For Nevermore Season 1

this now. No, no, no.
    Noella flashed on Jessica’s body on the floor, blood on Noella’s hands.
    She couldn’t bear the thought of having one of her episodes and hurting Tori.
    No, no, please. Not now.
    She slid down along the back of the closet, and then to the floor, her knees to her chest, fearing what would happen next. She hoped Tori would open the door and tell her she was it . She strained to hear anything which might bring her back to her world.
    Noella gathered her courage and finally stood. She went to slide the closet open, but it was no longer a door on casters. Instead, the door had a knob.
    She turned it, cringing, and stepped into the room that was no longer Tori’s and definitely not Sam’s.
    There was a bed against the wall, but it was large and oddly sized — fatter and longer than any other bed Noella had ever seen. The sheets were crimson with waves of shadow which grew and retreated along with the flickering candles which lined a large wooden dresser beside her.
    This isn’t happening.
    Noella swallowed something thick in her throat, and was about to cry out for Tori, but she drew in her breath instead, then inched toward the door and placed her ear against the wood.
    She listened for Tori, but heard nothing.
    How do I get back to my world?
    Noella was deciding whether to call for Tori or go back inside the closet to see if that might send her back from where she came, when she heard footsteps outside the door, heavier than Tori’s, and on hardwood rather than the carpet that was supposed to line the hallway floor.
    The door opened and Noella gasped.
    Oh my God.
    Dante!
    He stood dressed in what looked like tan-colored riding pants, tucked into tall black boots, with a crisp white shirt and a high collar. He also wore a black vest with a straight-edged fabric and pointed corners.
    Noella wanted to shake the oddly dressed stranger, and demand that he prove his reality. She fell backward instead, stumbling toward the closet, the moment’s horror caught in her mouth.
    “Noella, wait!” he commanded.
    She froze, staring back at her guardian in shock.
    “What are you doing here?” he asked.
    “No, you’re not real,” Noella shook her head. “This isn’t happening.”
    She closed her eyes, trying to imagine him away, while taking another step back toward the closet door.
    “Did anyone see you come in here?” he said, running to the window, staring out the glass, and looking up and down the street, then closing the curtains and turning back to Noella.
    “I don’t even know how I got here!” she insisted. “Where am I?”
    “You mean you really don’t know?” Dante said, eyebrows rising in surprise.
    Noella stared at him, wondering if she’d gone crazy, but was lost in the depths of his eyes enough to not care. His eyes went deep and were instantly familiar, like looking into eternity and knowing it was home.
    None of this is happening.
    I’m stuck in a moment that cannot exist.
    This is exactly what the pills were trying to stop.
    She had to escape, and in the meantime, she could try and figure out what in the world was happening.
    “I don’t know anything,” Noella said. “I thought I was going crazy. I didn’t think you were real, but here you are, right in front of me. Where am I? And who are you?”
    Dante stared in her eyes and moved one step closer, but kept his hands fastened to his side. “You don’t remember me?” He kept staring at Noella in disbelief.
    “I see you in my dreams,” Noella said. “All the time. But I have no idea who you are.”
    “I’ve known you for centuries, Noella.”
    “What?!”
    The horrible fissure between fact and fiction threw Noella from her balance and sent her to her buckling knees. Reality had already ripped, but the tear grew bigger. Noella felt her body grow lighter, preparing to leave one world so it could bleed to another.
    Tori’s voice, a mile away but growing closer, rang through the air as though an echo of the past, “5...4...3...2...”
    Noella didn’t want to leave. She had to know more. She tried to fight the feeling of vertigo. Tried to do something she’d never tried before, to stay.
    But she couldn’t.
    “One. Ready or not, here I come.”
    “Wait!” she called, reaching out to touch him, as if he might be able to hold her and keep her there. He recoiled, “I can’t touch you,” he said. “Ever.”
    Dante whispered the word ever like a death sentence.
    Noella tried to hold onto the world