The Girl with Cat's Eyes

C H A P T E R 6

The woods are silent

night draws close

but don't lose hope

because you can see them

the children that dance

in the shadows

and they will help you

C H A P T E R      6

I ran faster, harder, adrenaline pumped through my veins, and as I stumbled over tree roots and the sound of twigs cracking under me, a strange sense of deja vu fell over me. I had done this before. Once. I wondered when. I ran for miles, what seemed like hours. I must have been in the hospital a few towns over I guessed, because the woods were here, but I didn't recognize much.

Finally after what seemed like forever my footsteps stopped, my breathing slowed and I leant against a tree trunk as I caught my breath. I slid down the trunk on to the ground, and put my head in my hands, letting fresh salt tears trickle down my cheeks. it must have been March by then, and the beginnings of a few flowers were sprouting around me, but though they were pretty, they didn't lighten my mood as they usually would have.

I sighed as my breath caught in my throat. What had happened? How long had I been out? Was it just a dream or a memory? And lastly, how on God's green earth did Jesse bloody Jacobs fall in love with me?

I thought for a while. Maybe he was just joking, or trying to get me to wake up. No that couldn't have been it. I saw the hurt on his face before I had run. Maybe it was just a puny crush he had mistaken for love? Yes, that was probably it. It was something small that he, or I, had made too much of a big deal of. He couldn't love me. He just... couldn't.

I tucked my knees to my chest and rocked back and forth as I cried. I couldn't fall in love. Not again. I didn't know how but I had killed both Levi, and my mum, even my Dad in a way. I mean he clearly hadn't always been like that... I looked at the ground again, picked at some grass sprouting up and moss that clung to the tree bark.

I had a strange sense that someone was watching me. I looked around, peering deep between the trees. I wondered what time it was. Around mid-day I would have thought, as I could see the sunlight creeping through the canopy of leaves. However the forest was dark, because of the close knit trees and their leaves and branches. I searched for a pair of eyes among the undergrowth and brambles but could see nothing. So I decided I would take a mid-day nap. Maybe it would help me gain a bit of much needed perspective.

I woke up, after what could have been hours or minutes. My neck was aching and my nose was itchy. I felt something brush my hand, and so I looked around. It was just grass. I sighed and rubbed my arms. I needed to get back, because all though I didn't want to face Jesse, I needed to stop them worrying. I wondered what I should do, how I should approach him. Should I ignore him, or act like nothing has changed? It would be awkward that was for sure...

I stood shook myself out and rubbed off the dirt from the seat of my jeans. I looked around into the depths of the forest that I had thought I had known like the back of my hands. Now I realized it was much bigger than I had first thought.

I started to run then, and as I did I smiled. I loved this freedom, as the wind blew past my cheeks, and my eyes watered from the cold air.

I carried on running until I reached the edge of the woods. I knew where I was now, I think. The east of the village near the outskirts. I carried on walking, the journey not taking long, until finally I reached the small mud road that would lead me back to the house.

I sat down in the grasses, just below the humming electric fence, on the side or the road. My shoulders slumped as I let out a long shaky breath. I closed my eyes and let the tears drip from beneath my eye lashes.

How could this have happened? My life was finally going okay, normally, but I didn't even know what I felt for Jesse, let alone whether I was in love with him. And even if I was I would never let him know. It would only hurt him. And me. Love was bad. A mistake.

What seemed to me barley a few days back, my life had been complicated enough: I couldn't talk, or remember anything, but I was getting better, much better, and fast. I was working, Sarah was even wondering about sending me to school. And I was okay with the idea. But then Chelsea had to come and ruin it all. Because of her, I had remembered parts of my previous life I wish I didn’t, I had collapsed unconscious on the floor. If it hadn't been for her, I would never even have been to the hospital in the first place, there would have been no reason for me to have heard Jesse, and I could have gone on living and getting better. But now... Now I was messed up. So messed up.

Because I couldn't love again. And I now remember that everyone I had ever loved before had, because of me, died, though I didn't know how.

Oh, goodness... What was I meant to do?