Chapter Six- Each Lonely Life
Brooke woke in a strange, yet familiar bedroom. One filled with books and dirty clothes littered around the entirety of the room. The walls were a maroon color with a white crown molding. Posters of bands she listened to quite frequently were plastered loosely on the walls, the pins holding them together slowly inching away from the walls hold.
A desk with textbooks of all sorts were sprawled all over it's dark wood. Even a computer was dangling close to the edge, about to fall over and land in the trash can which was filled with crumpled pieces of paper.
She narrowed her eyes at a picture frame on top of the desk, the only straight thing on the messy room. The vicinity around the frame was spotless. Not a single piece of dust noticed.
Brooke gently trudged over to the frame on the far corner of the room and held it in her hands. The picture inside of it brought tears to her striking green eyes. Her cold fingers nipped at the picture inside of the black and white frame. Brooke read the four words that struck a cord through her heart.
I love you.
-Adam
In the picture, Adam had Brooke in his arms. A gentle, passionate smile fell on his perfect features. His short, auburn hair looked as if he has just woken up. In fact, he had just woken up and was rushed out of his room by Brooke before he had the chance to fix his hair.
Even her own blonde hair was put up in a messy ponytail. She remembered the event that happened two weeks ago clearly.
She was so caught in the moment that she hadn't even seen the flash.
"Brooke?" A voice called from below her.
She put the picture back into place. "Coming!" She responded, playing with her blonde locks until she felt confident to go downstairs.
As she walked down the staircase, a figure appeared beside her. "It took you long enough," he whispered to her, his minty breath tickling her skin.
She giggled. "I had to make sure I looked presentable enough to your parents. I don't want to embarrass myself. I've done enough of that with you around."
Adam smirked behind her, his cobalt eyes glittering in mischief. "My parents love you, there's no need to be embarrassed in front of them."
"Liar," she scoffed. "Can't you see how much they hate me? They'd rather you be engaged to Brittany than this low life." She pointed to herself.
He growled lowly and a scowl replaced his facial structure. "You're not a low life." The scowl disappeared as he looked into her forest green eyes lovingly. She hadn't even noticed that they stopped in the middle of the staircase. "My mother and father are just too stupid to see what a wonderful person you are."
Tears struck Brooke's eyes. Adam lightly pecked her on the nose and took his large, comforting hands on her artistic ones. He brought them to his heart. "You feel this?"
She nodded.
"That's my heart pumping. It's pumping for you and no one else," he finished, taking her hands away from his and embracing her in a hug.
She nodded a once more against his buff shoulder, tears threatening to dampen his shirt. But Brooke refused and parted. She took in a breath and slipped her hand into his.
Everything then started to feel wrong. Shapes changed form, peoples facial features shifted into something diabolical.
Then, a push sent Brooke fumbling down the stairs.
Brooke woke up with a scream. Sweat lingered on her temple and fresh tears stuck to her now pale cheeks.
Aveline quickly scuttled to Brooke. "Are you okay?" She questioned, her irises scanning over Brooke's fearful ones.
The blonde's breaths were labored; her penetrating green eyes frantically scanning the area. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just a small scare," she answered distractedly.
"Didn't sound very small," she retorted somewhat snarkily in Brooke's opinion. "Take slow breaths," Aveline eventually advised.
Brooke followed Aveline's instructions until she had enough oxygen in her lungs to satisfy herself. "It really was. I just scare easily," Brooke lied, her voice hoarse from the scream.
Deep footsteps barged into the room just as she finished her sentence and rushed down the stairs. "What happened?" A males voice asked in front of them. Brooke looked down at her shaky hands.
"What happened?" Jett's voice echoed through the musty basement.
Brooke kept her head down as she spoke. Anyone listening would have to strain their ears to hear each word she said. "It was nothing. Just a rat," she answered swiftly, ignoring the looks Aveline was giving her.
"We're okay," Aveline replied shakily.
Jett looked between the two skeptically before nodding and heading up the stairs. They creaked under his thunderous step.
The brunette let a whoosh of breath escape her lips. "I'm surprised he even cared." Aveline's voice was full on confused and the expression on her face matched it.
"Yeah," Brooke mumbled, drawing patterns against the cold cement floor. She arched her back in a stretch. Carefully, she placed her back against the floor and rested her hands on her stomach, eyes looking up into the empty ceiling.
"Seriously, though. Are you okay?" Aveline repeated her question from before.
"Yeah, I'm fine," Brooke growled defensifely, snapping her head to Aveline with a scowl before returning to her previous position.
"Mkay, sorry," Aveline grumbled. Brooke peeked a look to see Aveline looking down on her feet, a sad expression painted on her face.
Brooke sighed, her tone guilty. "No, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have snapped when you don't know anything."
Aveline smiled softly at the girl with the broken heart. Brooke felt a pang of guilt rush through her again. "It's okay. I shouldn't have kept bothering you. Sorry about that."
"You're just curious. It's alright," she replied. She hesitated. "I've just had a really bad background."
The blue eyed beauty nodded her head. "I know someone kinda like that," she replied. "Besides, I'm a bit to curious. That's part of the reason I ended up here."
Brooke snorted unintentionally and blurted out a snarky remark. "I'm not surprised. How about we make a compromise? I'll tell you a little about my life and you tell me a little about yours?" She bit her lip nervously.
The other girl nodded again. "Fair enough. My life is pretty lame, though," she retorted with a slightly bittersweet laugh.
"Mine is..." She trailed not knowing the exact word to use for her life situation. "I don't really know what it is." Brooke decided to say.
Aveline smiled at Brooke. "Do you want me to go first?"
"Sure. Why not?" Brooke responded.
"Okay," Aveline said, taking a deep breath. "Back home, I was that quiet one who didn't really talk to anyone. I liked reading a lot, which was typical. I have one friend, his name is Dorian. He was pretty outgoing. After all, his home life was pretty rough. My parents are very...determined. They want me to become a lawyer. It's all they ever talk about. This is going to sound stupid, but it aggravates me how they never asked about my day, or how I was doing.
"Dorian suggested that I try running. It was supposed to relieve stress. I really got into it. I would run everyday after school. But, on the day I was kidnapped, I had had a really crappy day. I was practically the school laughing stock. Then my parents started up again when I got home. I went running as soon as they were finished.
"I eventually got to the bad part of town. But I didn't stop and turn around. I was curious about where my feet would take me. Soon enough, I was lost. Then a car pulled up, and they took me. Staying here hasn't been very great."
Brooke looked at her, laughter bubbling at the back of her throat. She suppressed it eagerly to hide the fact that she thought her capture was funny.
"Well, you'll have to tell me about this Dorian character sometime seeing as we might be here awhile," Brooke mentioned, a sly smile fell on her lips for a few seconds. It disappeared soon after.
She wrung her hands together. Her heart was racing to the point where Brooke believed the whole household could hear it. She rubbed the palm that wasn't bandanged against her pants. "So, it's my turn. Okay, I got this."
Brooke gathered her breath like Aveline did moments before. "It all started when I was-". A screen moved in the corner.
"Can I get rid of that?" Brooke asked pointing to the camera.
"Go ahead," she replied. "And let me know when you want to hear about Dorian. It's not like there is anything better to do."
She nodded silently. Brooke jumped from the floor and walked to the camera which followed her every move.
Her lips fell to a smirk as she stood on the tips of her toes to remove the camera from it's holster. Juggling it from hand to hand, Brooke thought of the nightmares from the two nights prior.
She looked back at Aveline's calculating gaze. Turning back around, she brought her bandaged hand in front of the lens and bluntly flicked it off before smashing it against the ground.
Wiping her hands, she basically skipped to Aveline with a new aura of confidence.
Aveline chuckled. "That was pretty dramatic."
"Yeah, well, they need to know I'm not going down without a fight," Brooke shrugged, sitting down with her bare feet crossed. She clapped her hands. "Anyway, I have a story to tell."
Brooke saw Aveline nodded her head. Again. "Okay. You really don't have to if you don't want to. But if you do, I'll listen," she said with a smile.
The blonde rubbed her hands together. The nauseating pain from her head was long gone, making it easier to tell her past.
"Well, it started when I turned eleven I believe. I lived with my mom. My dad left her the day before I was born." The dizzying memories were dumped in the far corner of her of her mind. She put them in there of hopes of forgetting them but now they are all making themselves known.
"Anyway, on my eleventh birthday she sent me away to a foster home because she believed I would be better off. In reality, she hated me because I look like my dad. But I went anyway because I would have been abused if I didn't. I couldn't see that.
"Everything went fine until my sixteenth birthday. The days that followed were the worst of my life. There was a boy named Jimmy and he was my baby. I loved him, cherished him. His death was my fault. I wasn't there when he was in a coma or when the vase fell on his head. I couldn't even attend the funeral."
Tears blurred Brooke's vision. "I'm sorry, just give me a moment."
Aveline crawled to Brooke and embraced her in a sisterly embrace. "It's okay. I get it. I can't believe there's more. No one deserves to go through that."
Brooke returned the gesture with a small laugh and a sniffle. She wiped her tears away with the back of her long sleeve shirt. It was now dirty from being dragged against dirt and now smudged makeup.
"Thank you. But anyway, a few years passed. At the age of seventeen, I think, I met a guy. His name was Adam. We had the classical romance going on. I was just about to turn nineteen when he engaged. As a young teenager blinded by love, I said yes. We weren't going to have the marriage anytime soon, we just wanted to know we belonged to each other.
"For my nineteenth birthday present he cheated on me and shoved the ring in some other girls finger." She stuttered at the end. "I ran and now I'm here." Brooke finished, eyes glossy with unshed tears.
Aveline gasped. "I would have beat him up on the spot. And I'm not very violent. Wow. I'm so fudging sorry," she whispered, tightening her grip on Brooke as if she were about to fall apart.
"Yeah, well, that's my tragic backstory," Brooke snorted letting out a short bitter laugh.
"You know, if you cried, I wouldn't judge," Aveline said quietly.
"No, don't worry about that. I've done too much of that." Brooke's voice was barely above a whisper.
Aveline agreed silently. "Okay. I'm here if you need to talk, though. No matter how cliché and stupid it sounds."
Brooke nodded uncomfortably. The idea that someone caring for her sent chills through her body. She shook her head nonetheless and smiled back at Aveline.
I can trust her, Brooke chanted.
In the corner of Brooke's vision, Aveline moved to shuffle her back against the wall. Brooke didn't want or like the silence.
"I got something from-" she was cut off when the sound of the keys rattled against the door. Brooke froze and slowly stood up.
"Jett wants you guys now. It's time for your meal," a raspy voice called, not even daring to take foot to where the girls were.
Brooke looked back at Aveline's shrunken form. With a nod, she replied, "We're coming."
Aveline followed behind, a blush crawling on her cheeks.
The short blonde with the broken green eyes cautiously took the first few steps to do the stairs. She gulped as flashbacks flooded her mind. Visions popped back and forth through her mind.
She shook her head and looked up the stairs to the man with the bruised face. A laugh tickled at her throat.
Aveline followed Brooke's every move.
"Dude, what happened to your face?" Brooke asked the man at the top of the stairs.
He growled in response. Opening up the door a little bit more, the man waited for the two to walk up the stairs.
Brooke grumbled but obeyed anyway.
The two walked in a small line as they were escorted to the dining room table. Everyone stood clear of the two as they sat down.
As last time, the men came and gave them their meals. Brooke pushed hers away again and rested her chin against her hands. She blew her side bang out of her face temporarily.
A shriek thundered through the house. Brooke opened her eyes, unaware that she closed them. "What? What happened?" She asked almost instantly going on high alert.
"Spider," Aveline mumbled, biting her lip. "Sorry."
"Oh, it's alright," Brooke replied. Suddenly, she thought of something. Her eyes lit up and a mischievous smile appeared on her face.
"I have an idea," she blurted out loudly. Brooke looked around. No one had heard.
Good. They won't even see what's coming, Brooke pondered evilly.
****
Hey guys! So I bet everyone is a little bit curious to what Brooke is thinking about, huh? Just remember that she's used to getting in trouble so this should be fun.
As for Jett, he has someone very special to meet. But I won't say anything.
Like I always say, hope you enjoyed the chapter and be prepared for another Jett chapter soon. It should be good.
Comment.
Vote.
All of that stuff. And always, keep reading!
~Morgan