dawn

Chapter 2

I had biology first hour with three of the five boys. And while the angelic one that I felt very close to wasn’t part of the group, I didn’t mind it. Class was class and they caught me up for the most part. Back home, biology wasn’t year long like at the Academy. We only had it for a semester and back home we were about to start quarter three. Here, they didn’t even have a Spring Break until early April.

In any case, sitting with them was quiet, the uproar in the student body. I hadn’t a clue as to why but they ignored it and it was easy to zone out with them, and without my uncle.

The reason I was even there, at school, even when I was a prisoner of some bewildering war, was because my uncle had neighbors. It was so simple. Normal neighbors, I’d guess, who thought that I was that girl from the Missing posters, which I was, but they grudgingly let the theory go, much to my disappointment and relief, because I called him “uncle” and because Uncle John and I almost looked alike and he had our ancestor’s portrait which I was supposed to resemble; I still hadn’t seen it.

Also, and probably the most compelling reason was because I met Miss Gretchen Armani who was the sweetest woman I’d ever met in all of my life. She was strange looking, for a woman of sixty or fifty which she sort-of claimed to be. Her face wasn’t wrinkled or saggy and if I had to guess on the street, I would have said she was about twenty four and a little up. She had long silky hair, a black that hurt the eyes and her eyes were the same tone, a metallic obsidian.

When I met her, I think Uncle John was surprised by how childish she became.

I’d never been the pretty one in my family. No one ever said that I was the sweet niece or that I was the favorite, but her reaction caught me up with what it felt to be the popular one.

“My, my! What a lovely child you are!” she held my face with her bone-chilling hands. I resisted the urge to tremble but that didn’t mean I didn’t slightly shake.

“Thank you,” I muttered through clenched teeth.

“John! You didn’t tell me how absolutely precious she was!”

“My words couldn’t label her. You had to see her to do her justice,”

My face burned and I lowered my eyes.

She let me go with a laugh like bells, like notes in perfect pitch. “And so modest,” she murmured in praise.

I lowered my face that was burning uncomfortably. Attention. If there was only someone else, a sibling, like smart Arthur, to dilute it.

“I better get to work,” my uncle suddenly said.

“Oh,” she said, surprise coloring her voice. Of course, she hadn’t anticipated that her surprise visit would be cut short.

I took a swing in the dark, probably not the best reaction but it was just that—a reaction. “We’ll be fine here, Uncle John,” I said. And while I didn’t know if there were any things that I had to look out for, I had to try to have the people who didn’t want to hurt me around me. It was a strategy. Like playing chess or cards; it helped.

What I thought was a smart move, became a nervous breakdown for my uncle. He rushed around the house, giving me instructions for the essentials, leaving me for the first time. He was worn, moving at light speed—and it wasn’t enough for him—while his guest sat in the living room, patiently, silently.

“I love you,” he murmured, holding my face, and kissed my forehead and grudgingly shuffled out the back door.

I had anticipated such a parting from him in any case. Would she run away? Would she die? Would she go hungry? Would she be in trouble or danger?