The S.O.L.O.ists

Chapter 46

Annica's Point Of View

I am in shock.

The image that I saw yesterday night haunted me in my sleep. My dad would never do that. Would he?

  Why does it seem that every single time something good happens to me some dark cloud has to shoot down lightning upon my happy place leaving me to build it back up again? I would give anything to have a normal life without S.O.L.O., without my brother's hatred, without my father's undoing . . .

 My thoughts scatter when my eyes fall on the light figure that contrasts against the dark mahogany staircase.

His crimson crew cut sits uniformly on his pale scalp, with the freckles sprinkled across his nose and cheeks to offset the strictness of his appearance. His eyes – which are surprisingly not covered with his far-sighted glasses – are cast down on a book that's in his hand from Carter's secret stash of Sci-Fi collection that is kept underneath his bed. 

  Without Kenton?

I could never have a life without him. With the mysterious picture with his younger self and my brother and I in it including his mother's recordings that showed him being in the walls of this household before. I knew him in another life. A life of a girl that's no longer exactly here. Instead I'm here. I miss the part of me that never had a real care in the world. 

 But this me is better.

Better for the rest of the world.

Ding Dong.

"Sh*t," I hear Kenton curse, "Frickin' Millard is ready to drag us back to h*ll!"

I look back at him, "Calm down, Kenton. He's doing what's best for us. In spite of the fact that we could have been protecting others from crazy murderers and stuff. He runs the organization and we are the students that have to listen to him for the greater good. Besides, at least one of us will be out and running anytime soon without having to do it secretly."

My friend lets out a splutter, "I guess." He ducks into my brother's room to put the book away. "But I still feel like you're holdin' back something, Annica." His figure emerges from the door and he appears at the railing. "Something very dangerous."

"Children!" Principal Millard sings out as the door swings open, letting in frigidly cold air, "are you ready for the departure?"

"The departure, yes." Kenton mutters practically incoherent, "You? No."

Luckily our principal doesn't hear this, "You guys have to hurry I don't have all day."

Miraculously my friend arrives by my side quicker than expected and we walk out the doorway into the dark early morning. The same car that brought us here sits in its usual form, something that resembles a normal black van and Kenton opens the trunk and stuffs both our bags in there. The monster of a guard that shoved him into the car last time isn't here and the one that is driving just stays in the driver's seat.

The whole 'ready to go back to your crazy strict home' scenario blurs by so fast and the next moment I find myself in a moving car that's already at the gate of my property. I turn around in my seat to look out the back window and watch as my house fades into the darkness and I feel a spasm of sadness wash over me and tears gently sting my eyes. And before the structure that I was raised in dwindles from my sight I press my lips to my hand and blow it a kiss as the gate closes, severing my close proximity of its warmth. 

 I turn around and sit properly in my seat and from my peripheral vision I catch Kenton looking at me with his green eyes giving off a hazy glow. I fully contort my body to look at him straight in the eye but I find myself just staring at his profile, the light in his eyes diminishing.