The Devil May Tempt (Predicted:Unraveled)

Strange Town

Chapter One 

"Okay, I know it's only been 24 hours since you left, but I miss you. I mean, what am I going to do in Church Hill without you?" said a grumpy Sienna on the other end of the phone.

Azura had been talking to her for a whole hour, convincing her that it would be fine, and that Azura was only going to be away for a few months. It was January, and Azura's 18th birthday was in May. As soon as high school was over, Azura would return to Church Hill for the summer. Then Sienna and Azura would go to NYU, as planned.

"Calm down, Sienna. It's not the end of the world. Only for a few months." Azura repeated for the 100th time.

"I hate your mom for disappearing on you like that." Sienna said.

"Trust me, hate is just the beginning when it comes to what I feel for her." Azura replied, feeling a tinge of guilt. She always felt a little guilty when she said something bad about her mom, but she also always continued to do it anyway. It was how she got on. She knew if she let herself feel the pain of abandonment, she'd drown into it and hurt herself. She'd done it before, when she was 14 and her father left. Her mother was hardly able to cope, and Azura was as good as a scarecrow. She became all gothic and cold, never spoke to anyone, always aloof.

But in that time of need, Sienna reached out to her, and she was back to normal in Freshmen year. But it was quite a task, and the last thing she wanted to do in Chaste Town, the place where she'd just moved to, was become a loner and ruin her uncle and aunt's perfect image of her.

"I know. Listen, Az, I gotta go now, Jake is here. I'll talk to you after school, okay? Bye." Sienna said, in a rush of words and cut the line before Azura could reply. Sienna was always so excited about Jake, her boyfriend for the past month, sometimes she did the stupidest things in front of him, half of which Azura would much rather forget.

"Azura, you ready? Your uncle can drop you to school on his way." called Anne, Azura's aunt.

Azura put her phone in her pocket and grabbed her bag before sprinting downstairs. She didn't want to end up walking in the strange town she'd never set foot in before, and she most definitely didn't want to take the bus. She would rather wait till class started to get to know what Chaste High's students were like.

"I'm ready," she said, holding the door open for her uncle John. John was a doctor at a local clinic. The few times she'd met him, he had seemed nice, but she was only 10 when she last saw him, so she didn't remember that much. As for Anne, Azura had met her plenty of times, last being two months ago. Azura's mother, Remy, was too close to her sister to go a month without talking to her. That's why Azura had chosen to go to her aunt rather than her grandmother. She had hoped Remy would call up sometime and so she could talk to her. But Remy had disappeared, and for one and a half months, there was no news from her. So most of the family had given up.

Everyone, except Azura, seemed to think that when Remy was gone, there was no finding her unless she wanted to be found. Without any evidence, the police didn't know what to do either. So the court just handed Azura over to her aunt and uncle, for the five months she had before she was 18.

"Well, you coming?" said John from the driveway.

Azura took a second to wonder when he'd gotten there, before she ran over to the car and took the seat next to him.

"Bye!" Anne called from the door.

Both, Azura and John waved at her, then peeling out of the driveway and getting onto the wet road.

Chaste Town wasn't that far up north to be covered in snow, but it also wasn't down south enough to be pleasant in January. The strange climatic conditions kept it wet all through the year, even though all the neighboring towns were practically deserts of snow.