Rune Keepers

One

Copyright 2019 © Abandersen, Rune Keepers

Insomnia is a bitch. A bitch that the bags underneath my eyes hate with a passion. I attempted to dab some of Aunt Gens concealer on top of them, but no less, I still look like I haven't slept in two days.

Which isn't entirely untrue. I've had about five hours both nights, my overactive brain finally shutting off around three am and giving me some reprieve.

I don't want to have to start the sleeping pills again, I hate the way they make me feel when I wake up. Groggy and gross, but ever since we moved to Stone Beach my sleeping habits had worsened.

I rest my elbows on the desk and sigh into my palms, my lids heavy and will myself to wake the hell up and scrounge energy from some place in my body. Today is supposed to be exciting, I'm supposed to be excited and rushing down the stairs eager to leave.

I glance back up and point at myself in the mirror, "don't make them change their mind!" I scold myself and push up out of my chair.

Plastering on a smile and refraining from flicking my eyelids or slapping my face, I grab my bag and head downstairs.

"Good morning, honey," Aunt Gen walks over from behind the island counter and placed her hands on my shoulders. Her doe like eyes scan my face for only a moment before her brows furrow. "You look tired."

[edit ends here] please excuse this 😂 I am starting a small edit of this and sharpening a few things up.

I'd been home-schooled my entire life by my Aunt and Uncle; we moved too often for them to enroll me in a real school.
Until now.

I could remember at least eleven different towns off the top of my head. They were all small secluded towns, often near beaches or rocky shores, like the one we were in now.

I spent the first two weeks of our arrival riding along with my Uncle to the two nearby beaches here. Much to Frank's dismay, I had stopped going, I almost hoped that after a while I could convince him to take us to a different place.
I wanted to see more, experience more, but like usual we never strayed from the course.

"There's just a few more tests I need to do here," he would say.

Now I wasn't entirely sure what that meant or what exactly he was looking for, my brain almost went into autopilot and knew to switch off whenever he would start rambling about rocks and soil and the earth.
I could swear his whole life revolved around it, which meant when he received a 'new assignment', we packed up and moved.

It was on our third week of living in our new house here when I finally decided I would put my foot down.

"You're awfully quiet this morning," Frank said, raising his thick eyebrows at me as I took another plate from his soapy hands and began drying it.

"Just tired I guess," I lied. I'd gotten a good six hours sleep that night which was a record compared to other nights.

"Look at me," he softly ordered, tilting his head.

"What?" I scoffed. Playing dumb, I reached for another dish from the rack, knowing he knew me too darn well.

"April," his voice was low as he dipped his head down to try to get a good look at my face, "you're not just tired, you've been off for a couple days now. Don't think I haven't noticed your lack of concentration during our sparring sessions and we barely ran two miles yesterday before you started lagging."
"So what is it? What's going on?" He took the cloth from my hands and turned to lean his lower back against the counter so he was facing me.