Sometimes You Need To Let Down Your Hair

Chapter 26

       I took a seat in the front of the bus and started thinking about how crazy my life had become. Nothing would ever be the same again. There was so much I had to do now that would be really difficult. First I needed to make it back to my house, although I suppose it wasn't really my house because the person I thought was my mother wasn't. Anyway, I needed to somehow get the police to believe me although I feel like Lucas could help me with that. He did say his dad was a cop. Then I needed to find my actual parents.

       I wondered what they were like. I hoped they were nice and let me have friends and stuff. I wish they would automatically accept me, but I was scared. They probably thought that they'd never see me again, so what would happen when they did see me? What if they didn't want me? What if they had already moved on and decided that I wasn't worth it? No. I shook my head to clear the thoughts and instead looked out the window at the city. 

       Before long my eyes felt heavy, and I fell asleep. I had a nightmare, which isn't really much of a surprise. I was running from the happy couple who I realized were my parents. I tried to stop, but my feet kept moving. Then I was in the back of a car crying. Tears streamed down my face and Gothel kept repeating for me to be calm. Time sped forward and all a sudden I was in my old room. Gothel and I were yelling at each other, and the next thing I knew I fell down. When i sat up I was in my kitchen looking down the barrel of a gun. It moved up and I saw it being pointed at Lucas. Gothel pulled the trigger. I ran as fast as I could to get away, but I heard her mocking voice follow me everywhere I went. "You shouldn't have ran Willow."

       I stopped running and found myself in front of a nice little house with a red door. For some reason I thought it was where my parents were. I walked inside the house expecting to find them, but instead I found Gothel. "You shouldn't have ran Willow," she whispered. I started backing up and noticed that behind Gothel there were two bodies on the floor lying in a puddle of blood. I raised my hands up to my mouth and took another step back. Gothel ran toward me so I turned around and ran again, but I ended up running into someone. I looked up to see Lucas and my parents. They whispered, "You shouldn't have ran Willow." I turned around and Gothel stood there with a gun pointed at me. bang!

       I sat up in my seat and gasped. I looked for the gun and realized it was all a bad dream. The noise had actually come from the bus doors. Someone boarded the bus and a few people got off. I looked around me. There were only five people left on the bus. I wondered when the driver would be able to take me to my destination. maybe she would when everyone was dropped off. My stomach growled so I dug into my bag to grab some snacks.   I selected a bottle of water and a pop-tart.

       When I finished I was still a little hungry, but I wanted to save the rest of my snacks for later. I stuffed the trash in the pocket of my jeans and leaned back against my chair. To pass the time I talked to the people around me. Most just talked about trivial things like the weather, but a few asked questions that made me a little uncomfortable. They asked things like "Where are your parents," and "why aren't you getting off?" I was lucky though. For some reason when people asked questions like that the bus driver told them to stop bothering me.

       When the last person was off the bus the driver turned to look at me. "Hon, it's around 2:00 pm so when we get there it will be dark. Do you have someone waiting on you? i don't feel comfortable leaving a teenager alone in a strange city after dark."

       I smiled sweetly and lied through my teeth, "Of course I do. I'm going to a visit a friend, so all I need to do is walk to their house."

       She shook her head and said, "What's the address, I can just drive you to your friend's house?"

       I scrunched up my nose and realized that I didn't even know the address! The whole time I stayed there, I never thought to see what the address was. Sure, I hadn't needed to, it wasn't like Gothel would've been okay with me going anywhere, but I should've looked. "I forgot what the address is, but I know where it is. I can make it there. Could you just drop me off close to that cute little diner in town?"

      "There are more than one cute little diners. Which one are you talking about?"

       I quickly explained what it looked like and she acted like she knew where it was. We didn't talk anymore, so the ride there was rather lonely. I didn't mind though. I watched the landscape flit past my window in a blur. It was cool to watch. The bus driver wasn't kidding when she said it would be dark when I got there. It was kind of unnerving. When the driver stopped I thanked her a lot and she just nodded. As I left she told me to wait. I turned around and she handed me the money I gave her earlier. "Look kid, I don't know why you ran but your gonna need this money more than I will. I was in your shoes when I was sixteen. Probably for different reasons, but anyway I know what it takes to get through it. People showed kindness to me, so I'm paying it forward. Take your money and take care of yourself hon."

       I smiled at the lady and told her thank you one last time before I got off the bus. As soon as I got off the bus she left. I looked at the diner and was relieved to see that it was the right one. it would've been awful if I had gotten dropped off somewhere else and been forced to wander around this place trying to find out where I was. My stomach grumbled, so I decided to go ahead and get something to eat in the restaurant because I had already eaten all of my snacks on the bus and now I had some more money to spend. 

       I yawned and blinked my eyes sleepily before trudging into the restaurant. I looked around for a seat and something caught my attention out of the corner of my eye. Someone sitting in a booth had dropped some papers on the floor. They scattered everywhere, so I decided to help pick them up. I grabbed a few off the floor and looked at what they said. i wasn't trying to be nosy, but I was curious.

       On the paper was a picture of me with the words "have you seen this girl?" written across the top. Then it gave information about me like my name, age, appearance, and the last place I was seen. I was shocked to say the least. I looked up from the paper and saw the person they belonged to. He stared at me, then the papers, then back at me before giving me a wide grin. We both dropped the papers in our hands and he enveloped me in a giant hug. After a few moments he pulled away and whispered, "I'm so glad your okay," before planting a kiss on my cheek.