smile as she reminded me so much of my grandma. Next to her I painted who looked a lot like my grandma Lois, she unlike Peggy was on the short side. Her short black hair was the same just styled a bit different, she wasn't wearing the same big round glasses which made her chubby face stand out, but she had the same loving smile. Her eyes were a bright green instead of light blue like my grandmother's, and she was wearing a beautiful sea green dress. I added people dancing and talking around them, but they were the center of the painting.

I stood back and studied the painting, these two looked like the best of friends. They looked like they were from a different time, I could have sworn she was my grandma, but my grandma never wore dresses. I moved to my next canvas and started working on Captain Daniel, he was a little more difficult he looked to have been in his mid to late thirties, his hair was dark brown and spiked on top of his head, his Hazel eyes would scare the hell out of anyone who dared to step up to him. He was wearing tight brown pants, his top half was what looked like a black long-sleeved shirt with a metal chest plate and shoulder plates, and light metal going down his arms. His sword hung in the scabbard on his back, he looked like a very mean man no smile on his face like he has seen some bad things in his day. I put him in front of the knights, with the forest behind them and a huge light lavender dragon flying over the trees.

On the next canvas I started painting King Jackson's study, I worked in the fireplace first, it was big and the first thing you noticed when you looked at the room, the detail in it was beautiful. The mouth of the fireplace was gold and drew your attention straight to it, the rest was a matte black which made the gold shine even brighter. I moved on to the desk to the left of the fireplace, at the desk I added King Jackson holding some papers and a lamp that through shadows on his face. His hair was rather short and in the dark room it looked black, but I wasn't too sure on the color. In the dark room I couldn't tell what color his eyes were, but they were studying the paper. He was rather handsome but rugged, someone who didn't want to be approached but loved attention.

I stared at my next blank canvas, it felt like hours had went by. I had him in my head, but I couldn't figure out how to paint him. I decided to paint him looking in a mirror, I painted the background black, so the focus of the painting was Prince Ryan. I painted the mirror and as best I could paint Ryan, in this moment his face showed so many emotions, but still held a smile. His hair was short on the sides and on top the longer hair was slicked back perfectly on his head, the color was black but when hit by the light just right had a blue shine. My favorite part to paint was his dark navy-blue eyes, they shined sk brightly and brought the whole colorless painting together. His outfit was similar to Captain Daniel's armor, except he had a cape on, the underneath of the cape had the same maroon color of Peggy's dress. His jawline was perfectly square and had a fresh clean shave.

I stepped back and looked at all four of my canvases before I went to get my grandma and suprise her with them. I walked into the kitchen to get a cup of coffee while I waited for my grandma to wake up and ran into my best friend Brandon. We have been best friends since we were babies, we were born just minutes apart and he never let's me forget he is three minutes older than I am. "Good morning sunshine!" He said pouring a fresh cup of coffee. "I have actually been up for awhile." I sighed. "Bad dream?" he grinned then added, "About a Ryan maybe?" he was full on laughing. "What are you talking about?" I snapped at him. "Girl, you talk in your sleep, and even if you didn't. I can bet big money if I go into your room right now there is going ti be at least one if not more new paintings drying waiting on your grandma to claim them. So, who is Ryan?"

"You're so annoying! I don't know if he was real or if he was me."

"Let me see the painting, I know how good you are. You already painted him in full detail."

He led the way back to my room; I slowly sipped my coffee as he looked over the paintings. When he got to the one of Prince Ryan he daw dropped. He put his freshly tanned hand on his hip, and looked over at me. His rainbow hair still a mess from just waking up, and his dark brown eyes were wide with questions. "If this is what you look like as a man, then you better go get that s*x change like yesterday." He joked. "What are you talking about?" I asked not quite getting his joke. "Girl look at him! That man is the reason my standards are so high, and I can't find a man."

"That is the first time you have ever seen that man. The reason you can't find a man is because you don't like gay men, you try and get with straight or married men. Which I never understood by the way, you are gay."

"Just words and phrases my dear sunny, straight men don't know they're gay because they never had a gay man before. And don't get me started on those married ones."

"I think I'm going ti go wake my grandma up now."

Brandon grabbed my shoulder as I went to walk away, just by the look on his face I knew the conversation was changing. He pulls me over to the stool by my isle and sat me down, he tucked my hair behind my ear like he usually does when he wants to be serious. "Sunshine, was Luna in this dream too?" I didn't know what to say, nor did I want to answer. I had told them the dreams had stopped, I thought I had hidden it pretty well, but u had to paint these people. Ever since the accident the only person I was ever able to dream about was Luna, this was the first time in six and a half years that I have had a dream where Luna wasn't the main focus of the dream..

"She was, wasn't she?" I couldn't hold the tears any longer. I couldn't take it anymore, I jumped up with tears rolled down my face. "STOP! Luna is dead! I don't want to talk about her anymore!" My hands flew up ti my mouth before I could say anything else. He didn't say anything else either, he just pulled me into a hug because there was nothing left to say.

The hug didn't last long before my grandma swung the door open, "SUNNY are you alright!? Did you have another dream?" Brandon walked over to her, put his had on her shoulder and whispered something in her ear. She turned her head slightly, but I saw the tear roll down her cheek. She started walking to me, but my paintings caught her eyes. As she was standing in front of the painting of Queen Peggy and Lois. she whispered so lightly I don't even think I was supose to hear what she said. "I remember this night." I walked closer to her, to get a look at which painting she was looking at. I got next to her just in time to catch her as she collapsed, "MAMAW!" I yelled as she fell into my arms and I started to slide down to the floor hoping she didn't hurt herself on the way down. "BRANDON!" I screamed. "CALL 911 HURRY!" He came running in the room on his phone. "Sunshine I have the dispatcher on the phone what happened?" He said out of breath, I looked at him with tears streaming down my face. "I don't know! She..."

"It's okay sweetie, breath." He said rubbing my back, then stood up and walked over to the bed.

"Ma'am, we need an ambulance our grandma went unconscious. No, she has never done this before that we are aware of. Okay, thank you." He hung up the phone and walked back over to me and my grandma on the floor. "What happened?" he choked out, trying to hold the tears back. I couldn't speak the tears were a constant stream at this point and I didn't know what to say back, I didn't know what happened. We heard sirens outside, Brandon went to let them in. and I sat with my grandma, praying ti whatever higher power was out there that she was going to be okay.

I jumped in the back of the ambulance after they loaded her, I wanted her to know I wasn't leaving her side at any time. She never left mine, she raised me by herself, she struggled, she cried, but she did it! How could I leave her side when she needed me most? "Ma'am, we're going to need you to get out of the ambulance. " The female EMT said. But I just looked at her and shook my head no and sat back. "Sorry about her, her grandma is all she has." Brandon said then added, "She is very stubborn, she isn't going to get out as lone as her grandma is in there, and she needs to get to the hospital so the best thing to do it just gi and nit argue with her."

"Yes sir, I understand that. But we have rules we have to follow our insurance might not cover her and we don't have time to call and check." She said back with pitty in her voice. "Okay?" I snapped. "She needs seen and I am NOT leaving her side. So, what if it doesn't cover me? If I get hurt that's my fault, can we please get her to the hospital?" I snapped again. She didn't argue with me anymore, she climbed in and started checking my grandmas' vitals, while I sat quietly watching.

When we got to the hospital, and they started rushing her back, as I was following a doctor stopped me and said. "I am sorry, but you will have to wait over here until we can figure out what's going on, we can't have the room crowded. " I was shocked, can't go back with her? "Excuse me? I need to go with her! I can't let her go back alone! She needs to know I'm here! I won't be in the way!"

"It's hospital policy I'm sorry. Please have a seat in the waiting room and a nurse or me will come out and get you as soon as we can."

"NO! You can't do this! She needs me right now; you have to let me go with her!" I heard some one walk up behind me and sart talking to the doctor, my mind was all over the place I couldn't place the words they were saying. Whomever it was placed their hand on my back and whispered in my ear. "Let's go sit in the waiting room."

"No!" I said angerly. "If you don't go sit in the waiting room, they will kick you out and you won't be able ti go see her when they are ready for you to go back!" It was a man, his deep voice sent chills down my spine. I turned around to face him, he looked so familiar like I have seen him before. His dark brown hair was tucked underneath a ball cap, and his Hazel eyes bored into mine like I better do what he said. "Lead the way then." Was all I managed to say back.

When we got to the waiting room I sat down and pulled my knees to my chest and rested my chin on my knees. I looked at the guy sitting across from me as he was texting on his phone. "Who are you?" I asked finally able to shake the anger and sadness I was feeling. "My name is Scott; my grandmother Peggy was good friends with Lois. I was stopping by to see her since it had been awhile and saw them load her in an ambulance thought I would come by to see if everything was alright. Who are you?" He asked with a puzzled look on his face. "Her granddaughter."

"You can't be her granddaughter."

"Excuse me?"

"I mean the last time I saw Lois was when her only granddaughter died, I went to her funeral."

"How long ago?"

"About six years ago I want to say." My accident was six years ago, I must have known him before it happened and my grandma never told them that I was okay, but why? "I was in an accident around six years ago, my grandma said I had almost died. I can't remember anyone or anything from before it happened." His eyes got wide, he didn't say anything else before he got up and walked out of the waiting room.

Brandon walked in the waiting room digging in his purse, he pulled out two suckers and offered me one, I ignored the sucker and asked, "Did you just see that tall guy with the baseball cap on when you were coming in here?" He put his sucker in his mouth and shrugged his shoulders. "He said the last time he saw my grandma was six years ago, at my funeral. " He chocked and spit his sucker out. "Funeral?" He asked. Before I could reply a nurse came on and said; "Family of Lois Allaband?" Brandon and I both jumped up and ram over to her. "I'm her granddaughter." I said. "Well your grandma isn't doing good, we suspected she had cancer and didn't tell anyone or get treatment and it has caught up to her. The doctor suspects she doesn't have much longer, you can go back now to see her." The tears started to flood again as I thought about my grandmas silent battle with cancer, did she ignore it because she didn't want to worry me?

When we talked into the room my grandma was in, I grabbed the clip board at the end of her bed. I was shocked as I read over it. "Grandma, why is the nurse telling me you have cancer and not long to live when the test results all came back negative? It says you are healthy." Brandon was behind me reading the paper and said , "What are you talking about? It says right there that she has stage four lung cancer. "

"No it doesn't!"

"First you talk about the guy that went to your funeral, now you are in denial and can't even read a paper right." I was shocked ar Brandon's harsh words. I walked over to my grandmas side and grabbed her hand. "What's going on grandma?" When she looked up at me, I noticed her eyes wasn't blue anymore but a bright green like the woman from NY dream, she smiled at me and said; "You will understand later, I want you to go home and get some sleep, I will see you there shortly and be careful Sunny!" I looked up at Brandon confused, he was wiping away tears and said, "Come on Sunshine, let's go home and get some sleep. We can figure everything else out in the morning." I was even more confused, so I looked back at my grandma who was lying in the same position she was when we walked until the room and was pale as a ghost, the monitors next to her were at a flat line. I started crying again thinking maybe I didn't see the guy in the ball cap, and maybe u just imagined my grandma talking to me. I stood up, kissed her on her forehead and walked out of the room with Brandon.

My mind raced all the way home, I couldn't have imagined that guy the doctor talked to him also. As we walked into the house Brandon asked me if I was okay, and I snapped. "You think I'm okay. I just lost my grandma, and before she died she told me she would see me shortly! Some random guy comes in, talked to the doctor and tells me he went to my funeral six years ago! I told him I was not dead, and he gets up and leaves without saying another word! You're supose to be my best friend and don't even believe a word I am saying to you! I'm just freaking peachy."

"You have been acting weird all day! There may have been a guy in a ball cap there, but I didn't see him, you said he walked out right before I walked in. That paper said stage four lung cancer, you asked your grandma why it said she was healthy? And your grandma didn't say anything to you when you were next to her, matter of fact she Flat lined right after you went next to her!" He yelled back at me before storming off to his room. I screamed then fell to the floor crying.

After what felt like forever crying in the living room floor, I got up and walked to my room. I looked at the alarm clock next to my bed and it read 8:00 PM. I crawled into bed, and to my suprise it wasn't hard to fall asleep. I tossed and turned all night with dreams of my grandma and Scott. I jumped up thinking the whole day was a dream and looked over at my clock it read 2:55 AM. I went ti the kitchen to get a bottle of water when I heard the lock on the front door click. "Brandon, is that you?" I asked walking closer to the door. It opened, and I screamed. "Scott? How did you get a key to my house?" He didn't say anything just walk into the living room and let a few other people into the house. One of them was my grandma, I was confused, sad, angry, and hurt at the same time. "Grandma?" I gasped. "Sunny, I am so sorry. But you need to be quiet before you wake Brandon up." She whispered. "I told you, that you would see me shortly."