It was a beautiful July morning. The air was silent,the birds sang a symphony and the trees coated with soothing colurs swayed to the rhythm.
While I sat down on the pavement,I saw a little girl. Despite the heat of the scorching sun,she still managed to ride her pink bike with a smile on her face ringing her bell with much enthusiasm. It was hard to not smile at her. It gave me a slither of hope that there is still happiness in the world. It went with her and my eyes darted to see my father packing our things to the front lawn.
I didn't want to leave California seeing as it was the only connection I had to my mother, well that and the lovely crescent necklace she gave me before she passed on. The events that led to her passing are still as clear in my mind as if it happened yesterday.
"Dad watch out!!!" I screamed as I saw a bus heading directly towards us. Dad was too occupied with shouting at my mother for not making lasagna as he wanted,to see the incoming vehicle.
I should tell you that my father has anger issues. His doctor, Doctor Robin,has placed him on a lot of therapies and medications for the past two years but nothing seems to work. The last report he got had a comment "Mr.Brown,we have tried the best we can but you are a tough nut to crack. Nevertheless,we will not give up on this journey."
The bus did not stop coming and dad only saw it when mom shouted out (a little too late if you ask me). All I could remember next was the glass shattering,my glasses falling off my eyes and the last bang before I slipped into unconsciousness.
When I woke up,I was greeted by the sun staring directly at me. I blinked my eyes a few times to see clearly, scrambled on the floor to find my half broken glasses. I put them on and searched earnestly for my mother and that's when I saw my father pulling her out of the passenger seat. I went to help him with it because I could not picture myself surviving without her. We succeeded in pulling her out of the passenger seat just in time for the car to explode therefore extending us few kilometers away from it.
At that point,my entire body hurt more than it has ever hurt in my entire human existence. I forced my eyes open,grateful that the sun did not blind me like before,and I saw my mother looking at me with tears in her almond shaped eyes and I knew she was about to utter her last words to me,so I held on to her with my last strength. "Amelia,you are a beautiful and intelligent girl,do not allow anyone to tell you otherwise. You come from a line of fighters and we fighters never stop fighting even when we do not know if we will win. This necklace has been in our family for ages. Take it,it will protect you and bring you good luck. Take care of yourself,take care of your father and remember I love you with everything in me." A tear fell on her cheeks and it was the last things she felt before she gave up the ghost.
I sat there drowning in my tears as I watched life slip out of the only person that meant the entire world to me. I could not move,I could not think, I am not even sure I was breathing. All I did was cry. Dad woke up a few minutes later. The devastating wail he let out on realising that his wife is dead was soon drowned out by the sirens of the ambulance.
The Uber driver got there just in time to take us to the airport and still numb from watching my mother being dropped into the ground at the cemetery,I could not move. Dad picked me up and put me in the back seat. We didn't carry anything apart from our clothes. I believe the memory attached to the furnitures was too much for dad to keep around. So he left everything there. Why we were leaving California, I had no idea, but I sat and watched from the back seat as the only place I called home faded away from my view. I was comforted by the singular fact that my mother's necklace laid proudly round my neck.
We had a smooth flight and in the next minutes,I found myself standing on the native soil of New Orleans. The city where the supernatural meets the natural. It all sounded like a bunch of mumbo-jumbo to me. But looking at the streets filled with ancestral artifacts,I was a little bit excited that I would be living here. The car took us to our new home. It was smaller than the one back home and I immediately hated it. All feeling of excitement that I had on the drive here went with the wind. The sitting room was designed with outdated furniture design. The floor needed a cleaning company to clean it ten times before it would appear clean. The only striking feature of the room was the fireplace,which looking at it closely, had a dead rat in it. The table cloth placed on the dinning table had a hideous stain on it, nothing a little club soda and salt won't solve.
Dad showed me to my room upstairs and I almost threw up at the sight of it. The bed was creaking and the mattress had cockroaches on them. My wardrobe was too times too small for me. I hated the house and wondered why dad would make us leave our haven for this mouse trap. Suffocated by the smell oozing out of the house, I ran outside only to behold the most breath-taking sight I have ever seen in the form of a boy. I stood there for few minutes soaking up his features and daring to think if I would be allowed to run my hands through his chiseled jaw bone.
I was so occupied with the thoughts that I didn't even notice that his hand was out for me to shake. He touched my shoulder to snap me out of my dream world and I fell into a deeper one. The next thing I heard was "Are you alright?" I stuttered a little but could still get out the words "Yes, I'm fine." "My name is Derek" and there was that hand again. Touching it may make me fall into a complete bliss but judging from the day I've had,I knew I deserved it. Taking his hands,I said "Amelia". And he smiled at me. Suddenly,I could feel the air that took my excitement of being in New Orleans bringing it back to me. I guess New Orleans won't be so bad after all.
A sleepless night was the best thing I had hoped for because I was still traumatized from my mother's death. It was perfectly normal for a kid my age to be worn out after witnessing her mother's death but my friend back home,Bonnie, did not agree. For some reason she was really angry when I told her that I could not stop crying. Most people didn't really understand her, unfortunately I was among them. She always kept her feelings locked in. I tried telling her that it wasn't the best way to live because when those walls are opened and the feelings start rushing out,she will be a mess. But no matter how hard I tried,she just never listened to me so I eventually had to leave her to her fate. I just hope she will have a shoulder to cry on when it happens because now, all thanks to my father, I will not be around. She did sound friendly when I told her about Derek. Oh,just the thought of him makes me smile. We did not get to talk for a long time but I truly believed that we are go
The hooting of the owl could be said to have a calming effect on a troubled mind but all that seemed to calm my mind was the evening breeze which slowly erased the sting from my skin. It felt wonderful to soak in the rays of the full moon, and few minutes later,I fell asleep on the front porch. The night was traumatizing. Reoccurring scenes of the event that took place swamped my dreams. In my head the scene was replaying over and over again. I was so crippled by the nightmares that I could not wake up from it. I have always heard of the termed sleep paralysis and getting to experience it was twice as bad as all the doctors I know have explained it. After a lot of struggling I finally awoke to the meowing caused by our neighbor's cat and I lifted my half numb body off the resting chair and dragged myself inside. Looking through the doors to my father's room,I saw him lying scatterly. I hated the sight of it. I suddenly had the imagination of taking his bedside chair and bang
I forced my eyes open and blinked a few times to regain my ability to see. The environment had an ambience to it that was difficult to explain. Soothing yet alarming at the same time. It offered you peace but left you feeling dizzy. I felt strange, disoriented. I shivered at the thought of where I possibly could be but I knew I wouldn't find my answers lying on the floor. Nevertheless, my present surrounding made me feel stuck. I could see my body but somehow it felt like it wasn't me. It felt like a part of me was missing and nothing I could do would ever bring it back. It felt like I was a leaf flowing through the wind. At that point,I didn't know if it was as the result of the breeze blowing the autumn leaves smoothly around the void environment I had found myself in but I felt wonderful.I turned slightly to my left and my beautiful mother was staring at me with a smile on her face. I immediately knew that I was home and safe. I walked towards her and she engulfed me in a hug. I w
A completely normal young girl would have been totally angry and perturbed with the present situation I had found myself in, but I guess normality becomes just a phrase when you've died twice. I was a little bit fascinated with the fact that I was in another time and age. I was excited to learn about their culture. Nevertheless, a part of me was begging for an explanation. Screaming for answers from someone I wasn't sure could hear me. Just hoping that I would get what I earnestly desired but when that wasn't forthcoming, I decided to at least stay alive.I looked at the food that was placed in front of me and the sight of it was disgusting. I was sure the food would taste as bad as it looked but considering the fact that the hospital I was placed in didn't look like a "semi-prison", I wanted to give them the benefit of doubt. I glanced at the nurse who brought the food and she smiled gently at me. Her action urged me to carry the spoon and start eating. I was hugely disappointed at t
The shock I experienced was not seen on my face. It felt like a bucket of cold water was poured on my bare back. My brain was going on an overdrive and yet my body felt numb. I finally understood that you can be alive and still be dead. My life was taken away from me and a sham of a new one was handed to me. They erased me from the surface of the earth and left me with absolutely no one to pour out my emotions to. That was the worse part of this dilemma, I had absolutely no one to talk to. I had to find some trustworthy people that I can talk to or maybe they did give me a companion and all I needed to do was find her. I immediately put my mind towards finding this person.I didn't really have enough time to collect ponder on where they must have kept this person or to even hear myself think or process my feelings because Becky's parents were always walking into my room to see if I am still breathing. I couldn't blame them though. I remembered when my mother died, I wished earnestly f
On a beautiful Sunday afternoon with the warm summer breeze blowing in and out of the hospital room, I found out that Becky's best friend,Amanda,was my great grandmother. I wasn't angry, I was just shocked. My parents never told me anything about my grandparents. I wasn't even allowed to go visiting during the holidays. We always spent all the holidays together in our rickety old house. I enjoyed spending time with my parents back then because they were lovely and kind to each other and also to me but a part of me still yearn to know who my grandparents were. I knew they weren't dead because I could hear the phone calls mom made with them once in a while. It hurts that whenever I would bring up the topic of meeting them, my parents would get a angry and toss it aside like it means nothing to them. I wondered what God was upto. Was this supposed to be an exciting turn of events for me? At that point, I desperately wanted to get into His mind and know what He was thinkingEven when I co
The unconscious state that we drift into when we sleep is something I have loathed all my life. The complete feeling of helplessness were you cannot control what happens to you,has always been scary to me. You could be killed while you sleep and you wouldn't even know. I was petrified of feeling that helpless. It always amazed me when I see people taking a nap. To me it felt like they didn't care about themselves, they didn't care about their safety. Anything could happen while you sleep and you wouldn't know.I never slept in the afternoon. Because I'll be damned if I allowed myself to sleep more than once in a day, therefore allowing myself to slip into that unconscious state called "dreaming". And the crazy part was that I could always tell when I was dreaming. Bonnie found it werid and maybe she was right. I have never heard of someone who could consciously tell when they were dreaming. She once suggested that I go see a therapist. According to her, 'I was mental'. But I didn't se
The demented house I lived in before Dad killed me was the same house I was looking at. But at the same time, it wasn't the same house. The house felt different. Maybe it was because of the family that lived in it. They loved each other and the house must have eluded the same love that they gave. I did not feel completely restless or pissed at being there. I actually felt at peace, it felt like home and I just wanted to turn around and ask Rebecca's mom how she did it. How did she make a place feel as home to a complete stranger? My mother was great and warm at heart but she never knew how to make the house that I lived in feel as home. The house had an elegance to it. A fashionable look and a welcoming air surrounded it. It was almost like it was calling out to me. The fear I felt in the car about surviving in there totally went with the wind and all I wanted was to experience what it will feel like being inside the house. I had goosebumps.Before we got into the house, I took some