Flames And Blades

Chapter Ten: Family Affair

 No one mentions freeze as an option for fight or flight instincts. I guess it's because it's not really an option, it just happens.

To me, specifically when the haze reappears and everyone starts becoming an ass again. Seriously, that goddamned bloody haze needs to cue me in one when it's going to hit so I can get the hell out of dodge and not be taken by storm like this.

First off, my alarm clock quite actually needs to be terminated. Me and waking up in the morning is a match that has never, nor will ever, be. It shouldn't be that hard for it to understand that, after all, it does get thrown across the room almost every time it goes off- so what's the issue here?

Anyways, the true kryptonite in disguise wakes me up at four in the morning, with a Thursday of school that I don't have to go to. And when I do wake up, I do so to a much more noticeable and heavier cloud of people around me. I sigh, a lovely combination of anger, annoyance and exhaustion at the inky clouds that are practically dripping and oozing at every corner, making the fog it had once been seeming like nothing. I grumble a "Thanks" to it all, and roll the blankets off of me.

Seeing as I have the time and panic forming from the haze to get work done, I do. I get up, get dressed and fed (only half the bowl of cereal actually getting into my stomach and not the ground), follow a whole routine of events I assume normal people do for the mornings. Then I proceed to unpack everything brought over from my parents' house. It's not that much all in all, and I know for a fact that they took quite a few of my more valuable possessions and sold them. It is, however, something to do, something to keep me out of my headspace. When I'm done, I hide the photos of them and any of their belongings in a cardboard box left over from unpacking. Shoving it into an unseen corner in my closet, I remember to take the Walkman out of the pile. It's too perfect to let go of, and I find myself glad that my dad hadn't thought to take it back, because, for it, I really would break back into the house that I know they changed the locks too (they, however, don't quite know that I know that and how to pick locks) and retrieve it.

The unpacking and cleaning of everything fills me with some sort of piece and control I can hold onto. Even if the process took me into the afternoon, it was nice. I stood in the doorway of what was once my old 'guest' room and is now my permanent one, admiring my handywork and enjoying the stillness of everything. Startled by the knocking at the door, I hop over to answer whoever it is. Relieved to see its Trevor, a little off-put when I register that my grams still hasn't come home.

The most sickening feeling of all was Trevor's eyes. His pupils were the darkest purples I have ever seen and filled with a heaviness of hatred and disgust. Without question, I know it was all focused on me. The same way I knew that this haze was going to last a few more hours than usual. The same way I knew that whatever Trevor did with the purple haze was always on the back of his mind. A small thought and feeling that received center stage when the haze fell.

"Would you just like to get it over with, or should I?" Exhaustion sets in, for what, I don't know. Maybe some last bit of teen hormones and irrationality.

"We're through. You and I- it doesn't work. Goodbye." He says 'bye' with his back already turned. So quickly and blunt I couldn't quite believe it. It was the statement of it all. His goodbye was the final; as if he was leaving the same way Ferox had in my dream. Only with so much less emotion and more distance.

It wasn't an easy feeling to shove back down. But I did. Because I had research to do. All the information given to me last night meant that there was a lot I didn't know- and that just simply doesn't happen in my life. So I blocked out any of my thoughts that were otherwise unhelpful to reading the books my Grandmother gave me. They were quick reads with only a few more little stories inside than Warrison, Adam and Luce had already given me. Coming up empty-handed in the last page of book three, I turn to the back flap of the book where a strange piece of paper falls out.

Shit, I broke the book. I panic and search around for glue or tape or something to fix the mess I had just created, coming up empty handed not moments later, I bend down to see what was there. Opening the paper to a more readable angle, I see it is a completely different set up than any three books. It was old and strange. Not old enough to be completely outdated, but not new enough to stand out from the hidden compartment it was in.

It also appeared to be a map. Coincidentally, to a forest in town that I used to visit for camping a lot when I was little. Given the fact that I had nothing else to do and that I knew the area decent enough, I jot down a note for my grams, when or if she comes back to the house and goes to the car. The new rental my insurance company gave me, some sort of shiny black 'extreme comfort' car. The kind that the dealer explains with a bunch of number mixed letters all around it. I would have preferred a much more simple option, but my car was complete scrap metal when I found it, meaning I have about three hundred dollars in cash for now, and a cars worth in paperwork soon. Luckily the driver (some food transport dude) took the fall for everything, so I don't have to lose that many old and saved up paychecks to the old car.

Figuring I didn't have enough experience with the mapping program on the dash, I start the ignition and wing it for the entire ride.