~*Game Called Life*~
Chapter One, revised.
In Which the Game Starts
Twelve-year-old Tabitha Summer Moira Pan Arantee slung her book bag over her shoulder then glanced out the glass doors of her school. Seeing no one, she trudged out of the building, stopping on the top of the steps warily. The faint rustle of leaves almost made her look sharply to her side, where several bushes were moving without the aid of wind. She slid her bag part of the way off her shoulder, sensing danger. A small rock flew past the tip of her nose, just barely missing.
"Bloody 'ell…" Tabitha swore softly, gathering her bag into her arms and getting ready to run. She took off, flying down the sidewalk up to the ominous school, a torrent of boys and stones following her. She yelped as a stone hit her squarely in the thigh and slowed down momentarily, allowing the large crowd of boys to surround her.
"Hey, flower-child, you do crack like your mama?" The boy who spoke was an American by the name of… Ralph, if Tabitha remembered correctly.
She glared at the boy, and snapped back, "At least my mum isn't an moron by nature, you slimy git!"
"So you're agree wit me, Tabs? You didn't say no!" Ralph smirked at her, too stupid to really understand the jab. "Tab-i-tha is a crack-head! Ta-bi- tha does her-o-in! Tab-i-tha is hi-igh!"
The other boys quickly joined the chant. "Ta-bi-tha is a crack-head! Tab-i- tha does her-o-in! Ta-bi-tha is hi-igh!"
The girl in question narrowed her icy-blue eyes, her fists clenching as the boys continued to chant. Finally she had had it and when one of the boys came too near her, she swung her fist into his jaw, sending him flying into another boy. She ducked under another boy's punch, then sent her foot into his stomach. The other boys didn't wait for her to get up; they were on her like blood-crazed piranhas in an instant. Tabitha snarled and bit and scratched and punched and kicked anyone in range of her, but there was one of her and ten or eleven of them. More often than not, the boys ended up hitting each other by mistake. She finally managed to claw her way out of the mob, bruises already forming on her tanned skin. She grabbed her bag and took off before the boys noticed that they were fighting each other rather than her. She took account of her injuries. Her nose was bleeding and quite possibly broken... Again. She thought wryly. Bite and scratch marks, most deep enough to draw blood, covered her face and arms. The white T-shirt she had been wearing was stained deeply red with blood, and her lip was split and swollen. Her right eye would be blackened and swollen in a bit, though it was fine, other than hurting rather badly, at the moment. She muttered to herself, her delicate features stormy. "I'll never have anything to do with the opposite sex. They're all a bunch of jerks. I hate boys!"
She fished her keys from her jeans pocket, approaching her apartment at a run, knowing better than to stop on the streets in this neighborhood. She quickly let herself into the building, making sure the door locked behind her. She shuddered, remembering the time someone had forgot to lock the door. Shaking her head, she ran upstairs and unlocked her door. The smell of marijuana and a heavy cloud of smoke immediately greeted her. She shook her head again, then dropped her book bag on an already crowded couch. Waving her hand in front of her face, she cleared the smoke away momentarily, and walked into the kitchen. She grabbed a cup from the heap of unwashed dishes in the sink, then rinsed it out with soapy water. She opened the refrigerator and grabbed the last slice of a lemon and the gallon container of water. After pouring herself some water and garnishing it with a lemon, she began to wash and dry the dishes, wishing her mother would do something other than smoke pot, shoot up, and eat all day. I'm more of a mother to mum than mum has ever been to me. I've been cleaning the house since I can remember. Why was I born to a hippie mother?
She sighed, drying off the last dish and putting it away before finishing off her water. She washed the glass at well and put the lemon rind in a pile of dried citrus fruit peels her mother insisted on keeping. Walking out of the kitchen, she picked up a CD player and book, then opened the door to her mothers room. Her mum smiled at her, clearly high. She was either high and sweet and happy as a clam, or not and morose and bitchy. There wasn't any in between with Tabitha's mother. Tabitha smiled back at her mother, then sat down beside her bed, sweeping aside the needles that litters the stool.
"Hello, mum. How was your day today?" Tabitha kept the fake smile up, wondering when her mother would sink into her drug-induced stupor.
"Hii schweetie… How wash school...? Peter'sch comin' schoon…" Brooke Margaret Arantee reach up to touch her daughter's face, noticing, just barely, in her drugged haze that Tabitha's smile seemed a little less forced once she did that. She also noticed the bruises and scratches and cuts on her daughter's face.
"School was… okay." Tabitha looked at the floor, pleased that her mother could actually move a little today.
"Whatsh wrong with your facshe? Fight…?" Brooke gently touched Tabitha's swollen eye.
"Yea. I got away before it got too bad. It's all superficial." There was a not added 'this time' to the statement.
"I love you, Tabby… I'm schorry..." Tabitha's mother turned away, grabbed a heroin needle, and stuck it into her vein, needing the pick-me-up after seeing her beloved child's bewildered expression when she told her she loved her.
"Love you too, mum." Her daughter mumbled and smoothed her mothers brilliant red hair from her sweaty forehead. She reached up to touch a lock of her own dark chocolate brown hair. Tabitha sometimes wondered if she was really related to this woman lying on the bed in front of her. Then again, her mother always said she looked like her father.
(A/N Okay, I've never paid attention in Health Class (Yet I still get an A+?), so I have no idea how a person ODing on heroin would be.) Brooke sat up suddenly, gasping for air. Her lungs filled, but her heart had stopped pumping. She continued to cough and gasp for air for several minutes, her world slowly going black as her brain stopped functioning from oxygen deprivation. She reached out and clutched at her daughters hand, who was frozen in shock, not knowing how to react.
"Peter'sch coming for me…" She twitched as she drew in her final breath, her hand opening and releasing Tabitha's. Brooke's brain stopped working, her heart had stopped beating, and now she didn't breath. Brooke Arantee was dead. Her daughter, still sitting beside her bed had her mouth open in a silent scream. She shook her mothers limp body, trying to get her to wake up.
"Mum? Brooke? Mummy? Wake up, mummy! Wake up! Please…? I'll be a good girl from now on! I won't get into any fights! Just mummy, please wake up!" Tabitha sobbed, still shaking her mother. Her hand knocked against the phone. Quickly dialing 999, she sobbed what had happened into the phone and her address. "God, please someone come and help!"
The paramedics arrived in a few minutes. Tabitha held onto consciousness until then, opening the doors for them before falling into the welcome black abyss of unconsciousness.
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"Look at this kid. She looks like she hasn't eaten in a month!"
"How on earth did this case get past Child Services?"
"How could we have no record on her? She looks like she's been in several significantly bad fights."
"Her nose has been broken at least three times, her jaw dislocated once or twice, her arms, ribs, and legs broken and never set, scars covering her from head to toe… I'm surprised she's not dead from the loss of blood!"
"Poor child…"
Tabitha woke several times to the sound of voices, but the memory of her mother hurt too much for her to really wake up fully. She couldn't move anyway, covered in casts and bandages as she was. She was just drifting off into lala-land again when a soft voice at her ear and a hand gently shaking her shoulder woke her up completely. She opened her ice-blue eyes to meet a pair of darker, warmer blue ones.
"Hello, Tabitha. It's Grandmother Jane and Great-Grandmother Wendy. We're going to take you in once you're all better, okay, dear?" Jane smiled down at her, though her heart hurt to realize she had never known this child growing up. Look at her. She's so mangled and gaunt I'm surprised she's not dead from malnutrition.
Looking up at her grandmother, Tabitha nodded. Jane then let go of her shoulder and let her drift off into sleep again. She looked pensively back at her own mother, who simply held out her hand to escort them both out of the room.
"Something's wrong. She's almost dead looking. Mother, what's wrong with her?" Jane asked.
"Jane, how would you feel if I died when you were twelve? A piece of Tabitha died with Margaret. Your poor daughter, she never did remember Peter, and always hoped he'd come, even at the end." Wendy hugged her own daughter tightly, remember how distraught she'd been when Danny died at ten. It couldn't be much different for Jane, even if her daughter was around thirty years old and she hadn't seen her in twelve years.
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Three Years Later
Wendy gazed out the window, hoping that Peter wouldn't forget to come, as he did from time to time. She turned away from the opening to gaze at her skinny, pale descendent who was tossing restlessly in her sleep. Though she was in therapy, Tabitha never had gotten over her mother's death, and she was slowly dying. Wendy did not know how she knew this, but she did. Tabitha was dying, she had lost a large piece of her soul that afternoon those three fateful years ago and she couldn't live without it.
Chapter One, revised.
In Which the Game Starts
Twelve-year-old Tabitha Summer Moira Pan Arantee slung her book bag over her shoulder then glanced out the glass doors of her school. Seeing no one, she trudged out of the building, stopping on the top of the steps warily. The faint rustle of leaves almost made her look sharply to her side, where several bushes were moving without the aid of wind. She slid her bag part of the way off her shoulder, sensing danger. A small rock flew past the tip of her nose, just barely missing.
"Bloody 'ell…" Tabitha swore softly, gathering her bag into her arms and getting ready to run. She took off, flying down the sidewalk up to the ominous school, a torrent of boys and stones following her. She yelped as a stone hit her squarely in the thigh and slowed down momentarily, allowing the large crowd of boys to surround her.
"Hey, flower-child, you do crack like your mama?" The boy who spoke was an American by the name of… Ralph, if Tabitha remembered correctly.
She glared at the boy, and snapped back, "At least my mum isn't an moron by nature, you slimy git!"
"So you're agree wit me, Tabs? You didn't say no!" Ralph smirked at her, too stupid to really understand the jab. "Tab-i-tha is a crack-head! Ta-bi- tha does her-o-in! Tab-i-tha is hi-igh!"
The other boys quickly joined the chant. "Ta-bi-tha is a crack-head! Tab-i- tha does her-o-in! Ta-bi-tha is hi-igh!"
The girl in question narrowed her icy-blue eyes, her fists clenching as the boys continued to chant. Finally she had had it and when one of the boys came too near her, she swung her fist into his jaw, sending him flying into another boy. She ducked under another boy's punch, then sent her foot into his stomach. The other boys didn't wait for her to get up; they were on her like blood-crazed piranhas in an instant. Tabitha snarled and bit and scratched and punched and kicked anyone in range of her, but there was one of her and ten or eleven of them. More often than not, the boys ended up hitting each other by mistake. She finally managed to claw her way out of the mob, bruises already forming on her tanned skin. She grabbed her bag and took off before the boys noticed that they were fighting each other rather than her. She took account of her injuries. Her nose was bleeding and quite possibly broken... Again. She thought wryly. Bite and scratch marks, most deep enough to draw blood, covered her face and arms. The white T-shirt she had been wearing was stained deeply red with blood, and her lip was split and swollen. Her right eye would be blackened and swollen in a bit, though it was fine, other than hurting rather badly, at the moment. She muttered to herself, her delicate features stormy. "I'll never have anything to do with the opposite sex. They're all a bunch of jerks. I hate boys!"
She fished her keys from her jeans pocket, approaching her apartment at a run, knowing better than to stop on the streets in this neighborhood. She quickly let herself into the building, making sure the door locked behind her. She shuddered, remembering the time someone had forgot to lock the door. Shaking her head, she ran upstairs and unlocked her door. The smell of marijuana and a heavy cloud of smoke immediately greeted her. She shook her head again, then dropped her book bag on an already crowded couch. Waving her hand in front of her face, she cleared the smoke away momentarily, and walked into the kitchen. She grabbed a cup from the heap of unwashed dishes in the sink, then rinsed it out with soapy water. She opened the refrigerator and grabbed the last slice of a lemon and the gallon container of water. After pouring herself some water and garnishing it with a lemon, she began to wash and dry the dishes, wishing her mother would do something other than smoke pot, shoot up, and eat all day. I'm more of a mother to mum than mum has ever been to me. I've been cleaning the house since I can remember. Why was I born to a hippie mother?
She sighed, drying off the last dish and putting it away before finishing off her water. She washed the glass at well and put the lemon rind in a pile of dried citrus fruit peels her mother insisted on keeping. Walking out of the kitchen, she picked up a CD player and book, then opened the door to her mothers room. Her mum smiled at her, clearly high. She was either high and sweet and happy as a clam, or not and morose and bitchy. There wasn't any in between with Tabitha's mother. Tabitha smiled back at her mother, then sat down beside her bed, sweeping aside the needles that litters the stool.
"Hello, mum. How was your day today?" Tabitha kept the fake smile up, wondering when her mother would sink into her drug-induced stupor.
"Hii schweetie… How wash school...? Peter'sch comin' schoon…" Brooke Margaret Arantee reach up to touch her daughter's face, noticing, just barely, in her drugged haze that Tabitha's smile seemed a little less forced once she did that. She also noticed the bruises and scratches and cuts on her daughter's face.
"School was… okay." Tabitha looked at the floor, pleased that her mother could actually move a little today.
"Whatsh wrong with your facshe? Fight…?" Brooke gently touched Tabitha's swollen eye.
"Yea. I got away before it got too bad. It's all superficial." There was a not added 'this time' to the statement.
"I love you, Tabby… I'm schorry..." Tabitha's mother turned away, grabbed a heroin needle, and stuck it into her vein, needing the pick-me-up after seeing her beloved child's bewildered expression when she told her she loved her.
"Love you too, mum." Her daughter mumbled and smoothed her mothers brilliant red hair from her sweaty forehead. She reached up to touch a lock of her own dark chocolate brown hair. Tabitha sometimes wondered if she was really related to this woman lying on the bed in front of her. Then again, her mother always said she looked like her father.
(A/N Okay, I've never paid attention in Health Class (Yet I still get an A+?), so I have no idea how a person ODing on heroin would be.) Brooke sat up suddenly, gasping for air. Her lungs filled, but her heart had stopped pumping. She continued to cough and gasp for air for several minutes, her world slowly going black as her brain stopped functioning from oxygen deprivation. She reached out and clutched at her daughters hand, who was frozen in shock, not knowing how to react.
"Peter'sch coming for me…" She twitched as she drew in her final breath, her hand opening and releasing Tabitha's. Brooke's brain stopped working, her heart had stopped beating, and now she didn't breath. Brooke Arantee was dead. Her daughter, still sitting beside her bed had her mouth open in a silent scream. She shook her mothers limp body, trying to get her to wake up.
"Mum? Brooke? Mummy? Wake up, mummy! Wake up! Please…? I'll be a good girl from now on! I won't get into any fights! Just mummy, please wake up!" Tabitha sobbed, still shaking her mother. Her hand knocked against the phone. Quickly dialing 999, she sobbed what had happened into the phone and her address. "God, please someone come and help!"
The paramedics arrived in a few minutes. Tabitha held onto consciousness until then, opening the doors for them before falling into the welcome black abyss of unconsciousness.
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"Look at this kid. She looks like she hasn't eaten in a month!"
"How on earth did this case get past Child Services?"
"How could we have no record on her? She looks like she's been in several significantly bad fights."
"Her nose has been broken at least three times, her jaw dislocated once or twice, her arms, ribs, and legs broken and never set, scars covering her from head to toe… I'm surprised she's not dead from the loss of blood!"
"Poor child…"
Tabitha woke several times to the sound of voices, but the memory of her mother hurt too much for her to really wake up fully. She couldn't move anyway, covered in casts and bandages as she was. She was just drifting off into lala-land again when a soft voice at her ear and a hand gently shaking her shoulder woke her up completely. She opened her ice-blue eyes to meet a pair of darker, warmer blue ones.
"Hello, Tabitha. It's Grandmother Jane and Great-Grandmother Wendy. We're going to take you in once you're all better, okay, dear?" Jane smiled down at her, though her heart hurt to realize she had never known this child growing up. Look at her. She's so mangled and gaunt I'm surprised she's not dead from malnutrition.
Looking up at her grandmother, Tabitha nodded. Jane then let go of her shoulder and let her drift off into sleep again. She looked pensively back at her own mother, who simply held out her hand to escort them both out of the room.
"Something's wrong. She's almost dead looking. Mother, what's wrong with her?" Jane asked.
"Jane, how would you feel if I died when you were twelve? A piece of Tabitha died with Margaret. Your poor daughter, she never did remember Peter, and always hoped he'd come, even at the end." Wendy hugged her own daughter tightly, remember how distraught she'd been when Danny died at ten. It couldn't be much different for Jane, even if her daughter was around thirty years old and she hadn't seen her in twelve years.
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Three Years Later
Wendy gazed out the window, hoping that Peter wouldn't forget to come, as he did from time to time. She turned away from the opening to gaze at her skinny, pale descendent who was tossing restlessly in her sleep. Though she was in therapy, Tabitha never had gotten over her mother's death, and she was slowly dying. Wendy did not know how she knew this, but she did. Tabitha was dying, she had lost a large piece of her soul that afternoon those three fateful years ago and she couldn't live without it.