Chapter#01: The good news

Dara’s eyes opened due to the bangs of the alarm. The brightest rays of the sun entered the room and the cool breeze coming from the half opened window lifted the curtains made of fine cloth up in the air.

“Uh another boring day!” sighed Dara as she got up from the bed. She moved towards the calendar on her wall and crossed 14^th May on the calendar with a marker, “Just four more days to go.”

She ran downstairs to the kitchen to have her breakfast, “Morning Mom! Morning Dad!” she grabbed up an apple.

“Morning Honey!” her mother Ellen greeted her.

“Can I skip school today?” Dara asked her father while taking a bite from her apple.

“You skipped the last whole week of school. What are you up to young lady?” Greg, Dara’s father replied to what Dara asked.

“Who told you that? I never skip school and besides I’ve got really good company there.” Dara gave a mock smile.

“Dara, sweetheart your teacher called us the other day. She told us you’ve been skipping school.” Ellen spoke while pouring milk in the bowl.

“There’s no use going to that school. I’m nothing more than a weirdo.” Dara sighed.

“No honey, that’s not true. You’re just different.” Greg uttered while taking a spoon from his cereal, “You don’t know how jealous they all are by your grades.”

“Well there’s nothing special in a girl who got no friends, who got grey hair which she can’t even dye.” Dara spoke in a taunting tone while taking a bottle of juice from the fridge.

Dara had grey colored hair from her child hood. When she was born, she showed symptoms of not a normal person. She had more speed in everything than a normal person. Her heartbeat was extremely different from a normal person’s heartbeat. At the time she was born, doctors thought that she won’t survive but she did. Dara was a quiet girl. She had no friends because she was different from every student of her school.

Ellen and Greg looked at each other, and then Ellen spoke, “That’s not really true. We love you.”

“Yeah you love me just because I’m your daughter and if I were not, you would have hated me like everyone else in my school.” saying this Dara came back to her room. “Huh…” she sighed and took out a small oval shaped antique mirror which was decorated by flowers made of bronze all around, “I wish you were here.” tears rolled down her face on the mirror.

Knock! Knock!

Greg knocked at the door. Dara quickly wiped her tears off and turned around to her father.

“I’ve got good news for you. You don’t need to go to that school anymore.” Greg told with a smiling face as he put his hand on his daughter’s shoulder.

“This really is amazing but why not?” Dara was happy to hear this but at the same time she was also confused.

“Because we’re moving back to Nexorus.” told Greg.

“Dad this is the thing I’ve wanted to hear for years.” Dara became very excited to know she was going back to the place where she was born and where she had spent her childhood.

“Your Granddad is a bit sick. He asked us all to come to him.” told Greg.

“It’s been years I haven’t met him. I feel so happy we’re going back there.”

“So start packing your things now. I’ve booked our tickets for tomorrow morning.”

“Thank you Dad. I love you!”

“I love you too my nut cake.” saying this Greg went out from the room.

Dara quickly opened her closet and took out a diary from between her folded clothes.

She wrote;

“Dear Wade;

                       I’ve been waiting for this for years. Granddad is sick. He wants us to live with him because you never know when a person fades away for sure. I’m coming back and I’ll find you. I know you’re still there and I know you haven’t forgotten me.”

She closed the diary and took a deep breath, “Finally!”

She went to her closet and started picking out clothes from it. She folded all her clothes in a purple colored bag. There was another bag for her shoes and another one for accessories, make-up and stuff.

“Phewww…I’m all done.” Dara said to herself while putting her bags outside her room.

“Honey, that’s a lot of packing. Are you going somewhere?” Ellen asked her daughter when she saw three big bags all packed up.

“Dad told me that we’re going back to Nexorus.”

Ellen giggled and said, “Our flight is next morning. You really are excited to meet your grandpa young girl.”

“Not grandpa but him.” Dara said to herself in her thoughts and gave her mother a smile.

Tick! Tock! Tick! Tock!

Dara laid on her bed and watched the needles on the clock move. “Ahhh…the time is not moving today. It’s been only five hours since I’m awake.” she sighed.

She rolled here and there on her bed. She picked up her phone and scrolled her social media for a while and then she went to the kitchen to eat something. She opened the refrigerator, looked at the food it had, “I don’t feel hungry anymore.” She closed the door of the refrigerator and when she back to the stairs towards her room, she felt hungry again. She went back to the kitchen, opened the refrigerator, “What should I have now?” she said to herself. “Ahhh I’m not hungry anymore.” she slammed the door of the refrigerator and exclaimed, “Why is waiting so hard?”

She went back to her room, put her ear-phones on and started listening to her favorite song. “Wise man say only fools rush in…” she sang softly with the song, “…for I can’t help falling in love with you.”

“Oh Wade! When will I see you?” she sighed. After a while, she slept.

Dara’s eyes opened due to some clicking sound on her window. She got up to see what was happening. She went close to the window and saw four of her school mates throwing eggs at her window.

She opened the window and yelled, “What’s the matter?”

“Happy last day weirdo!” one of the kids howled and all four of them laughed. One of the kids threw an egg on Dara but as she was quick in everything and could sense really fast, she quickly catched that egg. All of the kids started throwing eggs on her. She did manage to dodge some of the eggs but two of them hit her, one on her head and the other on her shoulder. Those kids laughed and on their cycles they ran away.

“Crazy people!” Dara sighed. Tears rolled down her face but she tried to stop them. “Uh! I should go get myself all cleaned up now.” She went to the bathroom to take a shower. After that she came back to her room and laid on her bed again. It was so hard for her to wait for the next morning.

“Who…who’s there?” she asked in a terrified tone. She was in a jungle; dark, cold and alone. There was something moving here and there in the woods but she couldn’t see it clearly. That thing stopped. Dara walked towards it. She moved closer and closer and…

“Dara!” Ellen shook her.

“Uh…I felt asleep.” Dara woke up.

“I’m going to Aunt Betty’s. Come downstairs to eat and come along with me. She’ll love to have you there.”

“Mom…I missed it again. Arhhh…I can’t believe this. I was so close to it.”

“Honey, those are just dreams. Dreams aren’t something to think about. I hope you find that thing one day.”

“Haven’t found it for years.” Dara sighed.

“Come on downstairs now.”

Dara got up from her bed. “I really don’t want to go to Aunt Betty’s. I hate her stupid son.” She went down to the kitchen to have her lunch.

“I thought to make pancakes for you.” Ellen smiled while putting the plate of pancakes on the table.

“Ummmm…I love pancakes. Especially the ones you make.”

“I know sweetie.” Ellen spoke while washing the dishes.

“Mom I don’t want to go to Aunt Betty’s.”

“Why not. She loves you.”

“Well, I just don’t feel good.”

“You really need to stop thinking about your dreams.”

“No it’s not about that. I don’t feel like spending my last day out from this house.”

“Okay then. I’ll be back in a bit. You know the rules when I’m away from the house.”

“Yes mommy, do not go out, keep the doors locked, do not cook and do not order pizza or anything.”

“Good girl! I’ll be back in a bit.” saying this Ellen went out from the kitchen and off she went to Betty’s house.

After finishing her lunch, Dara went back to her room. She took out her drawing pad and started to draw what she saw in her dream. “Hmmm…so it was the same woods...” she murmured while drawing, “…it was all dark” she drew the unclear details of her flashback. “…and I couldn’t see it again.” She drew some black kind of lines and circles to identify that thing from her dreams and put the pencil down. It was a rough drawing but one could clearly see what was drawn on it. “Why do I always miss that part of my dream.” she spoke while turning back the pages of her drawing pad. There were same drawings on her drawing pad; there were different drawings from her dreams but one thing common was that black thing which she couldn’t see clearly. Since Dara came to this city, she has been having these dreams, not much but once in three days. She started to draw what she saw but yet couldn’t figure out what she saw.

Time passed. She watched TV, spent some time with her parents, played online games and wandered here and there in the house. She was so excited to go back to her birthplace after 7 years.