The Wild Ride

Chapter 5

It was already December and there was no site of Jackson. The snow was already covering the the trees and grass. The animals were no longer seen for they were in hibernation. Anna started to get worry, she hasn't seen Jackson since a week after Fall break so about 2 months. She now has nightmares about what happened to Jackson, and she stays away from Nick as much as possible. When the phone rings now she's always the first one to answer it. "Hello is this Jackson!" she says every time she answers; but it's never him.

Her grandma has been worried about her including Anna's new favorite teacher Mr. Bonn. In art class she has been doing sloppy and she doesn't even try any more but he gives her test to get her grades up, and she always gets A's on them, but the class is about creating your own design not do hundreds of test. In all of her other classes she's been doing great but Jackson not being her has made her change. Alot!

Now she doesn't talk to anyone, her sweet smile that could cheer anyone who sees it happy is no longer shown, she doesn't wear bright colors, now only black and sometimes a dark brown, and she always wears a black with spikes on the shoulders leather jacket. She keeps her hair down, puts some of it in front of her left eye, and wears a black headband that keeps the rest of her hair in the back of her head. She doesn't talk anymore and now everyone is really talking about her, some people are saying that she's turning and acting like Jackson but she wasn't trying to; she just ended up doing it. She wears black eyeliner and a lit red lipstick now and even all guys love her new style they do want the old sweet Anna that they used to now and so does her grandma and her teachers.

Lately when she's asleep her grandma finds her standing in front of the front door in the middle of the night. Anna has been doing it since Jackson has been gone and it's scaring her grandma; she tries telling Anna about it but she never believes her. Anna's grandma tries to stay up to follow her to where she is going but so far Anna bumps into the door and stands there until after an hour and then she'll go back to her room and sleep on the bed.

Tonight when Anna goes to bed her grandma has a plan for Anna's sleep walking. "So Anna did you sleep well?" she asked as she was pouring some coffee for her and Anna. "I guess; I have to go." she replied. "But Anna it's Saturday you don't have school today." she said as she put down the coffee pot and gave Anna her coffee. Anna paused and then said that she was going for a walk. Her grandma said ok and then told her not to be gone too long and to check in once in awhile. Anna said yes ma'am and and left.

Every other Saturday she has been going to the river next to the cornfield and sit on the big rocks while putting her feet in the ice cold water for a couple of minutes and then take them out so that she doesn't get frostbite. She sits on the rock with her legs bent, her chin touching her knees, wrapping her arms around her legs, and watch the water flow down the river. She sits there listening to her thoughts and watching her memories go past her. But the only one that she can't seem to get out of her head is the memory of her meeting Nick.

She always tries to get other memories to show up but when she's at the river that memory is the only one that she could really see. She would look at the side of the rock and see her doing pic-a-boo to Nick to make him stop crying. Then she would look at the river and see her and Nick splashing each other with the water and getting the mud off of her dress but with a mud stain still. Anna would smile seeing her younger self happy but she wasn't happy now. She needed to see Jackson one last time and there was only one way to do it. To go to the place that he has always wanted to go. The College of Contemporary Music Musician Institute.

No one knew about Jackson's love for music except Anna. He would talk about going there when they were kids, and he has a guitar in the back of the seats in his truck and he was brilliant on it. She knew that if there was any place in the world that he would go it would be there. There was just a couple of problems to this plan. 1. She had no car, 2. No money, and 3. That school was in Hollywood, California; and she lived in Meredith, New York . From where she is at it could take her days to get there and that's with a car or bus.