Three

Chapter 2

Cressida

The Lockwood mansion was a large building completely made out of grey stone. The sun reflected in the windows and the small pond in the well-kept garden. Mr Lockwood's two daughters were strolling around on one of the stone paths in the huge garden.
"How are you feeling today, Carrie?" Cressida asked her older sister. It took a few seconds before Caroline answered:
"Terrence is going to leave me. Because of that I'm feeling very blue today." She was sad, Cressida could see, but she was not running around screaming and throwing things, so she was not that bad today. The younger sister nodded.
"Why do you think Terrence is leaving you?" She asked. This time Carrie didn't answer. Her dark eyes gazed into the distance. Cressida realized that she would not answer, so she just kept walking beside her sister in silence.
   Carrie had always been a little... Strange. One moment she could be happy, baking cute cupcakes or writing, singing and cleaning, but the next she would be crying ad throwing things, breaking vases and plates. For some time now she had been gazing of in the distance, as if she was looking at something only meant for her eyes. Cressida was very worried for her sister, but she still hadn't told anyone.

After several minutes Cressida tried to break the silence.
"Do you remember the girl who wanted to play paintball in the forest?" she asked.
"Yes." Carrie still didn't look at her.
"They played yesterday."
"Okay." Then the conversation was over. When Carrie didn't say more she wasn't interested. The two sisters turned and started to walk back to the house again. The birds were singing their chirpy tune and the grass was newly cut grass was green.
"Look." Carrie pointed at some of the bushes. An orange tail with white fur at the tip disappeared behind the bushes.
"It's a fox," Cressida said and Carrie nodded in excitement.
"Arawn," she said. Cressida looked at her, confused.
"What?" She didn't understand what her sister was talking about. It wasn't unusual for her to say odd things, but this felt different.
"Arawn. The name of the fox." Carrie said. "He told me." She waved at the bushes, as if saying goodbye to the fox. "Farewell." Cressida looked at the bushes but there were no traces of the fox. Carrie stared at the bush for several minutes before Cressida tugged carefully on her arm.
"Let's go back inside, Carrie," she said, leading her sister back into the mansion.

The very moment Carrie sat down in front of her computer she forgot about the fox. Cressida smiled as she watched her sister's fingers dance over the keyboard. Carrie had always loved writing and now it was what she always did.
  She worked on a newspaper, writing articles, and as soon as she got home she wrote poems. Cressida had never read any of them, but she was sure that they were good. Carrie was a terrific writer.
"I'll go to my room," Cressida said as she left the living room and hurried up the huge stone stairs. She had no reason to run, except that she felt like it.

Cressida's room was huge, cream colored walls and a large bed with flower patterned sheets. Double doors lead out to a balcony. There was an expensive computer on large desk by the left wall.
   Cressida sat down by her computer and went through her mail. Because it was summer break, almost no one had mailed her. On school days her inbox was full of spam from people who wanted do make friends with her money. They asked to be friends with her fore the sole reason of making her pay for things. It was mostly some annoying girl named Jessica who spam mailed her. Cressida wasn't that good with money, but at least her father taught her that jerks was a bad things to spend it on.
  Now the only mail in her inbox was from that paintball girl, Tana. Cressida opened the mail.

Thanks

Thank you very much for letting us play in your forest. Wow it looks so weird to write that o_o
Well, we were wondering when we can play again... If you could answer soon it would be good; we need to get Jayden's gun back...
Whatever

from Tana Johnson

Cressida tried to answer the mail, but after several minutes of not getting any further than to 'hello' she just left it there. She threw herself on her fluffy bed and buried her face in her pillow. She felt lost and was more worried than ever about Carrie. There was something else too, something that felt wrong. That fox shouldn't have been there. What was it Carrie had called it, again? Arawn. It was an odd name for a fox. And Carrie, who liked to make up names for things, had never given anything such an odd name before.
"I don't know what to do," Cressida mumbled, her voice muffled by the pillow. "I really don't."