Is this an imposter in my midst

Amalia Patel scoured the room frantically searching for the light brown hair that stopped just above emerald green eyes that could stare into your soul. After scanning around the room for the umpteenth time, she thought to herself "Atraus isn't here", her heart started racing so fast she was afraid everyone would be able to hear just how frantic she was becoming.

Amalia stood in front of the room full of familiar and unfamiliar faces and could feel the anticipation and impatience fill the room. She bunched her hands up in the fabric of her weddings dress, which was a beautiful white A-line dress with lace embellishment. The top of the dress had barely there mesh panels that showed off her beautifully plump chest, the bottom of the dress was an elegant cascading soie chiffon skirt, accented with a thigh high slit barring her white porcelain skin that was so pale it was somehow beautiful and mesmerizing. Her waist held beautiful shimmering moonstone and beadwork pulling the beautiful dress together.

This was to be the day she was supposed to marry the love of her life but something was wrong, he was no where to be seen.

Of course they had to decide that instead of walking down the isle the traditional way, She would wait at the alter for him to walk down. To them it seemed like a great idea at the time, but now that she stood there with all of those eyes staring up at her, She found that she had a new found respect for men during a wedding.

At this moment she thought that she wished She had Harry Potters invisible cloak. "Now you see me, now you don't" She imagined herself saying as she hid under the magic. But sadly she faced the fact that she did not live in a make believe wizarding world and there for, could not vanish from embarrassing situations such as this.

The sounds of whispering filled the crowded reception hall, comments bouncing off one another.

"That poor girl" one voice said.

"I don't think he's coming" whispered another.

"I knew it wouldn't work, he's to good for her" someone in the far back had said as they laughed not so quietly.

"ENOUGH!" Was all she could find her self screaming as she tried to block out the sounds around her.

Had they no decency? No respect? She had obviously been left, at the alter, on her wedding day, in front of over a hundred people. A big wedding no longer sounded like a good idea but a very, very bad one.

She felt tears sting the edge of her eyes as she bit back the sobs that wanted to come tumbling out of her small frail body, her hands grabbing tighter into the fabric keeping her steady as she stood with all eyes on her, and felt her cheeks flush red.

She was so pale white that when her cheeks flushed it was as if someone had dropped a bit of blood on a white rose to watch the color slowly change.

She felt that she needed to get home and drown her sorrows in a carton of ice cream and numb her pain with weed.

She wasn't normally one to partake in drugs, and even if weed was considered a drug she was prescribed by a doctor to take it to help with her constant migraines and stabbing pains in her side that she had experienced since she was a child.

No one quite knew what was wrong and no pain medications ever seemed to work until one day, at a complete loss the doctor suggested marijuana, which to everyone's shock had worked, this was when she turned 21 and had given up on finding something to help.

Now, she felt one of those migraines creeping it's way into the front of her head making her want to close her eyes in severe pain but instead she pinched the top of her nose, in between her eyes to numb the pain as she spoke clearly, "I apologize for my earlier out burst, lady's and gentlemen. As you can see the groom has been unable to attend his own wedding there for has for-fit the right to complain when I say this. Everyone is free to drink as much at the bar next door as compensation for wasting your time, tell the bar keep it will be going on the grooms open tab."

Lucky for her he had given her his card

and she had given it to one of the butlers that stood in the hall, this butler belonged to her father and had always watched over her since she tended to always collapse in pain. She was considered a very wealthy child from a young age, being born into a mob family. Not many knew of this fact, however, and just believed they Owned very wealthy businesses, which in fact was also true due to their power and status.

Mr. Harris was his name, he was a plump white man who was 5'2" inches in highest and dirty blond hair that fell in a side sweep to the right of his head, covering his large forehead. Mr. Harris was always a kind bubbly butler who's brown eyes seemed to always smile protectively at her as he nodded his head at her silent directions. He then silently left the building to head next door and open the tab.

After she made this statement everyone seemed to be quiet all of a sudden not sure what to say, but in that split second of confusion Amalia slipped through the door just right of the podium she stood on as it led to the back of the church, outside.

As soon as the cold air of the outside stung her lungs, she finally felt as if she could breath again, and in that instant all emotions came falling on her at once and she fell to the ground behind a couple of bushes out of view and cried until she couldn't cry anymore and the made her tears sting her skin. She had left with only her wedding dress in December and felt the cold rush over her body as the all to familiar pain in her side came rushing back in this moment crippling her in pain as she fell to a heap of white onto the snowy ground in Colorado springs where she lived. Before she knew what happened she had passed out, only her bright red hair noticeable on the ground where the rest of her only blended in with the snow.

——

Suddenly Amalia woke up violently in her bed in the upstairs sweet of her hotel with only memories from her dream coming back to her.

This was a re accruing nightmare she had every December without fail since that day ten years ago. She wished it didn't still hurt but it did. She remembered waking up in the hospital with her butler sitting next her bed half asleep in the chair as he had waited for her.

According to the doctors if she had not been found when she was she probably would have died from hypothermia. She had been sick for a month after that and unable to leave the hospital because she had fallen incredibly ill.

In that time only her butler visited her due to her family's business her father rarely had time to come see her and had been radio silent that entire time, completely un-aware of his daughters situation. He had been out of state and unable to contact anyone because of the business he had been dealing with.

She could recall the day her dad got back and finally heard from the house staff what had happened and he immediately sent a private eye to go looking for Atraous but to no avail. It was as if he had just vanished out of thin air. Like he never existed. His family had no idea what happened to him and after sometime had completely moved states.

It had taken her ten years to move on from that pain and find someone who treated her well and she mostly felt happy with him so she felt content. Unaware of the secrets that lurked in the dark places she could not see.