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T W O
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A rough gut twisting scream rang from my throat as I sat up. Tearing my eyes open, I gasped for breathe and examined the room around me. My whole body was layered with sweat and my heart pounded rapidly in my chest, pulsing through each and every vein that ran through my body.
Choking out a sob, I pulled my knees up to my chest and rocked myself back and forth.
The nightmares were so real I could feel them still lingering on my skin. I felt like I was still choking from the smoke filled air and crimson red blood was still running down my arms, whether it was mine or someone else's, I was unaware but it was still a haunting scene. My heart felt as if all the strings had been snipped with dull kids scissors and I couldn't describe the emotions that were trying to win control.
"Blake?" My gaze shot over to my little sister standing in the doorway, light spilling out over the carpet from underneath her closed bedroom door. "Are you okay?" She clutched her teddy bear close to her chest and waited for an answer.
"I'm sorry Emy," Wiping the tears from my cheeks, I pushed my blankets so Emersyn could have an empty spot to sit.
She walked slowly and handed me her bear as she pulled herself onto my bed. "Are you having bad dreams again? Mom told dad she hears you scream at night and I hear them too."
Not knowing what to say, I pushed a strand of blond hair behind her ear and ran my thumb over her soft cheek. "You've been crying?" Pulling my hand away, I watched my 9 year old sister break down in front of me.
"Are they about me again?" Her tears followed one after the other.
"No! I promise they aren't. Nothing is going to happen. You're safe." Gently, I wrapped my sister in my arms and held her close to me, tears of my own slipping down my cheeks.
"What are they about?" She sniffled, rubbing her nose with the corner of her sleeve.
"About...a little house on the top of a hill, like a castle. Three little boys live there, and they like to dance with flamingo's, and then their hair started to turn pink," A small smile graced my lips as my sister chuckled into my chest.
"Do the flamingo's sing too?" Her innocent question brought me a warm comfort.
"They love to sing, just like you," I tapped her nose and she giggled. She wrapped her small arms around me and tightened her embrace.
"I love you."
°•°•
Time felt as if it was going slower than usual. Walking down the halls it felt as if everyone was walking and talking in slow motion, the only thing not going slow were my unwanted thoughts and I couldn't seem to slow them down no matter what I did.
Although, the days grew easier to plaster a fake smile onto my face and even fake a laugh here and there, I still felt drained in so many ways.
My parents started getting calls from my teachers and they forced me to study. They didn't seem to care about the voices filled with worry over me, all they seemed to hear was how many sheets of blank homework I had been turning in and it gave me no time to let everything sink in or leave my mind. I hadn't had any time to myself and not even Emersyn was allowed to talk to me.
"No, so like he was going to take me out last night, but I sent him a picture of me with my mark showing and he flipped and cancelled?" Thea worked her way through an orange peel as she spoke. "Does that mean we have the same mark? Or does it not? Why are boys so confusing?!" She dropped her half peeled orange in defeat, with her elbows on the table, she grabbed her light blond hair and growled.
"Maybe he thought you were a Sleeved?" I reached over and grabbed her orange to finish peeling and felt both of my friends burning gazes.
"A what?" Kacen held his sandwich and all it's contents fell from the bottom as he stared at me with curiosity.
"A Sleeved, someone with multiple marks because they don't have a designated soulmate?" Sighing, I pulled at the orange peel and handed the bare fruit back to Thea.
She let out a fake laugh. "What is it with you and mark conspiracies?" She pulled apart her orange and ate one of the slices.
"It would make sense," Kacen was rebuilding his sandwich and not really paying attention at this point.
"First of all, it's not a conspiracy. I have met a Sleeved, he married a girl who had a part of his mark on her thigh," I informed.
"Who's to say they weren't Connected? Or that he didn't have tattoos as well? Huh?" Thea quirked her eyebrow.
"Because he was with someone else before her who had a matching mark, one of them on him at least. Tattoos are illegal, besides who can match it so perfectly for someone he hadn't even met?"
"Just because something is illegal does not mean people don't do it! Besides, even if sleeves, or whatever are real, my mark matches down my whole arm?" She ate more of her orange slices and watched Kacen curse into his bread.
She wasn't wrong, her mark was practically one line that moved around and formed different shapes, it was also dark, which wasn't uncommon. Her mother often described it as waves crashing together against the oceans surface. I always loved her large mark contrasted to her button nose, green eyes and freckles. She was beautiful, and her mark was as well.
"Give me that," Thea pulled Kacen's bread from his hands and slapped all his ingredients inside making me laugh.
While the two of them fought over how to properly make a sandwich, I glanced down to my bag. I had made it about one chapter and so far it gave me nothing but empty words, right before I got to something new my mother stormed in my room and yelled at me for not studying.
I reached over to my bag and pulled out a book. It was quickly yanked from my hand by Kacen.
"Hey! Give it back!" My mind thought up so many things seeing him study the cover.
"The Corn Conspiracy? You seriously checked it out? Again?" He laughed at me and Thea grabbed it from his hand to see for herself. I let out a breath I didn't know I had been holding.
"What is this? The seventh time you got this book? One more time and I will have it memorized," She tossed the book back to me and gave Kacen a knowing look.
"Are you judging me?!" I faked a shriek and threw my hand across my chest. "That hurts!"
"Oh come on, where's the other one?" Thea looked bored with her head propped on her hand.
"Well-" Before I could finish, Kacen jumped up and grabbed my backpack, he dug through it quickly. "Stop! Give it back!" Grabbing onto the strap, I yanked it from his grasp.
"You seriously only got this one? What is wrong with you?" He laughed and Thea joined him.
"Hey! At least I didn't get a whole book about popsicle stick buildings!"
"She's gotta valid point there," Thea chuckled and took a sip from her juice box.
"In my defense, I thought my brother would like it!" Kacen defended with a slump of his shoulders. He sat back down and lifted his sandwich.
"Your brother is twenty three," Thea smirked.
After lunch I went straight to my locker and searched it for the book about marks. "Oh please don't tell me I lost it," Scavenging my filled locker didn't seem to help as I was left empty handed, the floor covered in crumpled papers and some empty water bottles from my failed mission. Grabbing the trash, I shoved it all back into my locker. How can something get so dirty and full if I hardly even use it?
All through class my heart raced as I thought about the book. What if I left it on the table at home? What if it fell out of my backpack?
What if my parents found it?
°•°•
Closing the front door, I started towards my bedroom.
"Hey sweetie!" Dad smiled when he saw me. He was covered in flour and the smell of cinnamon swam through the air. "The cinnamon rolls will be done-" The timer beeped and interrupted him but he didn't mind. Pulling on the oven mitts, he pulled beautiful cinnamon rolls from the oven and set them on the stove to cool.
Dad had always loved baking, but recently it was almost an obsession since he wasn't working much. He was making me think I wasn't the only one needing a distraction.
"Oh, new recipe?" Pushing my want to go find the book out of my head, I took a seat at the island that sat in the middle of the kitchen.
"Yes!" He pulled off the mitts and came around to kiss me on the forehead. "Your mom and I decided to start trying new things and since I have never made these type of rolls I decided to try," He looked proud as he took the cinnamon rolls off the pan. "How was school?"
"Oh, It was okay," Thinking about it, I don't even remember what the topics were today.
"Your teacher called me, said your grades are still dropping?" After setting a roll on to a plate he turned to look at me.
"What-"
"Blake, if you don't start getting your grades back up and get back into focus before -"
Trying not to roll my eyes to the back of my head, I just smiled as If I was hearing something new. "Dad, I got it. My grades are fine I just need to retake the tests and-"
"Really? That's interesting, because that is not what your teachers are still telling me. You know if you don't start working on your schoolwork you will be grounded and wont be able to-"
"I'm going to go study!" My words were almost growls. Pulling my bag higher onto my shoulder, I hastily made it to my room, slamming the door behind me.
Throwing my backpack onto my bed I dragged my palms down my face. The memory of the book came to mind and I quickly searched for it. Digging through all my drawers and all the garbage on my desk, I found it sitting on my bed, peaking out from under my pillow.
Sighing in relief, I fell backwards onto my bed and held the book to my chest. Hearing the front door close, I sat up quickly and shoved the book under the pillow. It slipped and fell behind the bed with a loud thud. Before I could retrieve it, my sister raced into my room.
"Blakely!" She was leaping in excitement as she ran into my arms and let out a fit of giggles. I waited for her to tell me what happened.
Mom walked down the hall and into the room with anger written across her facial features. "Emersyn! Your sister has to study, she doesn't have time for you right now," She yanked my sister from me and pulled her from the room.
"Katie invited me to her birthday party and I finally passed my math test!" She had a huge smile on her face when mom pushed her into her bedroom.
"I told you that you could do it! Proud of you!" I called back, getting a long hard glare from my mother in return.
"Study," My mom grabbed onto my doorknob and slammed my door closed.
Rolling my eyes, I walked over to my bed and fell back onto it. If only mom knew how long I was helping Emersyn get ready for that test. She had been terrified because she didn't understand it and mom always refused to help her, because and I quote, "You should pay attention in school and stop slacking off!"
I didn't need to study my work like most people did, it usually came to me and was explained so simply in my head. I never had a problem with my work, but when ever I did happen to fall even a little, I was treated like I didn't even try at all. Although, even though I didn't need to study, I was always forced to do so anyways.
Being exhausted by reading the history sheets twenty times over, I stuck my hand in-between the wall and my bed and found my book, a small smile gracing my lips.
I finally had real time to read, and I was excited for all the words written between the pages.
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Thank you for reading! I hope you guys are enjoying this story, I definitely am loving writing it. If you want, you can give it a vote! If not, that's okay!
Hope you all have a great day!
Next chapter will be up on Thursday, that's the plan anyways.
~ skelocookie