Waking the Fae [BOOK ONE]

Chapter 5

Slowly Rebecca regained consciousness. She felt disorientated and confused. How had she gotten here?

The last thing she remembered was going to her P.E. class. Beyond that, she was clueless.

Looking around her, Rebecca’s already confused brain only became more puzzled. She was in the First Aid office. She knew she wasn’t imagining anything when her eyes roamed the room – same boring white walls, same standard, uncomfortable hospital beds, and same terrifying medical equipment. Rebecca had a fear of doctors and the ginormous stash of needles and scalpels made her skin prickle. Doctors had never been gentle with her, even when she’d been stabbed, so she didn’t trust them. That was a huge understatement — she despised them. Rebecca didn’t care what was wrong with her – she’d rather suffer through a broken limb than get a needle from a doctor who just stabbed without caring if it hurt — and needles hurt, no matter what people said. Especially when they missed the spot they were trying to stab and they had to try until your whole arm had been stabbed. 

Out of the corner of her eye she could see a nurse walking around the small room. She wore the uniform they all wore – a straight white skirt that went to the knee and a thick white blouse with the schools logo on it. Rebecca had never seen her before or she was just new. The latter seemed more likely.

When the torment had first started to get violent – shoving, pushing, object (heavy ones) throwing – Rebecca had gone to the First Aid all the time. Sometimes her injuries had been horrible – falling face first into a locker would do that to you. It had probably been her visited place within the school.

Eventually Rebecca had stopped bothering. If she got a black eye, she got a black eye. If she almost knocked herself out, then she just accepted the fact that she was lucky to be conscious and not out cold on the ground. No one had cared when she’d been injured. The nurses would give her an ice pack for a black eye, or any other injury she had and then tell her to leave. They didn’t ask her how she’d gotten it – didn’t care how. She could have been punched in the face and they’d just look at her indifferently.

Now she knew all to well that nobody cared if she was injured. It wasn’t their problem so they didn’t even think about it for a second. She hadn’t visited this room in over a year and a half, no matter the injury she had.

That was probably why she didn’t recognise this nurse. Rebecca had an immediate hate for her. Whatever had happened to her must have been bad, because there was no way she’d voluntarily step foot in this room. And, right now, she didn’t want to be here. So somehow she’d ended here and didn’t even remember getting here. Her injury must have been bad.

And here was this nurse, flouncing around as if she didn’t have a care in the world. Not for the injured person lying on a bed. Not for anything but herself.

The nurse turned to her, a fake smile on her face – obviously, she’d much rather be dealing with anything but injured teenagers. Rebecca couldn’t deny that at one stage she’d been pretty, but now she wasn’t. If she had to guess, Rebecca would say she was mid forties. Or, at least she looked that way. She’d had way too much plastic surgery to be considered pretty anymore – her lips way too big (she must have been going for the puffy look, but whoever her doctor was had sucked) and her skin unnaturally pulled back. Her hair was a bleached blonde that looked cheap and stringy. She was probably in her fifties and had been desperate to look younger.

“How are you?”

Rebecca forced herself to be polite even if she didn’t want to be – she didn’t smile though, that was a lot harder to force. She had to play nice, since for all she knew, she could be in a critical condition. “Good. What happened to me? How did I get here?”