Do You Know Indigo?

Epilogue

The salt air tasted delicious, just as I remembered it. The sound of waves crashing like titans against the rock face was akin to the crescendo of a symphony, just as I remembered it. The sunlight created diamonds on the water's surface, dancing on the horizon's waves, just as I remembered it.

I hadn't stood were I was standing in ten years long years but still it was so fresh in my mind.

My mother brought me as a child to the small seaside town; it was where my grandmother had lived and had done so her whole life. The town was everything I wished Edinburgh to be. It had been my home.

Ross and Jackson coming along had ended my days in paradise and robbed me of precious time with my gran. My mother chose to stay at home with the baby so Gran's services were forgotten. But my gran had wanted to see me. My gran had loved me so. Yet, after Jackson was born, my gran was in no condition to travel or caretake. A woman with terminal cancer couldn't do such things as care for a young and stubborn child.

Then on my seventh birthday she couldn't care for anyone anymore and I prayed Heaven was caring for her.

That was when he appeared. The stranger always within reaching distance though my mind could never touch him.

After my gran passed away Mum had said there was nothing left for us in the small, seaside town and that we wouldn't be returning. I remembered running to these cliffs with my stranger, not to jump but to look out onto the far away Fife and wishing time would stop.

I vowed back then I would return when I needed to breathe, when life suffocated me. Now I was back fulfilling that vow.

Nobody knew where I was. Mum thought I was around at Jude's house with Mandy while they thought I was out with Kieran who thought I was at home resting. I knew for a fact I'd be in trouble with all of them when I got back if I was to be found out.

Dr. Collins had told me things were going to be difficult when I left the hospital. A hospital was a sanctuary were people could be silenced and turned away. The outside world was different. People could bully you at all hours of the day and not be dismissed by a doctor.

Mum, the biggest bully of them all, had been saving all her questioning for the privacy of our own home. I could not understand why, my answers would have remained the same regardless of location.

"Why didn't you phone?" she demanded. She glowered down at the pitiful lump that was me, wrapped in a duvet. I wasn't sure I'd heard her right. Why could I not phone?

"Mum I was kidnapped. I wasn't offered a phone call as a part of the service."

"She's right Vanessa, it wasn't like she had a chance to phone anyone. Kidnappers only usually allow a phone call when they want ransom money and need to prove they've got the person in question," Ross had tried to explain. He propped his glasses back on the bridge of his nose.

"You watch too many movies," Mum muttered. "Why didn't you demand they asked for a ransom?" Mum had passed her attentions back to me, making her own point invalid.

"I didn't want to put you at any inconvenience." I'd then gathered my sheets and stomped out of the room. I had not quite believed I was getting a row for not calling my parents to let them know I'd been kidnapped but was OK because they'd allowed me a phone call. I hazily remembered Mun summoning me back to the room but I was too furious to even bother considering it.

Beth was discharged from the hospital a few days after I was. She wasn't fully herself but at least her mouth was working properly. All she talked about was remembering getting drugged and dragged off into a van and then nothing comprehensible. I hadn't realised we'd been drugged - perhaps that had only been Beth's fate. Devon had probably wanted me conscious and kicking.