Stop | Stop; Go Duology Book 1

chapter four: cass

The bus came as I stilled, the world shifting around me sluggishly as I try to understand what it is I hold. That girl is me. Or, maybe she's a twin that I was separated from at birth. But why is she in an asylum? And how did she end up in there? And why does she have my name? 

Everything stills again as I shuffle on, passing by the driver asking for the bus money from some woman in a scarf, and place myself in the back. As long as I don't move, the bus will take me to where I need to go. Seems simple enough, right?

I acknowledge the people speaking around me as I still, not wanting to hear any of it because I can't engage the way I want to. My earbuds blast "Spirits" by The Strumbellasfrom an iPod I swiped when I was at public school. Whoever's this was, they had some good taste in music. If I could live life normally, would I have made music like this too?

I think I'd be a jock, actually. Be a part of the track team and win races because of how fast I could be. I'd do the long jump and the high bar thingie with the long pole... I'd have friends who would be there in the crowd as I crossed the finish line. I would actually care about my grades, about things that happened to me. But I don't care about anything right now. I'm going to drop out of school as soon as it starts back up, after the holiday. If I'm still in the state by then. I'm a year behind, anyway. Sometimes home can be a hard place to leave, even if you wish it was blown off the face of the earth.

The asylum's address echoes in my mind, everything inside me calling to it.

Why did it have my name? My last name isn't Hodges, it's Burr, but... I'm obviously not in an asylum... I don't even remember ever being considered to go to one. So why is my name there? Probably just a coincidence.

Technically, it's notmy name. Cass Burr, not Cassandra Burr Hodges. It's what was on the note whoever left attached to my blanket. Cass Burr. Naturally, Cass would be a nickname for someone who's name is Cassandra, and she does have the "Burr" part, but...

My head begins to ache as I drown out my thoughts with music, the singer's voice overtaking everything. Streets pass me by, their colors blending together as people live their everyday normal lives, not having to ever worry about strange superpowers that appeared at age thirteen. Superpowers that require I stand still if I want the world to continue its course, becoming something of a weeping angel as I feed off its energy. The stillness makes me spasm. The movements make me ache. There's no superpower I've ever heard of that makes you give up your life so humanity can live on. The thought makes my hands shake, slowing down the world around me only slightly. The song fades into a pulsing punk-rock ballad, skipping like a scratched CD as my focus shifts to the manila folder in my lap. My knuckles are white around the edges, crumpling them. That girl has my face, my name.

I brace myself for the seat's impact as I move to open the folder. Everything freezes as I tap my foot against the floor of the bus, my eyes skimming over the documents inside. The girl's face is empty, void of all emotion. The top paper is her story, one chillingly similar to mine. She was left at someone's doorstep, Jessica and Richard Hodges, who, interestingly enough, had recently found out they could not have children. Jessica died when Cassandra turned four, leaving Richard to be an only father until Cassandra turned thirteen and he died in a car wreck caused by drunk driving on the other party's behalf. The other car had two passengers inside and one fled the scene and was never found. Cassandra was almost unscathed as she was pulled from the flaming car, but her mind fell to insanity a couple weeks after, when she was taken into the hands of the state, no family alive to claim her. She was deemed insane, talking about time and slipping into a loose and curious form of iambic pentameter when she spoke. She would incessantly cry about her deceased father and talk to strangers who weren't actually there. Cassandra developed a nervous tick, her body constantly in motion, and she would tell those who asked that she couldn't stop moving or the clock would cease to tick. She never slept and would write on walls a language only she could understand. She sounded truly insane.

And yet, I found her innocent of her insanity when the word timeappeared over and over. Could we possibly share this curse?

I pull the picture of her from the paperclip and lift it to my face. I've concluded that maybe we were twins separated at birth. If so, then why were we split apart from one another? And why wasn't I the one who got the free parents?

I grit my teeth and shove her picture back into the file. Inside were papers that were once torn, tape holding the shreds together by a thread. I assume it's her writing in the green and pink crayon, words in English scrawled about in messy handwriting. What takes up most of the paper, though, are images that look like they mean something, reminding me hieroglyphics from ancient Egypt.

The bus began to move again, my body finally still. The symbols seem so familiar, so personal... I can't explain it. Something about them had me mesmerized. A chill works its way over my shoulder blades as I ask the question to myself I should have the moment I laid eyes on the folder that mysteriously appeared next to me.

Who gave me this information?

I drop everything into my lap, the world stuttering at my abrupt movement. A slow hissing sound comes from the back of the bus in the pauses and makes my blood run cold. As I still, it quiets, my nerves slowly returning to normal. It was probably the bus's breaks; I was near the tires anyway.

But when I turn to ease my apprehensive mind, the world stilling, I come face-to-face with a moving monster from nightmares.

I scream.