No Happily Ever After

Chapter 26

JenniferTide came from a family comprised of a busy, widower father, hisbeloved mother who lived with them, and five older sisters. Theirdad was a powerful man who was rarely home as he worked, and traveledfor work almost all the time. His mother had moved in years backwhen their own mother had passed away. And four of her sisters weregrown and out of the house, leaving only she and her sister Adrianbehind.

The family of womenwas one of traditions, strange though they may be. Grandmother'srule was that each girl must wait until age fifteen to start dating.At age fifteen, Grandmother gave the birds and the bees talk to eachgirl, and then took her to pierce her ears before bestowing upon hermuch more freedom to explore the world. Jennifer hadn't been crazyabout the ear piercing idea, but it was just a thing that they alldid. Like some sort of symbolic rite of passage.

Jennifer had lovedEric Prince long before turning fifteen. She'd had grandiose visionsof a new world with him upon her fifteenth birthday. But the day hadcome and gone, and she remained just as invisible to him as always. She did absolutely everything she could to make him aware of heraffections, to no avail. His girlfriend, Stella, was undoubtedly anice girl and Jennifer certainly didn't want to be known as aboyfriend thief, or to hurt Stella's feelings. But she felt thatEric would soon realize they were meant to be and that Stella wouldunderstand.

However, yearfifteen came and went and by the time Jennifer turned sixteen, shewas despondent over being ignored and passed over by Eric.

When she discussedthe matter with her older sisters, they had a wide variety of advicethat ranged from decent, to really really bad.

Adrian's advice wasto just grow up and date somebody else.

"Just beyourself, love," said her sister Amanda.

"Why don't yousleep with him?" her sister Maggie had advised.

"How 'bout youspread rumors about that girl he goes with?" said her sisterTammy.

"Just botherhim until he notices you!" her sister Elizabeth recommended.

Sometimes theadvice and observations of her sisters made her wonder what sort ofpeople she was related to.

In the end, therewasn't really anything that Jennifer could do to win Eric'saffections. He was devoted to his girlfriend Stella, and seemed notto notice Jennifer was even on the planet. So, Jennifer pined awaygrowing progressively more down and depressed over time.

Which is why, whenshe found out that Eric and Stella were missing, she completely cameundone.

***

Jennifer's familydidn't send her back to school when classes resumed in the daysfollowing the murder of the Rampion's and the subsequentdisappearance of two more Faraway teens. For one thing, hergrandmother was terrified to send her out of the house. And, thepoor girl was absolutely despondent.

She was so upsetthat her father stayed home from work, and all her sisters returnedhome to try and give her comfort. Everybody had comforting things tosay, but Jennifer could not be consoled. In truth, the familyworried in whispers that she could not be left alone for fear ofsuicide. They'd had no idea how deep her feelings for Eric reallywere.

On day two of theTide family's bedside vigil, her grandmother entered her bedroomclutching an envelope.

"Look,Jennifer," grandmother said cheerily. "A letter's come foryou! Would you like to read it?"

Jennifer answeredby rolling over in bed and ignoring her.

Grandmother took aseat on the bed next to her and put her hands on Jennifer's shoulder. She gently pulled her granddaughter back to face her. "Please,darling," Grandmother whispered. "Just read it. It maymake you feel better!" Jennifer continued to be unresponsive. "Please," Grandmother said again, tears pooling in hereyes. "Come back to us, Jennifer."

Her grandmother'sworry and sadness finally broke through Jennifer's cloud ofdepression. She took the envelope and studied it for a moment. Itwas addressed to her, without any return address. Her curiosity waspiqued. For the first time in several days, Jennifer recalled thatshe was alive. She tore open the envelope and withdrew a singlesheet of lined notebook paper.

***Dear Jennifer,

Once you said that you'd be my friend if I needed you to. Well, I need you now. And you need me too. I think that I know where the missing people are, including Eric. But nobody believes me. Please come and see me.

Yours TRULY,

Zoe Locke***

Jennifer gasped,and after reading the short note, she met her grandmother's eyes.

"What is it,dear?" Grandmother asked.

"My friend,Zoe. I need to go see her," Jennifer answered, throwing backher covers and lurching out of bed.