Branded (The Branded Series) (15 page)

“Well, let's
get out of here,” she finally grumbled. “I'm getting hungry.”

My heart was
pulled apart in a hundred different ways. It hurt to breathe. The agony in her
eyes as she turned away made my insides feel like they were crumbling apart. I
just let the best thing in my life slip through my fingers.

The next morning
I woke with
pains in my stomach. I couldn’t remember exactly when I had fallen asleep, but
I remembered seeing a blurry, red three followed by a colon and a couple of
other blurs on my clock at one point, which was well after I had counted over three
thousand sheep and rolled over at least half that many times. I considered
staying in bed and skipping school, but I needed to see Anna even if she didn't
want to see me. Really, I couldn't blame her. I rolled out of bed and stumbled
into the shower as I struggled to keep my eyes open.

My breakfast
went down with little enthusiasm. Oblivious to everything going on around me, I
hadn’t noticed that Mom had made her way down the stairs and into the kitchen.

“Good morning,
sweetheart,” Mom chirped, kissing my head. I was thankful it wasn’t Dad. I
wasn’t in the mood for sarcasm or lectures.

“Mornin’,” I
responded as I watched her pour herself a bowl of cereal. “You're in a good
mood this morning . . . Why?”

“Why not?”

I gave her a
puzzled look and then stated the obvious, “Well, for starters, you hate
mornings.”

Mom gasped.
“Jake! I do not
hate
anything. How many times have I told you not to use
that word?”

I laughed and
rolled my eyes. “Okay, then let me rephrase. You
really
don't like mornings.
What gives?”

“Darling,
today is the first day of the rest of my life. I figure I should start it
properly. With a good attitude. You should try it too. It's very . . .
uplifting.” She waved her hands haphazardly over her head.

Mom was
random. She was known for coming up with weird and so-called "wonderful”
thoughts for the day. She enjoyed life and her infectious personality seemed to
rub off on anyone who spent time with her. I guess that's why I would often
find myself talking with her late at night when there was something bothering
me. She had a special way of making things seem not so bad after all. I wished
I had talked to her last night when I was feeling sorry for myself after
breaking up with Anna.

Mom
interrupted my thoughts. “Well, would you look at this.” She walked over to the
kitchen and ran her fingers across the cupboard doors.

“What is it?”
I strained my eyes to get a closer look.

“It looks like
a certain someone polished the cupboard doors last night while she was
sleeping.” She walked over to the dishwasher and opened the door. “And did the
dishes too.”

“Abby still
sleep cleaning?” I laughed.

“Shh! She's
coming. Don't say anything to her about this.” Mom quickly closed the
dishwasher and stood in front of it as she greeted Abby with a wide smile.
“Good morning, darling.”

“What?” Abby
snapped as she glared at us. She wasn't a morning person either. Must run in
the family.

“Mornin',
Abby,” I laughed as I stood up to put my dishes on the counter. “Mom, apparently
Abby didn't get the memo on today being the first day of the rest of her life.”

Abby reached
out and smacked my arm. “Are you making fun of me?”

“And risk you
not cleaning my room for me? Not a chance.” I picked up my backpack and headed
toward the door.

“Clean your
room? You wish!” Abby shouted after me.

“Love you
guys,” I called as I closed the front door behind me. I could hear Mom assuring
Abby that I had been acting strange all morning and that she had no idea what I
was talking about. Abby had a way of putting a smile on my face, so I was glad
I got to see her before I left for school. It took my mind off of Anna, even if
it were just for a few minutes.

Noah was sitting
in my
driveway when I left the house, so I decided to leave my car at home for the
day. We pulled into Noah’s regular parking spot, the farthest from the school
that he could get, and he cut the engine. He turned to me with a sympathetic
face.

“What?” I
snapped as I opened the door and climbed out.

“Why didn't
you tell me, dude?” Noah got out and jogged around his car to walk the path
next to me.

“Tell you what?”

“Rachel told
me that you broke up with Anna last night. Why didn't you tell me?”

Leave it to
Rachel and her prophetic visions. “Why would I? We're not
girls
.”

“I don't know.
I guess I figured you’d want to talk about it or something,” Noah said.

“And I guess I
figured, why break the peaceful morning silence by complaining about my love
life or lack thereof?”

“Dude, this is
hard on all of us. It's super strange what's going on with us and to have to
change our whole world for it. And I know how you feel about Anna. How you've
always felt about her.”

“Thanks, but
I'm okay,” I lied. “She'll be safer this way.”

As rehearsed, the
morning
messages over the PA announced that five students had been chosen to represent
Bedford High at the environmental conference in Toronto on the weekend. “We are
pleased to send our five volunteers: Claudia Henderson, Nick Murphy, Noah
Morgan, Jake Rovert and Rachel Riley, to represent our school this weekend at
the National Environmental Week Conference being held in Toronto.”

Hesitantly, I
turned to gauge Anna’s reaction to the announcement. Her confusion was evident,
but when she caught me looking, she rolled her eyes and resumed her position.

A few more
minutes and we were dismissed to class. I got up slowly, hoping Anna would come
and talk to me, but Rachel was standing in the way.

“So this
should be fun,” Rachel announced loud enough for everyone around to hear.

“Yeah, great
fun,” I sarcastically added.

“So we leave
Friday morning.” Rachel continued to talk although I had already tuned her out.
“It’s three whole days and I am so excited.”

Anna was
standing out in the hallway, seemingly waiting for us. I smiled and, much to my
surprise, she smiled back. I held my hand up to Rachel, motioning for her to
leave us alone, which she respectfully did.

“So you're an
environmentalist now,” Anna commented as we slowly walked down the hall
together.

“Well, yeah, I
guess. I just thought it would be fun to go,” I lied.

“Since when do
you care about the environment?” she asked.

“I care. I
care a lot, actually. I just don't show it very often.” I bent down and snagged
a chip bag off of the floor and held it up as proof.

“Sure.” Anna
snatched the litter from me and tossed it into a nearby garbage can. “And
Rachel is going too?”

“Geez, Anna.
You have to believe me on this. There is no attraction there at all.” I grabbed
her shoulders and turned her toward me so she could read my face.

“It doesn't
matter, I guess. We're not together anyway.” Anna looked past me with an
expression that I could only read as annoyed.

“Hi Anna.” It
was Rachel. She was like a bad dream I couldn’t get rid of. What was her deal?

“Hi Rachel.”
Anna showed her teeth in a weak attempt to smile.

Rachel linked
her arm through mine and said, “So, Jake, are you excited about the retreat
this weekend?”

I rolled my
eyes and pushed Rachel away. “Horrible timing, Rachel. Really.”

“It's okay.
We're not together. I don't care.” Anna turned and quickly walked away, disappearing
into a crowd of freshmen who were fighting their way to class.

“I was only
trying to help her get over you,” Rachel said.

“Well, you're
not very good at helping. Perhaps you should just stick to fortune-telling.” I
kicked the wall and stormed off.

The next few
days passed
in the same agonizing fashion. It was awkward being around Anna when all I
wanted to do was hold her and tell her how I would never let anything happen to
her. I was beginning to resent my gift. If it was such a gift, then why did I
have to give up so much for it?

The group of
us “environmentalists” were scheduled to leave from the school just before
first period on Friday morning. I was looking forward to seeing Anna once more
before I had to leave. I had just walked into the school with Noah when Anna
jogged over to us.

“Hey guys,”
Anna chimed. Hearing her voice felt like the breath of air you get when you
open a window in an old attic room—a huge relief after feeling suffocated from
the thick dust.

“You look
great,” I stated, as obvious as it was.

Anna laughed,
dramatically flipping her hair over her shoulder. “Don't I always?”

“You have no
idea.” An excitement churned inside of me. Anna was being cordial; she
wasn’t avoiding me. Was she okay now?

“Yeah, so did
you hear about my little visitor last night at three in the morning?”

Visitor? What
visitor!
I felt instantly protective. “Who on Earth would visit you in the middle of the
night?”

“Relax. It was
Abby. She was sleepwalking.” Anna laughed.

Although
relieved for Anna’s sake, I was now sick about the fact that Abby was sleepwalking
outside . . . in the middle of the night!

“Are you
kidding me? Why? Is she okay? What did she say? What did you do?” I had a
million questions, but mostly I just wanted to know she was okay and that she
made it home safely. I hadn't seen Abby this morning before I left for school,
so my mind was racing and my stomach was turning.

“She's fine. I
walked her home after she was done. Your mom met me at your door after I called
her to let her know I was bringing her back. She was frantic. I'm surprised she
didn't tell you this morning.”

“No, she
didn't. Come to think of it, I didn’t get to see either of them this morning when
I left for school. What was Abby doing at your house? Did she clean your
kitchen too?” My stomach was settling now that I knew she was okay, although
now I was concerned for my mom, who was paranoid enough as it was. This incident
would likely cause her to set up camp outside Abby's bedroom door every night
for the rest of her life.

“It was weird.
She rang the doorbell, which scared the life
out of me. Gretta answered
the door.” Anna paused, suppressing a laugh. “It was priceless, Jake. Gretta
had this frying pan in her hand. She was ready to fry an intruder.” Anna
laughed as she recounted her nanny’s actions. “Then Abby politely asked if she
could speak to me privately. I could tell she was sleepwalking because she
mumbled a lot and her eyes were hardly open.”

“Yeah, that's
her,” I said, nodding in confirmation. “So weird that she would do that. It's
kind of creepy actually.”

“Yeah, so then
she hands me this piece of paper”—Anna held up a folded piece of paper in her
hands—“and tells me not to lose hope.”

I took the
paper from Anna's hand and slowly unfolded it. I felt the colour drain from my
face as I recognized the paper and its markings. It was mine. It was a piece of
paper that I had been doodling on in my bedroom a couple of nights before when
I was supposed to be doing math homework. I vaguely remembered what I had
doodled, and I never dreamed it would end up anywhere other than in my garbage
can.

My eyes
pinballed the page from the heart in the centre, which encased Anna's name in
big block letters, to “Jake loves Anna” in big block letters, to a pathetic
attempt at a daisy with three missing petals. My eyes finally rested on a poem at
the bottom of the page. The colour returned to my face, in a deep crimson, as I
silently read the poem:

No
matter where I go,

I
need you to know.

No
matter what I do,

I
will always love you.

I slowly
folded the paper and held it out for Anna. My eyes weren’t yet able to find
hers. So embarrassing. I felt a slew of emotions toward Abby. Although I was
relieved that she was safe, I wasn't sure harming her when I got home wasn’t entirely
out of the question.
Why would she do this to me—consciously or not?

“Keep it. It's
yours.” Anna said as she pushed my hand back toward me with the paper still
folded between my fingers.

“This is
embarrassing,” I admitted.

“Don't be
embarrassed. I thought it was super sweet. So I decided to make one for you
too.” She handed me another piece of paper, folded in the same way.