A Second Chance in Life

'I never learned. It's a mistake to depend on others. I was a fool.'

"Mrs. Soleste!" was the last thing Aria heard before her head ducked beneath the ocean water for the last time and never resurfaced again.

So deafeningly quiet. So bitterly cold.

Then, something burned, which was strange, considering how cold she was. She tried to breathe, but again, that same burn flooded her lungs.

Aria didn't expect how dark it was underwater. The slow descent only seemed to prove that point more and more as all forms of light disappeared. Aria was now left surrounded by caliginous hues.

Burning. Freezing.

But it would be over soon, or so she told herself as her arms moved to swim back up to the surface. It would be much easier to just let herself drown. But she remembered one certain thing that kept her from giving up, and that was the fact she had not fulfilled her dream yet –

Her dream to sing for everyone in the world.

---

Aria felt as if she's floating in the air, wraithlike voices all around her.

"Can you unravel and reweave the fabric, Habishahmeen?"

"I can, Armonyaserah. But how far back should we go exactly?"

"Here. Orasrahni, can you move time back to this spot on the weave?"

In her state of respite, she was met with three faceless figures, each cloaked in light so staggeringly bright they radiated the unapproachable splendor of the empyrean itself. They appeared to be hovering around a scintillating weaving loom. Everywhere else she looked was awash with white, except for the walls and floor, which were covered in resplendent tapestries and rugs in a plethora of vibrant colors.

"O blest descendant with a special thread, mayst thou live thy next life to the fullest."

---

Aria woke up to find that she'd turned back in time, all the way back to her and Kai's wedding day.

She was there right in front of the altar, thoroughly frozen as she listened to her groom recite his marriage vows. "I, Kai Soleste, take you, Aria Marguerite, to be my lawfully wedded wife," he said with the same affectionate expression that she had deeply engraved in her memory. Her eyes instantly brimmed with tears, not because she was touched by his words of love, but because she recalled what would happen in the future.

'W-Why? How? What's going on?' Aria was at an utter loss.

The ceremony swiftly proceeded like how she remembered it did. Everyone made a round of applause, and they, the newlyweds, walked down the aisle. It was not until she got into the car and away from the crowd that she was able to think properly again.

'Did those angels do this?' she mused with awe, wonder, and a bit of fear. 'Oh wait, no, are they goddesses?'

At this point, she didn't know anything anymore. Everything was so mystifyingly surreal that she's surprised she could still think at all. It's a struggle to keep up with what's happening around her while absorbed in her thoughts like this. Perhaps, for now, she'd need to get through this day.

Once it's all over, Aria could lock herself up somewhere and do all the thinking she could do.

"Aria?" she heard Kai call from the seat next to her. "Is everything okay? You seem to be out of it."

Her lips quivered. "Y-Yeah. Okay everything is."

"You got that jumbled up," he chuckled before teasing Aria with a smirk. "Nervous for our honeymoon later?"

"U-Uh, no. Not at all." She knew it would not even happen.

How she wished she could tell him everything. How she wished she could cry it all out. How she wished he knew what she had gone through.

But the least she wanted was for Kai to think that she was going crazy. Aria could no longer trust that his feelings for her alone would make him side with her.

In the first place, those feelings of his were never enough to make him trust her.

'Love just isn't enough in this world,' she brooded over sadly. 'And I'd learned that the hard way.'

She didn't want to suffer all over again. They're not meant to be with each other, and that should've been clear from the start. He shouldn't remain stuck with someone so hopeless.

'We can't be together when both of us are only going to be unhappy, when I'm only going to die in the end. But at the same time, I don't want to disappear just like this, without doing anything,' Aria pondered deeply and glanced quietly at Kai. 'I still have time to uncover the truth of what happened that night, so maybe I can use that to change my fate. Would've been better if I'd traveled a bit far back than this, but there's not helping it.'

With that, Aria decided to find out what truly happened during the anniversary of her grandparents-in-law, all the while hoping that she could also discover a way to still live happily with Kai and avoid the worst-case scenario, which was to file for a divorce.