Through Her Lives

Morgandy

The metal chain was cold against her skin. The park was painted in grey hues, with dew settling on the ancient oak trees bare of all leaves and the fine singular pieces of grass covered in a thin white blanket. Soon this area would be out of bounds, though from the state of things one may have guessed it had already been forbidden. There was no sign of life other than a singular girl. The other girls were huddled inside watching fires, holding cups of fancy warm drinks. A classic cliché to what one may expect of a prestige girls boarding school in winter.

There hadn't been a moment yet that Morgandy had felt right at the school but strangely it was all she had and the thought while saddening her also made her feel further away from her family and freer than she had ever been. She sat on a rusted, squeaky, damp swing in the middle of a park area she had found uninhabited near the school grounds. It seemed to have been forgotten long ago. The area was over- grown and the only playing equipment was the swing on which she sat. The snow showed one set of foot prints unlike most of the areas around the school which had been treaded through all day by busy girls still in high heels regardless of the weather going to and from their many classes. The oaks secluded it from the world, hiding it away from everyone's view and muffling the sounds of the school, even the bell was very faint.

The feeling of seclusion was something Morgandy had yearned to feel over her life but it had come all too quickly. She had grown sick of eating in her room, unable to face sitting at a big circular table alone or with a group that would only ignore her, sick of sitting alone in class and being alone in her spare time and sick of throwing herself into school work with lack of anything to do. It was tiring and difficult to keep up with and it definitely wasn't like her at all.

She desperately needed winter to be gone, the heaviness in her body to be dismissed and the foul moods to dissipate. She felt she was bordering on the mildly insane. No work could be done and after only a few weeks she was overcome by boredom.

It took a long time and a lot of squeaky swinging for Morgandy to realise she was being watched. But the instant she did her body tensed, ready for confrontation. It wasn't like the movies, all slow motion and dramatic, it was over in a few seconds of flailing arms and legs, a kick to the jaw and a punch to the stomach. A girl Morgandy had never seen, lay below her clutching her stomach. Her eyes shifted uneasily looking from Morgandy to her stomach to Morgandy trying to understand what she was seeing. 

The girl didn't seem in immediate danger of dying and Morgandy was far from wanting to be stalked so she got up brushing her jawline, wincing as she did so and walked away, treading carefully through the snow watching as it compressed beneath her step. Not a word was uttered between the two girls. 

The girl lay still on the ground, fighting for her breath wondering. Where had her brain been? What had happened? How had she managed to seem to like such a threat that the girl socked her in the stomach? Why did her head hurt? The questions circled messily around her mind, awaiting their answers and she drifted into unconsciousness. Her breathing slowing down and there she lay, in her own style of white coffin.

***

There was worry through the school when an hour later she didn't show up to her usual classes. It was out of the ordinary for the girl, and she was always early to classes. It was how she functioned. The day had taken a turn for the worst, getting colder, wetter and windier and half an hour later a search of the school had been completed with no signs of her. The rescue crews had been called in due to fear of her being in the weather, the school searched again and the worry of hypothermia grew by the minute. A person in such weather would become hypothermic within the first hour of being outside without adequate gear. This girl hadn't been seen all morning. They had no idea what she was wearing or where she could have gone but the search outside started anyway.

Morgandy watched quietly wondering what she had done before wondering if she should possibly tell them about the park, it would no longer be a secret but the girl would be found. She built up the courage to go to the man conducting the search. He was about six foot seven and towered over everyone in the room, his head was shaven and his jaw was wide set. She was about to turn away, purely out of fear when he set his eyes on her. The eyes of a leopard looking at a deer knowing it had nowhere to run.  This was the type of man that if she didn't tell him what she knew, he would find a way to bring attention to her. She couldn't afford the attention and swallowing all pride, self-pity and fear that had risen to the back of her throat she pointed her head towards the door leading to the library. At least she could try admit her guilt away from prying eyes and ears. 

Morgandy had never been in the school's library before but it seemed appropriate that she teamed a new experience with a new place. She had never owned up to something she had done, never helped a person in the way she was about to. Even the looming bookcases were no match to the rescuers size, she wondered slightly if he had ever been in a library before that as well. He seemed so out of place, so big and bulky compared to the literature lining the shelves. His stride was full of confidence but his eyes showed that she had to be quick to get to the point. He seemed to think she was around to waste his time.

            "You know something." His voice was deep and his eyes searched her face, stating a fact rather than asking a question. She drew in a quick breath, not willing to launch into the story, just wanting to quickly tell him where she thought the girl was and to slink into the shadows again.

               "She's in a park to the left of the school, it's hidden by a line of oaks, and she'll be near the swing set. She's been there for nearly two hours though she's wearing warm clothes that should have stopped the hypothermia a little bit." Her voice came out shaky as she took a step backwards.

                  "You should probably act quickly." Not waiting around to see his reaction, she walked out of the library fully intending to go to her room but turned left instead at the top of the staircase and running quickly up more steps. She was standing at the edge of the bell tower and looking down upon the search within a matter of minutes and just in time to see the man walk out of the building. He looked no different to what he had in the library and she wondered if he believed her and again wondered if she had done the right thing. The inside of her left wrist drew hot and itchy and she scratched at it subconsciously with her nails thinking it was a mosquito bite. In the process, accidentally uncovering the phoenix that lay there, encased in a swirl, it was the one tattoo the school hadn't found out as it always remained covered. Suddenly she knew that he had believed her. It was at the exact moment she was looking down at her wrist that the man started running in the direction of the oak trees and by the time she had looked up he had reached them. A sigh escaped her lips and she watched as the rescue party swarmed the area and the girl was put in an ambulance. She enjoyed the ability to observe without being seen. Something she had learnt the hard way long ago in France.

With any luck no one would ask questions. Starting to try and smudge the rest of the foundation covering the tattoo across what she had scrapped off she looked at her wrist noticing with a shot of surprise that it showed no sign of the phoenix. What happened to her tattoo?

             "So, did you think I wouldn't believe you? Or did you just want to make sure the girl you left survived." Morgandy swung around to the voice, hiding her arm behind her back. He smirked, "I'm Dale by the way and we need to have a chat."

               "What's there to chat about? Girl lost, girl found." Inwardly groaning Morgandy wondered why she hadn't realised that even if no one else asked questions, the man, Dale, would come back and ask them, if only for his own curiosity if there was no report being filed. She wasn't ready to have this conversation, admittedly she probably never would be or be ready to explain but he was blocking her only exit and didn't look like he was moving any time soon.

If her calculations did her right he would be stronger than her but possibly not faster. So in order for her to get past him she would have to either duck under his arm which would be dangerous seeing as to catch her all he would have to do is move his arm downwards or summersault over him which she would possibly get away with. If she didn't hit her head on the doorframe or the roof and knock herself unconscious, it was win-win. She decided to wait him out. He would have places to be and jobs to do, where as she had all day. She sat down on the dusty floor with a thump, a cloud of dust rising to surround her and send her into a painful sneezing fit that lasted the good part of a minute and as the dust finally settled, she looked up to see Dale standing in the exact same position still looking at her intently.