Vital - Book 1 (On hold: to be rewritten)

1. Shadows

She shouldered her way through the crowds of people on their way to work, shouting into phones and clutching briefcases. In the park, she wondered down the path, eating her sandwich and listening to the music blaring into her ears. She marvelled at the way music was so capable of drowning out things she didn't want to hear. 

There was always the occasional child who seemed to be able to see everything, however hard she tried to disguise herself. This time, it was a little ginger girl with more freckles than skin. She pointed a chubby amr at Wren. 

“Look, mummy! It’s that girl again!”

Wren silently cursed herself for not turning up her music more. But some things just have to be heard. Wren thought vaguely of a quote in one of her favourite books, The Fault in Our Stars, by John Green. ‘That’s the thing about pain. It demands to be felt.’

“Lily!” The mother of the girl pulled her daughter by the arm, away from Wren’s path. She kept looking back at her over her shoulder while gripping her child’s wrist, eyes wide with fear. Wren sighed and kicked a pebble along the path a bit. She was suddenly glad of her long hair that masked her green eyes. Everyone associated those eyes with her now. Who else had eyes like hers; green, almost like grass mixed in with a sea-like blue, with a ring of brown around her iris. From the days when she used to go to school, all the other kids called her 'creepy eyes' along with the ususal nervous taunts that were thrown at her.

She decided eventually that she was bored of the park, and turned off at the next gate. She had money in her pocket, so she decided to stop by the book shop. She needed the final book of John Green’s anyway. 

That was the second thing that kept out what she didn't need to hear. With books, Wren could just fall into a new world and make a home inside it, often finishing a book in one sitting because she didn't want to come back to reality. Books were the only thing that kept her sane; the only thing in that was always there in a world where people avoided you, and feared you, kept their children away from you. 

A tiger in a zoo. 

The Waterstones on Regent Street was heaving. Wren skirted the crowds, making for the Classics section. The books were lined in uniform rows, shelf upon self of them, reaching up to the ceiling. She reached around a bunch of chattering twelve-year-old girls and grabbed Looking for Alaska off the shelf. Wren winced as she brushed the book against a girl’s shoulder. The girl whirled around before Wren could retreat. She wanted desperately to engage her powers; if she wanted to she could’ve escaped the bookshop in one 10 metre leap, but then everyone would notice her. 

If she concestrated hard enough, Wren could hear the thoughts that raced through the girl's head, not that she wanted to.

“Aren’t you-?” The girl began, but Wren had turned and left, loosing herself in the crowds. 

_______________________________________________________________________

One Hundred and Thirty Six Days Before

The week before I left my my family and Florida and the rest of my minor life to go to boarding school in Alabama, my mother insisted on throwing me a going away party…

Wren closed the book, placing it on her beside table. She was too tired to read tonight. But yet she was dreading falling asleep. For tonight, like every other night, she’d have her dream…