Toast

Chapter Thirty Nine // The Truth Behind Lois Parker's Death

- Priya's POV - 

As soon as school ended me and Elizabeth headed to the train station, at this point I didn't feel extremely nervous because I had her by my side but I knew that would change later on. My day at school was filled with awkward conversations and tense vibes from my own friends, maybe I'm just paranoid about what is to come this evening..

We stood patiently on the platform with our tickets in our cold hands, Elizabeth frequently glanced up at me and gave me a reassuring smile. I felt excited to finally meet my uncle Barry, even though we did technically meet when I was little but I forget everything about him. The train finally arrived and we jumped on, it was slightly packed with school children but Elizabeth quickly found two seats for us. She let me sit at the window so I could watch out. 

Instead of staring out of the window the whole train journey I turned to Elizabeth and held her hand tightly, my anxieties disappeared when I knew she was near. I glanced across the train to see an old lady staring down at me and Elizabeth's hands, she had a look of disgust on her face. I informed Elizabeth what the lady was doing and she looked over at her too, the lady soon stopped staring and brought her attention back to the newspaper in front of her. 

"How are you feeling?" Elizabeth asked me quietly, I shrugged my shoulders as she waited for a reply. 

"I'm fine at the moment, it'll be a different story later but I expect this to be hard" I explained to her, she nodded and glanced down at our hands. 

"It's going to be okay, it'll definitely upset you at some point but you can get through it. I'm proud of you" Elizabeth reassured me with a wide smile, I thanked her and we hugged tightly before the voice over called out our stop. We both got up quickly and hurried to the doors as the train stopped. 

When we got off the train we realised we had arrived an hour early, Barry wouldn't be at the cafe until 5:30pm. Elizabeth glanced around the small train station which was in the middle of my village, I could feel my anxiety resurfacing because I hadn't been back here since I left to start school. Elizabeth had a smile on her face as looked around the vintage type station, everything in my village was like a flash back to the 60s. 

"What are we going to do for an hour?" Elizabeth asked me with a nervous expression on her face, I sighed quietly and then had an idea that would possibly make my anxiety worse. 

"Want to see something?" I asked her while grinning, she nodded and we took each others hands to exit the train station. Instead of heading into the centre of the village where all of the shops were located, we headed to the long streets where everybody lived. Elizabeth continued to be fascinated by everything that we walked passed. 

After ten minutes of wondering through quiet streets we arrived at three big houses which were all beside each other, Elizabeth stared at them in confusion before glancing at me. 

"That's my house" I told her while pointing to the house in the middle, Elizabeth instantly looked petrified. We walked closer but then decided to hide behind a car which was parked across the road from my house, it seemed silent but that's what my dad always wanted me to think when I returned home from school everyday. 

"Why are we here?!" Elizabeth whispered to me in fear, I laughed slightly before hearing a noise which made us both jump. We looked back to my house and noticed my dad had opened one of the living room windows, he was glancing out while smoking a cigarette. I stared at him and for the first time I didn't feel scared, I felt more anger than I ever had before and Elizabeth could see this. 

"Maybe we should leave Priya.." She whispered calmly to me, I glanced across to her again and shook my head. My plan was to show my dad that I was stronger and he could never raise his hand to me again but Elizabeth wouldn't let me.