1 Chapter One

The sunlight drifted through the cracks in the curtains, dancing over the walls above my bed. Sitting up, I begrudgingly pulled the covers off me and swung my legs off the bed, slipping my feet into the warm, fluffy, cloud-like slippers on the floor. I stood up and dragged myself to the bathroom, looking in the mirror to find my matted, messy, untamed hair all over the place after a restless night's sleep. Sighing, I grabbed the hairbrush from the draw and pulled it through my hair, occasionally yawning and making sounds of discomfort as the brush pulled at my hair.

My name is Inari Blackheart, I'm 23 and live in London near the Excel centre, I live on my own thanks to the help of my parents who helped me get this adorable one bedroom flat. It had the best view of London, you could see all the way from the O2 arena to the Excel centre from up here. My apartment was mostly white, which kind of hurt the eyes when the sun caught it in certain ways, but that was combated by the thick curtains and pretty lace sheets that covered the tall bay windows, they also had tall glass doors, so you could step out onto the balcony that wrapped round quarter of the building.

Once I got my hair tangle free and tamed, I pulled it into a ponytail, washed my face using my favourite strawberry scented face wash, brushed my teeth and then walked back to my room to get dressed for the day. Opening my wardrobe, I pulled out a plain black, fluffy hooded jumper, I then opened different drawers pulling out fresh, clean under garments, a plain black tank top, skinny black jeans and a pair of clean black socks. Pulling the clothing on, I headed to the kitchen/living room area and grabbed a cereal bar from the cupboard.

With the bar in my mouth, I grab my bag making sure everything was in there. Checking my phone for the time, I grabbed my keys off the hook beside the front door. Slipping on my converse, I grabbed my coat and left the flat, making sure all the lights were off first. Walking down the hallway to the elevator I bumped into the elderly lady that lived down the hall from me.

"Hey Mrs B, How's Tigger today?" Tigger was Mrs B's elderly cat, he was a sweet little kitty and I brought treats round for him every now and then. Mrs B didn't mind and enjoyed the company from time to time, we would sit and have a cup of tea whilst she talked about her late husband who fought in the war back in 1939-1945. She may repeat herself, but she likes having the company and its nice listening about how the old days use to be before all the modern technology took over and changed the world.

"He isn't doing so well at the moment, he is getting old now, older than even me, I'm not sure how long he has left, you should probably say your goodbyes before it happens." Her eyes were filled with sadness, almost the same sadness as when she speaks about her husband, who died a few years back, natural causes of course, he lived a long, happy life with his beloved.

"I will make sure to pop by later, I have to head to work or I will be late. But I will pop round as soon as I get back from work. I promise, ill even grab some cake to have with tea." I smiled at her and she nodded "yes, that would be lovely, which tea shall we have tonight?" I looked at her thoughtfully, thinking about all the different tea's she had introduced me to. "I think we should have Earl Grey tonight and I know the perfect cake to go with it" I smiled and she nodded in agreement, after saying goodbye to Mrs B, I headed to the elevator and went down to the parking level, I lived in a 20 story apartment building which has 5 levels below ground for parking, you have to pay extra for a parking space but thankfully my family helped me with that side of things. I lived at almost top, floor 17 to be exact.

The elevator door eventually opened, it was old and needed maintenance, but the building managers couldn't be bothered to do anything and were trying to get us tenants to pay for it ourselves but most of us that live here are either elderly, students or like myself, in college and working part-time. I walked past a lot of dusty, beaten up cars that had been sat there for who knows how many years, like I said, elderly people. After walking past a few different cars, I finally got to my precious, it was an Austin Mini Mayfair from 1983 that me and my father had found and spent years restoring. When we first found it, it was a run down, beaten up shell, me and my father found all the different parts to go on it and slowly built her from the ground up, she even had her name on the license plate. We called her Lita after our family dog who was sadly run over by a drunk driver when I was 7.

Running my hand over Litas smooth surface, admiring her shiny, silver coat like I always do, smiling I remembered helping to put each panel on her body, revitalising her to how she should have always been. My dad even paid for the custom license plate "L1TA G66" my dad always had an amazing sense of humour, I was his dark little princess so he used that sense of humour and added "G66" as a reference to 666, the sign of the devil as a lot of church goers would say to me as I would get into my car.

I didn't care though, I loved my car and I loved my license plate, it was something me and my dad had worked on before my dad got sick, I have a lot of death in my family and sadly it was one of the reasons I liked being alone, I was always too afraid to get close to someone in case something happened to them. I know it's a silly fear, but it never stopped me from trying to stay detached. I had my fair share of slip ups though, like in high school I fell for this kid who was the best piano player in the school, we had the same music class together and I always wished I could talk to him, but I was the loner, the weird kid that spent her lunch break in the library reading or studying, or in the music block practicing.

Opening the driver's side door, I leaned in and put my bag and coat on the passenger seat and climbed in, put my seat belt on and check that my mirrors were straight before pulling away, I turnt the stereo on letting the last CD I had in there play, it was the soundtrack to The Greatest Showman, it was an amazing movie, I loved listening to the songs and singing along as I went to college and work. At the moment I was on my way to college for the only 2 classes I had which was 3 hours of practical music where we spent 3 hours performing what we were practicing that week in front of the class and practicing with the soundboard, I sing and play the bass guitar so I would be on stage twice, once by myself singing and then again with my band Hypno-Clock, I came up with the name because in the year previous we had a broken clock in our recording studio so I put a few different names to the band and we all voted on this one.

The second lesson I had today was only 2 hours, thankfully, but this was one of my favourites along with performing live. My second lesson was Photography, this was when me and a group of students would go out with a camera either of our own or provided by the school and get photos of each other or scenery and then go to the media department the next day and edit them. If you hadn't already guessed, I study two different subjects, their all things I'm good at, music and media were the two subjects that I got the highest marks in in my entire school grading list. I wasn't hugely smart, but I did well at these two subjects. Photography was always a hobby that I had picked up from my grandpapa, he used to photograph the steel mines back before they were all shut down, I'm sure he could get a pretty penny for those photographs now, but I don't think he would want to part with them.

I finally reached the college with 30 minutes to spare before my class started so I headed to the campus' personal Starbucks and grabbed my usual drink, a double chocolate chip Frappuccino, cream based instead of coffee, I wasn't a huge coffee drinker, I had it on occasion but it was a rare buy for me, I was more a tea person. Waiting in line for my drink I looked at all the different types of people that sat in here, some were your typical "daddy buys me everything and anything I want" kind of girls and the typical "jock" type guys, then you had the quiet type and then the goth type. I didn't exactly fit into a group as such, I was a goth yes, but I was also a quiet, a weirdo and a loner.

After receiving my drink, I headed over to my first lesson which was held in one of the colleges big halls, fitted with state-of-the-art speakers, soundboards and everything a music student could ever wish for. Walking in, I sat in my usual spot, at the back closest to the door, I liked being here in case the fire alarm ever went off, it gave me enough time to pick my bag and folder up and leave in a calm and orderly fashion, it was also one of the nicest points for the sound, it wasn't too loud but it was just loud enough that you could hear everything clearly. Eventually everyone filtered in and sat in their typical seats and got ready for the lesson ahead.

After all my lessons were over for the day, I headed back to my car, putting my bag and coat back on the passenger seat and put my camera bag on the back seat, along with the laptop bag that I had kept in my locker for the night, I didn't want to leave my laptop and camera at the college over the weekend so I always took it home on a Friday, I took it home every now and then during the week as well, especially when I needed to do a bit of extra work.

I sat in my car for a few minutes, yawning, still tired from the previous night's sleep. After about 10 minutes I strapped myself in and did my usual checks before starting the car and putting the stereo on, getting bored of the current CD I changed it to Black Veil Brides newest album Vale, yes I am a fan of Black Veil Brides, and yes I did get quite a bit of grief for it but I didn't care, I find their music quite good, for me personally, if the music has a decent sound, I will listen to it. Heading off towards Stratford, to visit my favourite bakery and get the cake I had promised Mrs B. As I entered the bakery, a wave of freshly baked bread overwhelmed my sense of smell making me think back to my childhood when my mother would bake fresh bread every few months.

I walked over to the counter and looked at all the different cakes my eyes finally landed on the cake I wanted. It was a Lemon Drizzle cake, I found it complimented Earl Grey tea perfectly and Mrs B always loved a bit of Lemon Drizzle as well. I bought 2 slices of cake and then headed home to have tea and cuddle Tigger before his time came. As I walked back towards the parking lot I had parked in, I felt like someone was watching me, it felt like a cold patch on my shoulder that continued to grow with each step I took. Stopping, I looked back the way I had came and saw a black van turn off to the left of me, shaking my head, I continued my walk to the car. "Inari, your just being paranoid, you need to stop watching so many crime dramas" I said to myself, not realising I had said it out loud till I realised the weird looks I was getting from people in the parking lot, chuckling to myself silently I jumped in my car and headed home.