Chapter Two

How could this have happened? What kind of other being could have done this?

The last thing Chloe Brass could remember, was the numbing of her slumped body as it fell to the floor, the bottle of what she thought was her anxiety pills tumbling from her hands, revealing they were in fact her bottle of extra strong melatonin pills to help her sleep, which she had downed with her large 3 sugar coffee.

She thought it was the end, yet here she is, waking up in a room so luxurious, she thought she really had gone to heaven for a second, until she turned and saw the woman asleep in the chair next to the bed, clearly alive and not some spiritual being or angel. She almost let out a scream when she saw the young lady, looking no older than herself.

Chloe remembers dying in her room, which looked nothing like the picturesque room she has woken up in now, and looks nothing like a hospital if she was in fact revived from her death experience. Should she not be hooked up to machines and lying in a diaper of her own filth?

Not wanting to wake the deep asleep woman next to her, she slowly lefts the blankets and slips out of bed, discovering a pair of fuzzy pink slippers on the side of the bed that fit her feet perfectly, as if custom made just for her. She shrugs and slips her feet in before quietly padding across the floor to the vanity mirror, wanting to see how ghastly her reflection is after coming back from the dead.

Letting out a yawn and rubbing her eyes, she carefully wobbles over to the mirror, her legs having no strength from lying in bed for however long. When her eyes meet her reflection in the mirror, she lets out the scream she was holding back earlier and stumbles back so far, she trips herself and falls back. The sound of the scream and her butt hitting the floor was enough to wake the woman next to her, who let out a strangled scream of her own.

"Oh my god, my lady! You're awake finally, this is a miracle!" she exclaims and rushes over to her, tears gathering in her eyes. As Chloe looks closely, she sees that the woman is dressed in a plain outfit that closely resembles a servant of some kind and she wonders just exactly where she landed herself.

"My lady, what are you doing lying on the ground like that? You shouldn't be out of bed." The woman helps her off the floor and carries her back to bed. "I'll get you some water and something to eat, you must be famished."

"Wait, can you get me a mirror please?" Chloe calls out. The woman looks back at her confused but nods hesitantly and disappears in the side door of the bedroom, which seems to open into an attached bathroom. She comes back out with a gold-plated hand mirror and gives it to Chloe before leaving to fetch food and water.

She takes a deep breath and closes her eyes as she lifts the mirror up, opening them once again to confirm that what she saw earlier wasn't a trick of the light or a gag mirror.

It isn't, the girl staring back at her with the unknown appearance is really her. Instead of the plain, mousy brown hair she had before, she now has luscious blonde locks that reach past her waist, and instead of her dark brown eyes she now has vibrant green eyes that sparkle like emeralds in the sun. Her skin is lightly tanned and flawless, not a single blemish in sight, with high cheekbones and naturally long lashes, soft pouty lips and neatly trimmed eyebrows.

She looks like the super models she aspired to be in magazines, and she has been lying in bed for however long, not wearing an inch of make-up or having bathed properly, yet everything about her still seems to be glowing. Is this what feels like to be born naturally pretty?

Her thoughts are interrupted when the door opens again and the servant comes through the door carrying a silver tray with a bowl of soup and a cup of water on top, like she is serving a member of royalty. She sets the tray down on the bed and stands by the bed side, as if awaiting instructions or to confirm Athena will eat the food.

"What are you doing?" Athena asks.

"I'm waiting to see if there is anything else you need? I have already phoned the doctor; he should be here in an hour to check your vitals and see if you're suffering any internal damage or other ailments."

"What exactly happened again? My memory is foggy from right before I passed out."

The woman seems to hesitate on answering.

"I think it would be best for the doctor to explain what happened, it would be easier for him than myself, I don't know all those fancy technical terms used in medicine."

It was a fair point; it was clearly something great enough that it killed the soul of the former Athena Rose. But did no one notice that this woman had died at one point? Was there no one watching her or monitoring her vitals to make sure she was at least still breathing?

She has only been awake for an hour at most, yet the only person to come to her room is a servant, who seems to have stayed by her side throughout the most of it, even setting up camp uncomfortably next to her bed. Does she not have a family or friends? This is a woman who is obviously wealthy and pretty, there is no way she lives such a lonely life, that only a mere paid attendant would be looking after her.

"Where is everyone else?" she asks the servant.

"By everyone else, do you mean your father and the mistress and her daughter?"

Is that all? What about her mother? Does she not have one? If that's the case, asking about it would seem suspicious, if her mother passed away than it would be odd if she suddenly asked where she is or why she wasn't mentioned. Instead, she just nods in agreement, planning to take a look around the room later for any clues to the identity of this woman.

"Your father is working, and Mistress Alexis and her daughter are out shopping as usual, it is just us and the kitchen staff in the manor at the moment. I haven't informed your father that you've woken up, I thought you might not want that."

Athena wouldn't want her own father knowing she was awake from her coma? That clearly meant their relationship isn't a good one, so bad in fact that she doesn't want her father to know she is still alive. This piques Chloe's curiosity even more, wanting to dismiss the servant and eat, so she can rummage around the room freely and find out just who she has hijacked.

Something is telling her that this new life is too good to be true, and the more she hears about her new family, the more the suspicion grows.

"Thank you, I don't believe there is anything else I need for now."

The woman bows her head and walks out. Chloe has yet to learn her name, but the servant seems like someone who might have worked there for a long time, and it would be another red flag if the master of the house was to ask what her name was, or maybe it might come off as arrogant that she can't remember a loyal servants name.

Either way, she will have to learn the names of everyone on her own, in her own way, if she wishes to keep up the act that she is the real Athena, until she at least figures out what is going on, and if this body switch is permanent. Once the bedroom door is closed, she turns to the silver tray and carefully slurps up the pumpkin soup, welcoming the soothing warmth that trails down her throat to her rumbling stomach.

Once she is done eating, she gets out of bed and looks around the room, wondering where she could find something that could tell her a little more about her new life. Thinking about what that something could be, a journal came to mind.

Everyone keeps their inner most thoughts about themselves in a journal, wouldn't they? With that thought in mind, Chloe goes over to the desk and rummages through the drawers, but to no avail. She checks the dresser drawers to see if the former Athena may have tried to hide it, when she suddenly thinks of the one place a person would keep something so personal.

Right next to them as they sleep. She checks underneath the pillows and underneath the mattress but still nothing. She slumps down on the floor next to the bed, just about to give up, when her foot kicks something light underneath. Getting down on her stomach, she reaches as far as she can, until what feels like the corner of a book comes into grasp. It's just an inch too far for her finger tips to grab it, but there is still a way.

Looking around the room, she spots a coat hanger by the door with a robe hanging on it. She discards the robe on the ground and grabs the coat hanger, taking the flatter end of it to fit neatly under the bed and push the book out on the other side. She nearly jumps for joy when she sees the clear front cover of a journal and it doesn't have any sort of lock on it.

Putting the coat hanger back, she picks up the book and returns to the bed to flip through the pages, her eyes quickly scanning the words for what is most important, but she stops halfway through.

No wonder this girl woke up alone; she has had quite the terrible life.

Before her 18th birthday, her mother passed away in a car accident when the driver lost control of the car and swerved into the ditch. The car engine caught on fire, and only the driver was able to escape before the car blew up, her mother still inside.

A month after the death of her mother, her father brought in his new lover and their supposed daughter he had, before he met Athena's mother.

What kind of story is behind that? She has a half-sister that's older than her, born before her mother and father even met? Why is she suddenly back?

It's clear her father was still having an affair with this woman, Alexis I'm assuming, while he was raising a family with Athena and her mother.

Just a month after his wife's death, he welcomes his illegitimate family in with open arms, and forgets all about his other daughter. What kind of father is this man? The suspicion that Chloe had that her new life was too good to be true, is really turning out to be true.

After reading through the journal and stomach as much as she could, Chloe was able to get a better understanding of her situation. She is 20 years old this year, has built a successful modelling career since she was a child, and she is the daughter of the Rose heiress, who are responsible for creating the luxury hotels called the Rose Towers.

She has lived a miserable life ever since her mother died and her stepmother and half-sister moved in, Alexis and Stella Heroux. Stella has had it out for Athena ever since they met in their first year of university, Stella already being in her second at the time. She believes that everything Athena has should belong to her, and has made that fact known to Athena.

The former Athena has written about every encounter with her half-sister, of how she has had gangs of girls corner her at school, drenched her with dirty mop water, thrown food at her in the cafeteria, publicly beat her in the halls and school grounds, and it doesn't stop when she gets home.

Stella continues to misbehave and blame it on Athena, their father taking Stella's side because he feels guilty for having left her at such a young age, but she never explains why her father left his former lover, especially if they had a child together? Is the man really that greedy, that once he found someone wealthy and the heiress to a mass fortune, that he would leave his former family for a chance at that wealth?

If that were the case, why didn't cut ties with them? Why endanger his chances of getting his hands on this vast fortune? If any lawyer were to find out that he was having an affair during his marriage, the will would be nullified and he wouldn't get a single cent. He did a great job hiding it until her mother passed away.

The question now remains; does her mother's will leave everything to her, or her father?

There is something deeper going on here, I just know it.

The eerie feeling, she had before crept up on her again, telling her that she has many things to be wary of, and her new half-sister and stepmother are clearly two of them she needs to keep her eye on. It's going to be difficult defending herself against these attacks, without knowing any context of the situation. This journal tells her a lot, and there is still many more details to read through, but the drama that Chloe has discovered is enough for her already.

She has to think about what she knows so far, and how she is going to use it to continue fooling everyone into thinking that she is the real Athena. Despite the red flags of this life so far, it is still too good an opportunity for her to give up, and she is still unaware of how long she has in this body. Everything she has ever wanted is at the tips of her fingers, all she has to do is reach out and take hold, hoping there are no big thorns along the way.

The sounds of voices floating down the hall piques her interest, dropping the journal on the bed and walking over to the door to crack it open a little and peek out. She can't see anyone, but she can hear a man's voice speaking with the servant she was with earlier.

"Has she woken up? Is she aware and coherent, any signs that she might be suffering brain damage?" the man asks the servant in a rushes voice, his footsteps slapping against the carpeted floor as he races towards the bedroom door.

Chloe closes it carefully and runs back to the bed to pretend like she had never left, tucking the journal under her many layers of pillows to hide it, just as the door opens again and the doctor walks in with a large smile on his face. It is the first overjoyed person she has seen since she woke from her death experience, the only person to show her such relief that she is alive.

"Well, you look as healthy as a horse, you can barely tell you were even asleep for almost 3-months."

3 months? Is he serious? No wonder my legs felt like Jell-O when I tried to stand up, do I even have any muscle mass left in my body?

Given how fit Athena's body appears to be, it would seem she didn't suffer her physical form that much during her time in a coma.

The doctor did his usual check-up, making sure her heart rate is normal, and vision isn't impaired. He asks her questions like who she is and if she remembers what day it is, and thanks to the calendar on the wall, she is able to respond despite not knowing what year she is even living in.

Based on the modern looking bedroom, the fact that cars and other automobiles exist, and there is top notch medical care, it would seem she isn't that far off from her previous time. She has in fact only gone five years in the future, if you base off the last year and day, she was alive, which was the year 2017 and it is now 2022.

"I was going to recommend a quick trip to the hospital just to be sure, but from a minor examination right now, I'd say you're just fine. If you feel any dizziness or sudden headaches, I will strongly recommend getting checked out at the hospital, to make sure there aren't any lingering internal damage done to your brain or internal organs.

"Doctor, there is one thing that I can't seem to remember. How did I end up like this?" Chloe finally asks, wanting to put her curiosity to rest as to how this woman died as well.

The doctor gives her a somber look and smiles gently.

"Unfortunately, you mixed a large amount of sleeping pills with alcohol. We rushed you to the hospital and stabilized you, but you were barely clinging on to life. It is such a sad way to go, and a hope this has taught you that life is precious and there is always another way."

Chloe holds up a hand to interrupt the doctors words and wrap her head around it all.

"Wait, what are you saying?"

The doctor shakes his head.

"Miss Rose, you tried to take your own life."