Veronica Blue

Chapter 13

I didn't see Amira again after math class. She was probably avoiding me. And to be absolutely honest, that was what was best for her. She became friends with me and, apparently, I ruined her life.

The rest of the school day was dreary, tiring and irritating for some reason. Everything just seemed so annoying. More than anything else I just wanted to go home.

And eventually I did.

When I got home I collapsed unto my bed and laid there, staring at the ceiling because...why not? Plus, I'd much rather stare at the ceiling than into the eyes of that dead girl I keep seeing in my dreams.

While I stared at the ceiling, I thought about my life and everything that had occurred recently, and that was when it hit me. "My phone!" I gasped.

I jumped off my bed and went straight to the drawer where I had kept it. I had totally forgotten about it. I didn't even tell my mother about it. Or even bother to know exactly what went wrong.

But when I opened the drawer and pulled out the phone, I realised there was no need for that...because my phone was perfectly fine!

"What?" I muttered. I couldn't believe it. I was sure, absolutely sure my phone blew up...or something like that.

I glanced over to the spot on the floor where it had burnt, and as I recalled, there was a black stain on the floor right there. It couldn't have been a dream.

I pushed the power button and it came on, like nothing at all happened to it. I was starting to wonder if it was my phone that blew up or something else. But then it couldn't have been anything else. Why would I just lock my phone up in a drawer for no reason?

I just tossed it unto the bed and lay beside it. I'd had enough drama to think about already and I wasn't in the mood to add a resurrected phone to the pile.

Eventually, I fell asleep. Thankfully, there was no dead girl nightmare this time around.

**** **** **** ****

By the time I woke up, my mum was already back from work, and already fast asleep. I figured her day was just as miserable as mine...possibly worse.

I staggered into the kitchen for a sandwich, I didn't have the appetite to eat anything else. I couldn't stop thinking about the whole Amira thing. I just had to figure out what the problem could be.

Staring at my half eaten sandwich, with my vision blurred and my forehead pounding, I could almost swear that I saw something move from the corner of my eye. I took a quick glance. There was nothing.

Or wait...was there?

This time I didn't glance, I looked. There wasn't nothing, there wasn't something either. There was someone. It was a she...the she. The 'she' from my nightmares.

I couldn't see her face clearly, like I said, my vision was blurred. But she was standing, right at the door, shoulders slouched, face lowered, but eyes staring straight into my soul. I gulped down something as huge as a bite from my sandwich but it wasn't a bite of my sandwich at all.

She wore a sack-like dress, torn and raggedy just like her hair and her skin. Skin that was as pale as my lips had probably gone, skin that bled. No, skin that leaked.

She stood and stared. I stood and stared. I couldn't look away! I couldn't look away for all the love of God, I couldn't look away! She didn't move. I couldn't move. My vision was still blurry, but I could tell that she smiled. And then finally, I blinked and she was gone.

I couldn't eat my sandwich anymore, I lost my appetite. My throat was dry, but I couldn't drink water. I was shaking too much. So much that I didn't have the confidence that I'd drink water without dropping the glass at my feet.

A tear drop rolled down my left cheek. I didn't know if I could still go through that door. I didn't know if she was waiting for me. I didn't know what to do. Suddenly, like a jolt of electricity went right through me, I dashed out of the kitchen, into my room and collapsed against the foot of my bed, heaving.

I cried. I cried and cried and cried some more.

No. I didn't see her. I thought to myself. She's not real! She's all in your head, she's not real. She's just a dream. No, a nightmare! She's not real.

My mind suddenly felt a pull towards the witchcraft book. That same book that caused all this? For some reason I felt like the answers I needed were in that book. I crawled round to the side of the bed and pulled it out from underneath my pillow. Flipping through the pages like crazy, looking for something, anything at all.

Then suddenly I stopped. I saw something. Two pages back. No, one more. There it was. It was a picture of two heads, stretching out from one neck. They were facing opposite directions, in a way that they were not looking at each other. They both had their mouths open, but there was something different about the one on the left. But what pricked me about this picture, was how much I felt like I had seen it before.

I suddenly felt the urge to pee so I got up. But then I remembered the girl and I got cold feet. With a deep breath and shaking legs, I urged myself into the bathroom.

It was calm, everything was fine, I flushed the toilet and staggered out of the bathroom. I was so weak from fear I felt like I would pass out any moment.

I knelt down beside my bed, before the witchcraft book. I realised I didn't even know what time it was or how late it was. Stretching just a little bit, I dragged my phone from somewhere in the middle of the bed to where I was at the edge. It was upside down, but I was too lazy to turn it around, so I decided to just read the time upside down.

I felt around the edges for the power button and pushed it. But when it came on, I felt like the air I breathed became solid in the back of my throat. Right there, as my wallpaper, instead of the upside down bouquet of flowers that Veronica drew on my neck, I saw too heads, stretching out from the same neck.

Immediately, I referred to the book. What spell was that. "Binding spell." It read. And that was it, nothing else, just the words 'Binding' and 'spell'.

"What do you mean by binding spell!" I cried out in frustration. "What sort of binding spell?!" I couldn't help but wonder if Veronica was trying to tell me something.

**** **** **** ****

The next day at school, I kept my eyes peeled for Veronica. She was always in the lonely quiet places, places that barely have people. So I checked all those places. Eventually, I found her.

She was standing in the hallway, facing a locker. It was shut, I don't think it was hers, it couldn't have been hers. Her hands were behind her back and she was looking down at the floor as she played with something, kicking it around with her feet.

"Ve-ronica?" I said. I was still a good distance away from her. She looked up and faced me.

"Oh. Hey Nicole." She muttered.

"I've been looking for you." I said as I jogged towards her. She didn't say anything, she just stared at me with no emotion what so ever. "I wanted to ask you-" I trailed off.

"Ask me what?" She asked.

"Ask you about the tattoo you drew on my neck that time at the park."

"Yeah? What about it?"

"I saw it in the book." I said and shrugged. "It was on a page titled "binding spell". But there was nothing else."

"Okay..."

"Veronica, why did you draw that thing on my neck?" I asked, my throat had gone dry and so my voice was croaky.

"It means we'd be together forever." She said with a shrug. "I saw it somewhere, and it was a symbol that meant two people would be together forever. I didn't think there was anything more to it."

"Oh." I said, mostly disappointed. "Oh okay. Thanks anyways."

"Yeah..." She said and continued to play with her feet.

I turned around and left. No point. There was no point at all.