Ravenswynd Legends

Chapter 2. Invitation

Invitation

That evening I had a nightmare. It was one of those dreams that just hang around forever and pop back into your mind at only the least bit of prompting. The funny thing about it was that, when I first woke up and thought about it, I knew there was a lot more to it, but I could only remember a small but blurry scene: I was petrified and cold, and my heartbeat was wild and furious. It was dark, and everything looked fuzzy. Two men were in the midst of a ferocious fight. I heard the crackling slug of knuckles colliding on a jaw, and seconds later I saw a body being flung across the room and landing with a bone-crushing thud. Vehement shouting came next, but the exact words were muffled and unclear. And then I saw feet running up a flight of stairs, one set chasing the other. The man in pursuit had long black hair. Nothing else in this dream seemed familiar or real. The fear I felt was paralyzing, and one thing stood out that was indisputable: the smell of blood was all around me.

***

A few weeks went by and I couldn't stop thinking about the man in the mall and several times a day, I recalled the dream. I recognized my fascination with the man, but for the life of me, I couldn't figure out why this particular dream chose to haunt me. I could not make any sense of it. Not much seemed to make sense in my world anyway.

My twin, Melinda and I had spent most of our lives isolated. All we ever had was one another. When we were three years old our parents died in a plane crash and because neither had any siblings or any other living relatives, the state placed us in an orphanage. Two years later we were placed in a foster home together. Melinda says she has no memory of our parents at all. The only memory I have of my mother is when I was sick with a fever, and she held me in her arms all night long as I fell in and out of consciousness. I believe the memory stayed with me because every time I opened my eyes I saw the frightened look on her face. And any time I've ever been sick since that day, I've been haunted by her fearful look.

The little we knew about our parents came in bits and pieces through the years from our foster mother. She had told us they were originally from Peace Dale, Rhode Island, and they moved to Providence just after their marriage. The few pictures we had of them revealed how much we resembled our mother, especially around the eyes. I would like to believe our foster parents took both of us in after falling in love with our cute little heart-shaped faces and dark, sapphire-blue eyes. But the reality of it is more likely due to the fact that we refused to be separated. If and when anyone ever tried, our blood curdling screams caused them to re-think their actions immediately.

Even our teachers learned their lessons quite fast. One time in grade school, the teacher tried to make my sister sit on the other side of the room, farther away from me. It only took five minutes of stereophonic, high-pitched screaming for that teacher to change her mind. It didn't matter how much reasoning was used: we never gave up; we would not be separated - period.

It wasn't until our senior year in high school that we attempted to become two separate individuals. We determined together that eventually we might want to go on a date alone, possibly even kiss a boy, and we were sure none of the boys at our school would feel the inclination to ask the two of us out together. So it was then, in our last year of high school we told our guidance counselor that we both wanted to try taking a few separate classes. Melinda took the initiative to enter his office alone and told him about our decision. He just about fell off of his chair, and of course, he had to check with me first before he could change anything. By the look on his face when I entered his office, sans my sister, he was almost positive Lindy had just changed her clothes and re-entered.

He put his pen down; a puzzled look wrinkled his face, and said, "Melinda?"

After extensive persuasion, he finally believed I was indeed Elizabeth, and not my twin. We had decided we would try two separate classes: English and History. These two subjects being our easiest, we could study and do our homework alone, finally not relying on one another for help.