The Best Part of Hello [sample]

07

dedicated to lordpringles because the comments just make me laugh!

Chapter Seven

IT'S FRIDAY the thirteenth and I'm fourteen again. It was one of the worst but also one of the best years of my life. It was the year Evan moved in next door. The old couple beforehand needed to downsize, but God I missed them. Years of babysitting and being read stories to in funny voices were something fourteen-year-old me was going to miss, even if I didn't want to admit it. Our seemingly quiet neighborhood was now replaced by the sound of another fourteen-year-old boy arguing with his little sister, all the time. But that year wasn't all bad. The best thing that happened was Ben Moore asking me out. Ben Moore, complete heartthrob even at that age, and he chose me. I pretty much fainted, I had never been so happy. He did it in front of everyone, announced it in class as a big show. I was half humiliated and half ecstatic...okay maybe more ecstatic.

But for some reason, it's the year I can't stop thinking about now. It's the year that everything changed.

I'm certainly not thrilled that I am awake again, because the pain is back, just duller. Sophie is sitting on the metal slab that I have now figured out is a kitchen worktop which means we must be in some kind of staff kitchen. She's got her head in her hands and is mumbling something repeatedly under her breath. The air smells stale, metallic and worn as if someone has sucked all the energy out of it. I try to raise my head and bend my knee, but a shooting pain from my leg fires at the nerves in my body, and in shock, I fling my head back quickly onto the table. The racket I make stops Sophie from doing whatever it was, and she gawps at me, long and hard, as if she is waiting for me to fall back asleep - or die, I can't tell. It's like she's imagining it.

Her gawping turns into a large smile as she confirms I am awake and conscious, and her arms come flying around my neck. I can feel the warmth of her fingertips heating my skin and I smile into her shoulder gratefully as she hugs me tighter. She feels familiar. She feels like home.

"What happened?" I croak out. I haven't spoken in a while, that's obvious and I have no idea what's happened or how long I have been out. Sophie pulls away, moving so that she is perching on the side of the table that is closer to me. I look down and realize I am laying on a table myself, padded by a wad of blankets. When I look back to Sophie, she nervously flips her hair over her shoulder and something in the pit of my stomach tells me that it is bad.

"Oh god, what?"

"It's bad Kay, it's so bad." She whispers.

I frown and try to shift my position, so I can see her better but everything aches. "What do you mean?"

"Right," she starts, "it started after we went to sleep..."

"I'll sleep on the floor," I offer. The blankets Adam has dug out for us were decent and warm enough and I feel so exhausted from today that I am craving sleep.

"If you're sure," Damon says reluctantly and puts his stuff over two of the waiting chairs and eyes me with caution.

"I'm sure."

"Okay, well I guess goodnight," Tom smiles at all of us and slips down next to Sophie, who is slumped against one of the chairs and looks miserable.

"Night," I say, wriggling to get comfy.

I look at Sophie and frown. "I remember all of that, I don't get where this is going."

"Just listen, Kayla." She interrupts with a motherly telling off. "It was about three in the morning when all shit when to hell..."

A scream echoes. The sound of deafening shrieks as someone struggles. I'm thrust awake, but I can't see. I can't see anything. But I can hear everything.