Unforgivable Lacerations

Chapter Thirteen

I was awake, eyes drooping, heart pounding, and ears alert, when the tedious alarm sounded beside me, making me jump off of my bed in sudden fright at the noise. 

3:00am flashed blue from my alarm clock as I hit the button for it to shut up, sitting back on my bed and raising my arms over my head, stretching. To be awake at this unearthly time was torture, especially as these past hours I had been thinking and rethinking the phone calls, trying to recall his voice in order to check if I recognized it. 

It didn't help that I felt as though someone was outside, watching, waiting, wandering. 

It was intelligent of me to have booked the cab driver to collect me in an hour, giving me only two hours for going through security and finding the correct gate. However, on the other hand, all I wanted was to fall back on my bed, shutting my eyes and pretending I didn't have this weird feeling in my gut. 

"Ugh!" I moaned, annoyed as I reluctantly escaped the tangles of covers and sluggishly walked to the bathroom, brushing my teeth and stepping into the shower, hoping the warm water would rid my body of the stickiness of not sleeping, and wake me up. Unfortunately, the latter didn't work as I continued to feel as though an internal bomb had detonated in me. 

Afterward, I yanked a brush through my hair and towel dried it until it was damp, tying it up in a ponytail as I threw Edward's CD into my bag, along with unplugging the chargers and electronics. Checking my curtain was shut, I then dressed in a pair of jeans and top. 

I switched my bedroom lights off and went around the upstairs of the house, locking windows as I knew downstairs was all locked. I had just finished checking the upstairs windows were locked when a knock at the door made me jump and tumbling down the stairs to open it with apprehension. What happened if it wasn't the cab driver? 

Opening the front door to the darkness of night, I soon saw the man in front of me was the cab driver who was hired to drive me to Port Angeles aerodrome. Professionally, with a local accent, he asked my name and requested if he could help with my two bags, in which I gave him the bag holding my clothes as I kept my electronics and passport near me. As he was taking my bag to the trunk of the yellow cab, I ran upstairs, switching the hallway light off then racing down the stairs- hating the dark that was chasing me. I only stopped my haste so I could lock the front door, only feeling safe when I was in the cab, the door slammed shut. 

When the car started to move, finally as I was having a near panic attack thinking someone was going to run up to the car, bashing on the window and demanding I step out away from the safety of the car, I looked up at the stars, seeing the thousands that were above me aglow, taking advance of being out of the urban lights. They glistened and twinkled each saying their own story. It was then that I remembered what Dad had told me, 'Just look up at the stars and I will be there as every time you think of me, I'll be thinking of you too.'

I hoped he was okay. 

Quietly, when I arrived in Port Angeles, I paid and wished the driver a good day, rushing into the aerodrome and checking myself in just in time. 

Ignoring the people around me, since the feeling of being watched exited my system when I left Forks, I plugged my ears with my earphones and sat back into the seat as the plane started to move, listening to Rob Thomas. 

*_*_*_*_*

Once I arrived at Jacksonville, after a restless and uncomfortable nap on the plane from Seattle to Charlotte, and then Charlotte to Jacksonville, I kept my head down, wanting to exit the airport as soon as I could as I was impatient to find the house, and more importantly, to sleep. 

With lazy legs, stiff from the limited amount of movement I had made on the journies, I pulled my bag over my shoulder, and the other bag off of the conveyor belt as it passed, before rushing to the cabs outside, lined neatly as each driver waited for their customer.