She felt as though everything was so fragile.

That if she touched something, it would crumble into dust, and what memories it held would be lost and forgotten. Flora stood there, the doors that brought her into the room shut behind her, afraid to even lean against them lest something would break. It took a few minutes of gazing around the room she once lived in to realize that simply standing here held no purpose. There was no point in just looking around. Besides, the Surrounding was already restored, and everything was pretty much still standing after the whole invasion.

She took a deep breath, and a step forward.

The tiles her boots stepped on had cream and light pink intertwined into flowery patterns, to complement the main colour scheme of the room; the pink and green that mostly made up her fuku. Flora reached the ornate dressing room table, gingerly settling herself into the chair, which thankfully, held her weight despite all the years it had been left abandoned. The oval mirror before her was surrounded by flowers and leaves carved into the white wood, and she stared into her reflection, a pale and unsure face framed by blonde curls.

And suddenly, her reflection shifted, smiled, and her hair was much longer, thicker, and thrown into braids. “Hullo,” it said, and Flora realized, with a start, that the girl in the mirror was Fleur. The girl who she once was in a previous life, who had lived in this room, dressed in the same flowing dress she had once seen, with hues of pink and green.

“I don’t think I need to introduce myself.” Fleur observed, propping her chin up with a hand to grin impishly at her. “So, what to do you think of my... no, our room?”

Flora narrowed her eyes at her. “Is that all you can say when you’ve given me nothing but useless memories?” Nothing of significance, nothing of purpose, nothing that connected her closer to her Court.

“Zephy’s not useless~” Fleur sighed, with a roll of her eyes as she began undoing the braids in her hair, fingers combing through the blond strands. “Do you honestly hate him so?”

“I-” For a moment, Flora was at a loss for words. Normally, Eve Summers could shoot back a retort without hesitation, but it seemed as though she had met her match in herself. “I don’t hate him!” She spluttered out, her voice pitched a little higher than usual. “But that’s not the point! I don’t need to know the details of your little romance! Can’t you show me something about here? What fighting alongside everyone was like? I feel utterly clueless besides the rest; I don’t even remember anything about the Prince!”

Fleur made a face, in the midst of untangling a knot in her blond waves. “Fighting isn’t very interesting. And if the Prince isn’t coming back, what’s the point of remembering? Of dwelling in the past?” She had a point, of course. Eve Summers was always optimistic, always looked forward to what tomorrow could bring. But still... being locked away from the memories of who she once was... was terrible. At times, it felt stifling, like there was a part of her that was missing, an empty hole in her heart.

“Princess Chronos told me this. What hurts the most is to realize you’ve forgotten about something that matters.” Flora breathed, recalling the very words Serenade had once confessed to her. “Because it mattered, and that forgetting it feels like a betrayal.”

Fleur shut her eyes, a bitter smile forming on her lips. Was she relenting? Flora wondered, and lips parted to further convince her past self—

And she jerked awake.

Flora stood up shakily and stared into the mirror, where she could only see herself, and with no sign of Fleur. Gloved fingers reached out shakily and pressed against the surface of the mirror, hoping that it would somehow summon the girl she once was.

Nothing happened.

There was only her, with her short hair and her fuku with white wings that signified her recent power up.

Flora was left alone, in her room in the Surrounding, left wondering if it was really a dream. Left wondering how much of it was real, and how much of it was just her fantasy, a manifestation of the desires of her subconscious.