In Control

Chapter 1

"Luna! I swear that this was the only choice we had! I'm sorry, I promise we wouldn't have left if we actually had a choice!" Mother yelled after me as I stomped off to my 'room' and slammed the door. "Please, baby, I'm still here! And we can have your friends come over anytime. This isn't the end of the world..."

This was the end of the world. All that I had known is now over a hundred miles away along with my sanity. Pressing my back up against the door and sliding down, I covered my face and sobbed. The room was chilly, as it was winter and the old heater didn't work.

"Please... Open the door I promise that you'll be okay."

"GO AWAY!" I shouted back.

I could hear her stumble a bit behind the door, then sigh. Minutes, which felt like hours, passed and she spoke again. "Dinner will be ready at seven... Your favorite I promise..."

I sobbed into my hand again and curled into myself. Not exactly ignoring her on purpose, but not wanting to listen. For the past few days, every time I listened to her I was just getting more bad news. First, it was the news of us moving over a hundred miles away from everything I knew. Then she had told me that I had less than a week to say goodbye to everyone. All this just seemed to crash into me once we arrived at the house and I yelled at mom. I felt bad thinking back on it and I knew she felt bad that all this happened, but it was all in the moment.

About an hour later I laid down in front of the door and fell asleep, having a nightmare about being abandoned and left for dead in the woods.

~----~

"Luna?" A knock at the door roused me out of the nightmare and I gasped. "Sweetheart its past seven. Are you okay? You never came down for dinner..."

Rubbing my eyes I sat up. "What time is it?"

Mom gently opened the door and peaked in, frowning when she saw me on the floor with a drained look. "It's nine at night honey." She opened the door the rest of the way and knelt next to me, pulling me in. "I'll warm up the food and bring some to you. We'll make your bed and you can eat up here okay?"

I nodded into her neck and hugged her close before we both pulled away and she went back downstairs. She moved slow and glanced back at me before disappearing beyond the door, her footsteps creeping down the stairs. I took the time to actually look around my room and take in everything. Noting how all the walls were a nice dark blue.

On the far wall opposite of the door was a fancy window that bulged and curved out the room. I believe they call it a bay window, perfectly centered on the wall and was trimmed with an intricately carved, dark oak pattern. The window seat itself had a dark blue cushion with white lace details. I walked over, stumbling a bit around the boxes that littered the room, nearly tripping over the foot of my bed, and took a seat, looking out at the view it gave. Outside I could see the thick, surrounding woods that seemed completely endless. It was hill after hill after hill of trees that were stuffed so close I felt claustrophobic just looking at it. But there was something about it that seemed eerie. Maybe it was just how vast it all was.

Maybe it was something else...

I felt a hand on my back and the smell of food broke my concentration. "I thought this would be the best place to start new. You never were one for the city, and if you haven't noticed, this ain't no city. Here we only have to drive about ten minutes to get to the market and school. Then you can go straight to the woods and walk around. For about four acres at least. It's all ours. We can hunt or cut it all down if we wanted."

Mom put the plate on my lap and smiled at me when I finally broke contact with the woods to look at her. "You eat and I'll make the bed, put some new sheets on it and dust it all off."

I glanced at the bed which matched the rest of the room, kind of. It had the same dark blue, but there were splashes of green, pink, red, and splattered white. I guess it was supposed to be a homemade galaxy bed sheet? It was pretty decent, to be honest. Mom patted the sheet and dust flew out in all directions as she coughed and tried to wave it away, which made me giggle at it all.

"Well if the house is just as bad as the bed here, we'll have some serious cleaning to do over the next month or so." She laughed and I began eating.