(COMPLETED STORY)
Uncorrected draft, under revising.
While everyone believes he's dead, Isla is still determined that her younger brother is alive and in need of help somewhere. Isla's brother, Grayson, had a mental obsession with clues and patter...
The doors to the train slid open, Nick and I walked out with a few other people.
Marseille – Saint-Charles station, finally!
The platform was crowded, commuters taking and leaving variant trains. Teenagers, adults and families all passing by the rush hour, 1:45PM read my watch. I slid my hand into my zipped pocket, and took out the note. The possible key to everything, everything that I had wanted to prove for the past half year. That Grayson is still alive. Nick gazed at the paper, he hadn't seen it before now. Perplexity crossed his face once again, causing him to squint his eyes at the small sized paper.
"What's that?" We stood in the middle of the railway platform, both staring dependently at the note in my hand.
"This is why we're here, because of this note," my hand shook the paper, "I found it in his room. In a book I know he wouldn't read! That he couldn't. A turkish book, he doesn't speak turkish. This is the address I'm looking for, it's here. In Marseille." I gushed, spilling it all out. Nick tilted his head to look at me, his face expression completely blank.
"Hold up. You're telling me we came all this way, lied to our parents, just because of some stupid note? This address could mean anything! His favorite restaurant, where his friend lives, a museum, a freaking flower shop, it could be anything. God, Isla! Did you even search the address online to make sure it wasn't fictional?" He looked frantic, his green eyes visually burning. He made me sound like a little girl who had drawn on the walls with red markers. Reckless, immature, juvenile, and foolish.
"No," my head automatically dropped, flushing. I felt shamed and embarrassed. Nick was right, I should have checked the address, not relied on an unconvincing note. I truly felt like a narrow-minded toddler, wanting her lollipop so badly she didn't even realize it was poisonous. Wanting to runaway from Nick's sight, crawl in a corner and cry, I decided better not. I wasn't going to do that, as much as I wanted to. I raised my head back up, determined not to make more of a fool of myself than I already had.
"It was your decision to come, you practically forced me to let you. It was your fault that you came, not mine. I'm going to search for this address whether you like it or not, and I couldn't care less if you followed," I looked him deep in the eyes, expecting him to fire back. Despite my demanding language he kept quiet, breaking his gaze from mine. Guess he had nothing to respond with, because he knew I was right. Clearly beaten, he turned around and walked in a random direction.
I heard a near inaudible, "whatever," coming from Nick. I looked up at a staircase with a sign above it, Nick walking the opposite way.
"Actually, it's this way," I pointed to the staircase. He lazily whirled around, his head down, and followed me up the stairs.
****
We had walked miles on the brimming streets of Marseille, my face distracted by the map. Once in a while there'd be incidents where I would nearly walk into someone, luckily Nick would push me to the side. Classic old-fashioned buildings lined the streets, nothing I hadn't seen in Paris before. Sidewalk after sidewalk, pavement after pavement, crosswalk after crosswalk.
Despite the map in my hand, I soon declared us utterly lost. Nick had thought I was sure of where we were going. Although, honestly, half the time I was relying on my instincts on which direction to take. Nick sighed and jerked the map away from me, starting off with locating us on the map. Eventually, he gave up, deciding asking people was the better idea. An elderly pointed out where we where on the paper and kept on walking, Nick looked mildly grateful for the assistance.
"Hey, look. Can we just take a look in there," I asked, pointing at a music store at the end of the overflowing streets. You could see from where I was standing that the shop looked small in size, but was filled with instruments and gadgets.
"Sure, I guess," now responsible for getting us to the address, Nick followed me in to the music store.
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