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Chapter Three

MADISON

When I finish brushing my hair, I get out of my bedroom still with my hairbrush in hand wearing a formal turquoise dress, just like my mother says I should always be dressed. I go down the stairs running barefoot till I find my parents in the living room talking with a handsome man who is also wearing a suit. For some reason, I think I know him, even though I can't remember much of him, but he seems quite familiar. He stares at me with his big blue eyes on mine when he notices me, interrupting their conversation, and smiles as a greeting making me reply the same way.

"What are you doing barefoot and with your hair soaked?!" says my mother this time talking to me.

"I just wanted to -"

"Madison, go back to your room. We are in the middle of something important. Is it something urgent sweetie?" Sweetie? Both. My mother and I stare at my father confused for his election of the word till a few seconds later I notice by myself that they are waiting for me to leave.

"No, it was nothing," I say confused with a sigh before going back upstairs.

I take the bunch of pages that Levy gave me from my backpack and begin to read them until minutes later Sarah joins me at my terrible boredom giving me some company.

"What are you doing?" she asks entering to my bedroom, closing the door behind her and locking it. I stare at her, hoping she would give me a reason for that but instead she only forces a smile. I look back at the work in my hands and then I answer.

"Reading Levy's arguments for his Monday's debate," I say getting back to reading the boring script. "Why are there still people believing global warming isn't real?"

"Is it real?" she says sarcastically, and I giggle.

"People like you are the reason why it now snows in San Francisco," I reply with sarcasm too and she nods pressing her lips to stop herself from laughing.

"Do you want me to help you to get your hair done before it soaks more that beautiful dress?"

"Nice thought," I say standing up from the bed so that I can sit down on the bench in front of the mirror. She stands behind me and begins to slowly brush my hair, carefully, like if she did otherwise it would break. Meanwhile, I finish reading each of the pages writing a few corrections. When I am done, I stay staring at the waves of my hair falling over my shoulder to then look at Sarah through the mirror.

Unlike me, she has short and black straight hair a little more below the chin, so dark that it almost seems blue in the sunlight. Her nose is straight and thin, and her lips are as thin as paper.

The cries of a child are what bring me back to reality. I look at Sarah quickly and she just keeps working on my hair like she doesn't hear a thing, but I do, and it is crying desperately.

"Who's crying?"

"I don't know, Madison," she says biting her lip. Of course she knows, she always bits her lip when she lies.

"You're biting your lip," I recall, and she lets it go immediately looking at me through the mirror. "Who is it?"

"That's something your parents should answer, not me," she says overthinking what she was going to reply. I roll my eyes.

"You know they are answering nothing," I sigh and close my eyes at the cries of him or her, that sound clearly desperate. Suddenly I remember the man. He has come before, now I am sure of it. I have seen him sometimes before leaving to school in the morning and his blue eyes are impossible to forget.

"The man in the living room... is it his son or his daughter? Something like that?"

"Madison -"

"Sarah, you are the only person I can ask what's happening in here. Talking to them is like talking to a wall... please," I beg desperate dragging the last word and she just keeps combing my hair. I try again, "it has something to do with the forbidden door, right?"

"How old are you? Twelve?" she says, and I roll my eyes again. The queen of sarcasm, I only could have learned it from her. The cries suddenly stop as they began. "It's done," she says right in time, tying the elaborated braid that forms my hair with a hair band.

"I could fire you, you know. You work for me," I threaten her and stand up, leaving Levy's work over the desk to then sit down back on my bed.

"In fact, not. I work for the walls and I have been here for more time than you have," she replies, and I smile. "But if you have any complaints about me you could always tell your father. I am sure he will take care of that matter," she winks at me, laughing at the clear non-existence attention of my father to me, and I childishly just stick out my tongue.

"I hate you," I joke before the door gets open by Teo.

"Good evening Miss Wrestler," is all he says before leaving.

I get out of my room with Sarah following me like a puppy and I look from the railing of the corridor at the living room searching for my parents or the man, unsuccessfully, but when I look at the forbidden door, I find around five persons getting out from it, dressed in what seem to be doctor's suits. I turn around to see Sarah expecting for an answer. "Ask your parents," she repeats, and I sigh getting back to my room.

Outside I find other ten apparent medics chatting in the garden. I observe the movements of their lips through the window trying to decipher what they say between them, but my effort ends up being completely useless. Till suddenly, my father's Range Rover passes in front of them heading to the street.

I get out quickly from my room heading to the forbidden door and try to open it, but like every time I tried when I was a kid: it's fully locked. "Hello?!" I knock loudly with the palm of my hand, but I don't get a reply. "Hello?!" I try again.

"What are you doing?" I jump startled when Sarah whispers through my ear and I feel like my heart is going to get out from my chest for beating so fast.

"God! You scared me!" I say practically screaming before I look at her, laughing nervously.

"You know, I am pretty sure doors can't talk but you can try with the one of your room," she says grabbing me from my arm making me walk back to my dorm. "Or you could go and swim in that big pool that you never use and think about what you are going to ask your parents when they come back... of course, it's your choice."

Two hours later I am completely wrinkled because of the water and my mind is drowning in questions that want to be answered but that surely... would stay that way.