Poison Tree

𝚘𝚗𝚎

~

"Dylan!" A tired voice yelled from the bottom of the stairs. A small, dark-brown haired teenager soon appeared on the top step with a confused expression on her face, "could you walk to the corner store for me? We're out of milk" pat sighed. She raised her eyebrows at his request, "me?" She tilted her head. He huffed at her enquiry, "well who else would it be?" He nodded. She sighed heavily, "fine" then plodded down the stairs with her phone in her hands, it's almost midnight, can he not wait until the morning?

                "Don't talk to anyone you don't know" he handed her a few dollar bills.  She sighed and nodded before quickly firing her sliders onto her feet and dashing out of the house.  She began her usual stroll to the nearest corner store which, by foot, is around 10 minutes away.  Pat can't drive, so if they need anything it's always a long walk or the older brothers step up and drive Dylan around when they can.  It was pitch black outside and Dylan hated it, she couldn't see anything or anyone and it always feels like there's someone, or something, behind her.  Not liking the feeling, she picked up the pace and began taking longer strides, until she nearly tripped over her sliders.

She's a unique character alright... She stands at exactly 5 foot not-so-tall, she has dark brown hair which is close enough to black but not quite, and has dark green eyes. Her brothers always tell people she looks like Megan fox, because she really does, but she ignores them like usual. She's a figure skater at the local ice rink so she's fairly active, and everyone loves her in school, she's a bubbly character who's easy to love.

She suffers from NES, which stands for non epileptic seizures; it causes her to have extremely frequent absence seizures, of which she can never remember having, it's the result from a bad head injury she had when she was younger. But the good thing is, all of this is harmless and it doesn't affect her physically anymore, although it does affect her day to day life and schoolwork.  She has absence seizures on a daily basis, probably about 100 each day at a minimum, so it's a bit of a struggle to keep up with things when she doesn't know what's she's missed and what she hasn't...

As she arrived at the corner store, she wandered inside before saying her usual 'hello' to the cashier, then headed right for the fridge at the back of the aisles.  She scanned the shelves but soon came to the reality that she was going to have to climb up them for the milk, "watch it" she heard a familiar voice from behind her.  She stepped down and looked up to see her red headed brother grabbing the milk for her since she's so short, "what're you doing here?" He smiled and passed it down for her. She gratefully accepted it and looked up at him, "dad wanted milk" she shrugged. He sighed and flicked her ponytail out of the way, "c'mon" he nodded to the cash register.

As they strolled over to the counter Will stopped to grab what he needed but Dylan continued over to the cashier, "is this everything?" The woman smiled. Dylan nodded, "$2.15 please" the woman smiled again. Dylan smiled back and grabbed the change out of her pocket before freezing on the spot, she completely stopped and stared blankly at the shelf in front of her. Will walked over to see Dylan just stood there, "Dylan" he nudged her arm slightly. He sighed gently and took the change from her hands, he knew she was having a seizure, "thanks" he nodded as his sister snapped out of it. Dylan was confused since she now had no money in her hands, "I got it, let's go" he turned her around. She nodded and wandered out of the store with him following behind, they spoke nothing more of it, just like they always do. They never speak about her absence seizures unless they're unusually long and serious.

                   "Where you heading off now?" Will stopped her as she began walking down the sidewalk.  She raised her eyebrows, "home?" She nodded obviously. He smiled and shook his head, "get in" he nodded to the car.  She smiled and wandered over to his car before hopping in the passenger seat and putting the milk on her lap, "let's go" Will groaned and got in too.  She smiled as he began driving her home...