Just a dream

Chapter 14

Nightmares were the same

"Seriously, Ginger? Where are you taking me?"

"The library."

"Library? What do you wanna go to the flippin' library for?"

"Research, Jana."

"No kidding. What are you researching?"

I said it as I walked on, staring straight ahead. "Charlie Dickinson."

If I really was going to do this, I thought that I might as well start as soon as possible. And what better way to learn about what this school was really like than to research its founder - my father. Maybe the research I did on him would lead me to find out what Miss Pearlman had turned his legacy into, and whether that was for good, or for bad.

I knew where to look right away. I had been into the library several times after class. In fact, if I wasn't in the dormitory, it was where you would always find me. And so I knew exactly where the biography section was, and that the several books on this one man were in the very bottom corner, hidden away behind books on cookery and politics and other subjects that no GMD kid ever read.

I selected the first one in reach, and passed another to Jana, shoving it into her hands. She took one look at the book and pulled a face of boredom. But I couldn't do this alone. There wasn't enough time for me to do it alone. There was more that I had to do.

"I am not readin' that." Jana groaned, slamming the book down on the table.

"Yes you are. I need this information, and I need it now. Just, skim through if you're that bored of it." I said, flicking my hands about as I spoke. "I'm just looking for stuff like ... birth, death, family." That word hurt. I wondered if there would be anything about a wife in there? Or a daughter. I didn't know which would hurt more - finding it said he had no family of his own, or that he had a family, just with completely different people.

Jana was giving me an incredulous look. "Why on earth are you doin' this anyway?"

I paused. "Extra class research."

"You really are Miss Goody-Two-Shoes."

I tutted. "Sure." Any other time, I would have accepted it. Usually I was a goody-two-shoes, that wasn't debatable in any way. But now? The soul purpose of this was far from heavenly. In fact, it was to rebel. Before I no longer had the chance. Before my actions had to go into reverse. By then, there would be no one to help me with this. No one willing, anyway. Though, of course, Jana didn't know the full extent of what she was helping me do.

As I flicked through certain books, I found the same information over and over again. Born 1863 - in reality, he was actually born one hundred years after that - founded the school in 1901. Lived a relatively happy life. Died of a heart attack and high blood pressure. Family - two sisters, mother died early, father died a few years before him. No wife. No children.

Not even a mention of having no children.

It was just blank. As soon as his original family information had been written, it just ended there. I doubted the word wife even turned up in several of these books. And child probably only turned up to mention him and his sisters when they were younger.

"Oi, Ginger. What's gotten into you?"

I stopped, and realised how heavy my breathing had become. How watery my eyes seemed. I had to get over this. If I was to complete this mission, to do what Lula told me and find out the truth behind this place, I had to stop getting emotional every time my father was mentioned. But how could I not get emotional? He was my father. I loved him. Even if my last memories of him were so long ago, the love still remained. It always did.