Emergence ~ Split

Chapter Ten

With the recent downpour, it really should have been obvious that the street s would have be en flooded. Casey had her arms wrapped around her chest as she shivered, trekking through the puddles. She refused to take the bus home from school, in hopes to escape the paranoid looks of her peers.

But she was way to o distracted this morning to consider what the metal armour of the bus was protecting her from.

Her day had been long and bitter. Speculation over her failure to hunt and the disappearance of Claire being the only source of conversation. She managed to avoid needing to defend her family pride hunting of hunting.

She trudged down her familiar street, the old yellow mailbox easily spotted from the end of the road. She was only three months away from being able to leave high school, she already had planned to go straight into work. Running away. Was more the term of classification towards what she aimed to do.

She was going to travel to the outskirts of New York, living out of trailer parks and working her way towards a better life. It was the best idea she could think of without killing her uncle and robbing banks.

Of course she had dreams, ideas of a family, finding enjoyment in planting gardens, and having a proper job that she could be paid well to hate.

Casey never expected anything in life, not after her fathers death, and being raped. Instead she had little expectation towards anything that wasn't easily achieved. She had high hopes of leaving home. Not believing to survive anything outside her neighborhood, though. It would mean everything was going too well.

She pushed opened the front door, relieved to see the couch bare of her uncle underneath the piled plates and finished beer cans. Her bag landed with a thump when she spun into her room and dropped on to the floor, fishing out her phone and flicking through the different trains times leading out of the city next month.

It was nearing 7pm when Uncle John proudly stepped in through the front door, his shoulders dampened by the rain as he heaved in a dead deer. A smile broad on his face as he balled his fists up and rested them to his hips. "Never seen a deer this big, huh Casey?" He questioned.

Casey gave him a brief smile, "Well done." She continued to stack the dishes up to dry by the sink and ignored the stench that began to seep into every corner of the house.

John stared down at the deer, pleased that he shot it efficiently, reducing the amount of blood that would be soaking into the carpet. He was drunk, pissed on adrenaline and Jim Bean. "Might get Dennis over 'ere." He stated, giving the neighbor a call and stepping outside to pair his annoyance with a knock on Dennis's door the next street over.

Casey subtly retreated to her room, grabbing an apple to munch on as she sat in bed, flicking over the various photo albums she had of the better days.

John and Dennis entered the room loudly, her uncle boisterously talking about the deer as Dennis merely agreed, helping him heave it into the kitchen as they began to cut into it. Casey slipped in her headphones, drowning out the snap of bones.

Her fingers were shaking as she held each image, sadness and tiredness wearing her thin after hours of staring at the glossy colour of her childhood. She neatly shuffled the pictures together and hid them under her desk before slipping out of her room and moving over into the bathroom across from her room.

She didn't knock as she pushed in, headphones blasting. She was caught off guard by the shine of light on. Then noticing too late as Dennis shuffled back into his trousers as he looked up at her, a shy smile on his lips.

"Oh my god, I'm so sorry." She blushed, closing her eyes and pulling the door shut . She moved hurriedly back into her room. Closing her door behind her and running her hands down her face embarrassed. She was already feeling the heat in her blushing skin. She pulled out her headphones, dropping them on to her desk as she went back to bed, listening for him to leave the bathroom.