Blank Canvas

Chapter 5 - The Meadow of Memories

Chapter 5 - The Meadow of Memories

After doing my business, I rushed back to my room, which I successfully found, by some miracle, and pulled out my paints and pallet. I also started to look for my iPod, my gift from my sister soon after we had lost our parents. She said that I could use it to drown out the world if I needed to, or to remind me of the good in the world. It was the best gift she could have given me, and I always used it when doing art.

After a fair amount of rummaging through boxes the police had packed for me, with no success, I remembered that it was in my pocket.... That was such a typical me thing to do... I always forgot where I put stuff.

Carefully putting the earplugs in, I mixed a striking green, picked up a brush, and started my work.

******

Just over 4 hours later, I added the last stroke to the last flower, before putting down my brush and pallet and stepping back to admire the new walls. The flowers jumped out, looking so realistic that I could almost smell them, and fluffy clouds floated gently at the top, small patches within the brilliantly blue sky. I sighed happily at the sight of it. I loved it. It brought back my happy memories, not the painful ones I had become so used to recently.

Quickly clearing up the small mess I had made with my paints, I started to arrange the rest of my stuff, being careful of the wetter parts of the painting, assembling my bed and desk that the policemen had taken apart, putting my clothes in the wardrobe and putting up my photos and ornaments on the shelves. I didn't have much, but any familiar objects meant a lot to me in this foreign place.

When I was completely finished, I sat down on my bed.

Now I wasn't doing anything to distract myself, my mind started to wander, and I started to think about my sister.

She was so strong... She would have kept me together in this situation. I knew exactly what she'd do - she'd make me stand up tall, ruffle my hair a little, and whisper in my ear, "only you can stop yourself from acing today." Then she'd pat me on the back, and smile at me as I walked out to face each day.

I quickly wiped the tear trickling down my cheek away, and got up. I wasn't going to left anymore tears fall now. This home was a new start, a chance to leave the bad memories of the past year behind and only revel in the good ones, and I was going to make the most of this new life I had been given. That's what my sister would want me to do.

With a decisive nod, I walked over to the door and left my room. This was a new start. From now. After all, life had to go on. Lydia wouldn't have wanted me to cry over her. I stopped outside the door, looking at it carefully. Then I shut it and walked away. That may seem perfectly normal to you, but to me, that meant a lot. That was me shutting a door on my old life and moving on.

******

Starting off down the corridors, I very soon got rather lost. There was no difference in the doors, and there were so many of them! The house hasn't seemed this big from the outside...

After 5 minutes of wandering around hopelessly, I turned a corner and nearly crashed into Chloe, the small 6 year old who had greeted me first.

"Sylvieeeeee!" She said happily. "I was wondering where you were, I haven't seen you in hours, and you weren't in the den or the lounge!" As she looked up at me, her face suddenly filled with concern. "Are you alright?" I couldn't help but smile at the little girl.

"I was just sorting my room, nothing too interesting, and I'm fine, thanks, just a bit lost." I was hardly going to offload my burdens about my sister and making the best of this situation into her tiny little shoulders.

Chloe's face cleared. "Your room!!! I want to see it! But first, let me show you mine, and I can draw a map of the house for you - then you won't get lost, and you'll have no reason to be sad!"

With that, she grabbed my hand and bounded off round the corridors. We soon reached another of the identical doors, and she opened it quickly, before leading me in.

The whole room was covered from head to toe in pink. The walls and carpet was pink, the bed was pink with a pink fluffy drape around it, the toys on the bed were pink... I started to see pink myself after looking at all the pink for a while!

Rushing over to a little pink table in the corner, she pulled out a piece of pink 'Hello kitty' paper and a pink, fluffy pen, started to draw. I slowly walked over to her, taking in more pink details of the room as I went.

"Now, this is upstairs," she said, sticking her tongue out with concentration. "I can draw it for you, but you'll have to write the different rooms in, because my spelling is wobbly." She said this so decisively that I had to fight to not giggle at her cuteness.

Having finished her drawing, she passed the pen to me. Slowly, she went through the different rooms, with me writing down carefully what was in them, or who's bedroom it was.

When we got to the bathroom and hot guy's room, who Chloe called Anthony, I cringed inside, and madly hoped that Chloe wouldn't notice me blushing at the painful memories.

Soon I had a finished map for both floors, and I was carefully navigating back to my room with Chloe at my side, chatting away like there was no tomorrow. Having successfully found my way back, therefore being declared "The cleverest person ever" by Chloe, I let her into my room.

She took one step in, then her jaw dropped. She looked closely at the walls, before turning to look at me.

"Did you do this, Sylvieee?" I loved it when she called me that, the fact that she'd already given me her own nickname within a few hours.

"Um, yeah, I did," I said quietly looking at the floor.

"IT'S AMAZING!!!" She shouted, giggling loudly before running further in to take a closer look, then promptly trying out how springy my bed was.

I smiled at the little girl bouncing on my bed... She really was a little angel. And as I watched her, I realised that life here was going to be ok, maybe even good eventually - much better than any life I would have been living on my own for sure.

The big wide world is no place for a lonely teenager, sometimes we all have to release our inner children and have a bit of a bounce on beds!

So that's what Chloe and I did, bouncing away the afternoon, and laughing together.

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Hi everyone!

I thought I'd just point out that I have another book, which has the main characters of Emma and Ben. Ben in this book is the same Ben as in that book, so although he only has a small part in this book, do have a look at the other one for development of his character! One of the things you'll find out is that he also lived in a home when he was younger, and had obviously now progressed to be a youth worker, helping out kids who are in similar situations to his.
Also, I'm planning to write one more story in this set of 'good things in bad situations', where Sylvia will have a part :) so look out for that too!

Thanks so much for reading, and please vote and comment, it really does make my day!

Catherine xxx