Spirit World Adventures

Chapter 5 - The Spiritual Healing Centre

That night, I fell asleep with a knife in my hands. I can explain...it wasn't for my annoying brothers, I swear. It was in case the SSA came for me. For some reason, Kya still wasn't back and I didn't know what to do.

'Mom, Kya is missing.'

'Who? A girl from school?' Mom sighed, 'I'm not surprised. It can happen.'

'No, Kya is – Wait, you're not surprised by a girl going missing?' I couldn't believe how laidback she was being.

'These are hard times, things like that happen. Families and children especially in the Walled Cities are targeted by outsiders who get through the wall.'

'What's the point in the Wall if people can get through it?'

'It has many functions. Anyway, who is missing?'

'Kya, my shadow-kin. She went all funny since...well, she's not been herself and now she's gone.'

Mom looked genuinely worried. Somehow her dark brown face blanched to grey. She began frantically checking my temperature with a hard clammy hand to my forehead, pinching my cheeks and lifting my arms. I shook her off.

'What do I do?'

'Right, okay, yes, so what we will do is get you an appointment at the Spiritual Healing Clinic. It will have to be under my work's healthcare plan, otherwise it could cost a fortune. And let's just,' she looked around and lowered her voice, 'Keep this quiet, yeah? Just between you and me.'

I nodded, feeling a wash of guilt or something heavy and wrong in my stomach. We got dressed for the day and mom called work saying she would be late because she 'had to wait for a man to fix the water tank at our house' which was so funny. I had never seen her lie and she did it so badly. The harder part was lying to Aunty Thingy-Ma-Bob. She came around the corner in the hallway as we were leaving and didn't even have to say anything, but her energy was questioning.

'Oh, Tenaya needs new shoes. They are breaking her feet. She's growing so fast! So, I'm going to take the morning off from work, and she will from school, to get her...the...erm...'

'Shoes?'

'Yes, shoes!'

Aunty Thingy stared and nodded with hard eyes but she went into the kitchen so we ran out of the house as fast as we could.

From the moment we left the house, Mom gripped my hand so tightly that I was worried my fingers would break. We arrived at the train station within a ten-minute walk. Because the work and school traffic had already gone, it wasn't too busy at the station. All trains either went high above or deep underground. The ones high above were more expensive, so we went underground. People jostled and bumped into you underground, as if they were super late to everything all the time. It really annoyed me. I wanted to bite the next person who shoved me.

'Mind out the way!' barked a thick-moustached man as he pushed me and my mom.

'You mind out the way, you old rat!' I yelled, kicking my leg out at him as my mom pulled me back.

'You need to get that girl on a leash!' shouted the man, pointing at me like my very existence offended him.

'I'm so sorry, sir,' my mom said, bowing to him as if he were the Royal Prince of New Independent England.

I scoffed at her, trying to drag my hand out of hers but she had a vice-like grip.

'Can you just behave, Tenaya Walker? Stop acting like a little beast.'

Mom couldn't be reasoned with, but I naively tried. 'He was the one being rude! I was just sticking up for us.'

'He's a busy man on his way to do his day. Adults don't have time to dillydally like children do. We have responsibilities to attend to.'