"Forget Me Not" {first published novel}

Ch.16 ~ "Twisted Vine"

In a world of doubt, confusion and fear, only a few will choose to hear when you scream for help and cry alone so hold onto the ones who's kindness is shown.

Evan and I remain in shock. Dr.Chrystie is my substitute teacher? This is impossible! I saw her die before my eyes. I run up to Elaine and ask if I can speak with her alone. She rudely ignores my question and tells me to sit back in my seat.

"Dr...uh I mean Ms.Chystie, it's very important."

"Please, Miss Romaine take your seat."

"Elaine, please!" I exclaim loudly drawing the attention and focus of some of my fellow peers and acquaintances.

"Hall! Now!" She yells angerly, shoving me out the door and shutting it loudly behind her.

"Why are you acting so weird, Elaine?! Wait, more importantly, how are you alive?!"

As confused and frightened as I am, I need to know what is going on with Elaine.

"Elaine? I'm not Elaine. I'm Janet. Janet Chrystie."

"Elaine had a sister?"

"She used to have three to be exact. Now it's just Nancy and I, though. Margaret passed away a short while ago."

"Two sisters recently? I'm so sorry for your loss," I say, sympathetically.

"Two? No, just Margaret. We have only lost her so far."

"And Elaine..." I add.

"What are you speaking of? Elaine is not dead."

Evan and I have puzzled looks in our faces.

"She's in a mental institution in Chicago, but I assure you she is alive."

This changes everything. Every detail and splotch of information I knew about Elaine's death was false. I was wrong.

"But, uh. Who died then? I'm sorry this sounds rude but Ms.Chrystie I know I saw somebody die."

"That must've been Margaret. Her death was pronounced of accidental causes. When I went in to look at her, her body was unrecognizable and mangled beyond imaginable."

I looked down at my toes and nervously tapped them together between the peepholes at the end of my shoes.

"She told me she was Elaine. I really thought it was her too," I said, sadly.

"So, you saw Margaret die?" Janet asks, uncomfortably.

"Uh, yeah. I'm really sorry about that."

"Well, can you tell me exactly what happened? They wouldn't tell us much down at the station."

"Okay, well to be entirely honest, I thought it was Elaine. She pretended to be Elaine in order to tell me something apparently pretty secretive. Just as she was about to tell me, maybe a dozen officers came busting into the room and the next thing I knew, they were running after us. She uh, went to surrender herself or talk to them or something and they shot her. Wait no that's a lie, they shot an explosive and she kinda blew up, with it."

They reaction in Janet's eyes are not something I was happy to see. The blood-shot irises and faded pupils easily demonstrated her sadness and pity towards her fallen sister.

"Get back in class," she says, out of no where.

"What?" Evan and I say at the same time.

"I said get back in class! Before I call your parents!" She hollers, making Evan wave goodbye to me and head back downstairs to his class in a hurry and so I speed walk back into the classroom and to my seat.

Just a moment after I sit down and attempt to reorganize my thousand thoughts and feeling about the conversation that just took place, an object comes flying at the back of my head. I look back at where it came from and Gabby gives me a little signal forcing me to acknowledge she threw the object at me.

I look down and she an eraser with a note attached to it. I open it up quietly so Janet doesn't catch me and take the note away. Gabby is big on little note passing so I am not surprised to receive this one from her.

What I am surprised about is the lengthiness of her note. This immediately draws my attention and I realize whatever she wrote must have been important.

I look down at her words in front of my eyes and I as I been to read, I feel my heart drop. I read the note in my head.

"Did you break up Josh and Farrah?! Rumour has it somebody sent her a fake pic of him kissing some chick."

I pull out my red gel pen and nervously respond.

"No I had no idea!" I write while my hands nervously tremble as I feel ashamed for lying.

I toss the note over my shoulder back to Gabby and I can hear the crumpling of the paper between her fingers.

The remainder of the class goes by very slowly and the clock appears to be timeless. The past few days I have been having more and more flashbacks. I do not recall when the flashbacks begun or why, but regardless of the reasons why, all I want to figure out is how to put them to an end.

Last Wednesday I was on my way home from school and I caught myself zoning off into another surreal scene. There was an image of a boy and I alone on an outdoor patio which appeared to be in a outdoor furniture section of a hardware store. The boy grabs my hand and rants a motivating speech.

~~~

"Listen baby girl, this world is full of beautiful things. It's also filled with ugly things. I know that right now your life seems impossible but just in case you ever need somebody to hold your hand, don't you ever forget that I'll be your protector."

I laugh in the boy's face and put my arm around his shoulder and soon enough he begins to join in my laughter.

"Stop it! Do you have any idea how much you sound like a fuckboy right now?" I say jokingly.

"Ha, ha, ha, yeah I guess so. But admit it, it was great wasn't it?" He says smiling.

"It was okay." I say teasing him.

Then the boy leaned in to give me a kiss. I pulled my head away and he was left kissing the empty air.

"Hey!" He says assuming that I am just playing with him.

He leans back in to give me another, and I stand up and back away from him.

"We're going to fast," I say, biting my lip nervously.

"No we're not, you're just nervous come on," he says, pulling his lips into mine sloppily.

I pull away and slap him.

"I said no!" I yell back.

He starts to tell me how much of a chicken I am being and we begin to fight verbally. Our arguments are getting louder and louder. Our voices are getting meaner and meaner. Then the flashback ends. Right before I begin to hit him again. But who is this mysterious boy? Why do I feel like I have seen this boy before?

I am yelled at by Janet to pay attention and as I look up to face her, the only image that pops into my mind is Elaine's face. And she's yelling.

"Help me, Allison! I need your help!" And then I realize I am daydreaming again. But all that I know is that wherever Elaine is, I'm almost one hundred percent sure that in real life she needs my assistance.

"I'm sorry, Janet. Elaine needs me," I say, running out of the classroom.

I tell Evan to meet me in the front of the school. As I pace back and forth, I wonder how he will respond to this. Once he arrives bewildered to why I am skipping my class, I tell him that we are going away.

We're going to find Elaine.