See no evil - The awakening

15

I must have been 15 when my parents allowed me to go to school on my own for the first time. It was a long but easy trip. Cross the street, take the first bus to Belgrano, get there and take the second bus that would leave me 5 blocks away from school. Easy, but still kind of a milestone for someone who had never taken a bus on her own. When you live in a huge city like Buenos Aires, the things you can do as a kid are kind of restricted, it's not like the life we had on the weekends, we needed to be much more careful.

My brother Tom went to a school near to mine, but he was 3 years older than me and at that time, it was a huge difference, I remember all the things we did together as kids, but now it was different, he didn't want to spend time with his little sister, so I had to do it on my own.

I took the first bus and sat down by the window. A nice old lady sat down beside me and asked me about where I was going. –Don't talk to strangers. – We all knew that one, but this lady seemed like a lovely grandma, I was sure it was not going to hurt to talk to her for a bit.

– I haven't seen one of those in ages – she said as she looked to the window next to me. I turned my head and saw a black car. Spotless car which looked like something classic and expensive. My breath got shorter, more shallow, I knew that car, I remembered that car. I could hear the old lady talking but I couldn't really listen to what she was saying, my eyes were fixed on the car's window. They were deep black too and I couldn't see who was driving but I had the chilling feeling down my back that someone was looking back at me. We stopped at a red light and the car stopped right beside my window. I knew I shouldn't look, I knew it, but I just couldn't take my eyes away.

–Are you ok dear? – Her hand on my shoulder woke me up from the state I was in and I stood quickly. I was afraid and didn't really know why.

–I forgot something, I need to go back, sorry, thanks, bye! – I walked quickly towards the driver and asked me to let me get down, he opened the door and I rushed down the bus. I walked in front of the black car thinking to myself, asking myself not to look but I did. Over the front window I saw his face, his white, lifelike face looking at me. It was not more than a second but I think he was surprised. So I did what any normal teenager would do and I ran.

I must have ran for more than 10 blocks till I was out of air, hanging to my backpack with all my school books and things when I decided it was time to stop. I placed my hand on my knees to catch my breath and try to understand what I've just seen. Was it real? Was he real? He couldn't be, I've spent 10 years telling myself I had imagined everything and now he was there. I was sure it was all just a coincidence, a similar car, a similar man, nothing more than that. The vivid imagination of a 15 year old who wanted to be a writer and was already creating these crazy stories in her head. –Get it together Cas.

I was smart, that was my thing, you know how some people are funny, beautiful, cheerful, or whatever, I was smart. And my smart self was telling me that nobody could look exactly the same after 10 years, so it was just another man, in another car, and what happened 10 years ago was all in my mind. So I jumped on another bus and went to school.