Chapter One
"Samantha Clark! This is the last time I'll ask you to unlock your door! Open it this instant!" The intense shouting woke the sleeping girl from her dreams. She groaned and forced her foggy head from the pillow. She shrugged the blue comforter off of her and stood. Stiffling a yawn, she crossed the room and clicked the lock on the door. Pulling it open, Sam came face to red face with her foster mom, Claire. Sam's eyes widened and her drowsiness vanished. Claire looked mad, and sometimes that could get really bad.
"Why was the door locked?" Claire asked, twirling her red hair.
"Cause I was sleepin'?" Sam tried, hoping Claire wouldn't yell. Her hope died.
"You idiotic girl! Do you have any idea what time it is? I'm going to be late for work at this rate, since I spent a half hour trying to get into your room! And you have cleaning to do!" Sam winced at every word, praying the rant would end soon.
Then another door opened in the hall, and Sam's sister (Not really) Melody walked into the open. Her eyes were red and puffy, as if she'd been crying, and her face was half hidden by her dark hair and a sweater hood.
"What's going on?" Melody asked, her voice cracking. Claire then realized she'd arrived and began to shout at her, too.
"And you! You're just as bad as she is! How did I get stuck with such lazy brats? I'm leaving for work, now, and when I get back this place better be absolutely spotless!" With that said, Claire turned and stalked away. Sam waited until she heard the front door slam to let out the breath she'd been holding in. Frustration and anger consumed her, and she felt the need to hit something. But the she saw Melody sink to the floor, tears rolling down her face. All of Sam's anger quickly faded into compassion, and she crouched down beside her sister.
"You okay, Mel?" Sam asked, her voice gentle. Melody leaned her head on Sam's shoulder and sighed.
"I just can't take any more stress today," she said.
"What's wrong, Melody? You seem really upset."
"I… I snuck out to see him again last night."
"Please tell me you don't mean Kasey, the guy who has more girlfriends than brain cells."When Melody nodded, Sam sighed hard. "Mel, he's bad news. You shouldn't be dating him."
"I know. I just wish I'd listened to you sooner." This confused Sam.
"What?"
"We got into an argument, and…" Melody dropped her hood and brushed the dark hair away from her face, and Sam gasped. On her right cheek, under the crescent moon scar from the accident that killed her parents, purple bruises were starting to form in the distinct shape of fingerprints.
"Did he do that?" Sam snarled, her voice showing her evident outrage.
"Yeah. I'd noticed that he'd… changed. He'd become possessive and aggressive. So I tried to break up with him last night and…" Melody choked on her sentence. "… he hit me. He called me a stupid worthless bitch. He told me that, without him, I wouldn't be anything." Melody stopped, biting her lip to prevent her eyes from overflowing. Inside, Sam was boiling over with anger.
"That jerk," she muttered under her breath. "He'll pay for what he said."
"But… I think he might be right," Melody said, brushing away tears.
"Mel, you can't seriously believe that crap!" Sam exclaimed, shocked at her sister's suggestion.
"But it's true!" Melody tucked her knees up to her chest and sighed. "The only reason anybody liked me was because I was dating Kasey. Now, I'm just another nobody."
"That's not true!" Sam protested, putting her arm around Melody's shoulders. "Lots of people like you because you're you. Teresa likes you, Victoria likes you, and that new guy Christian likes you. He's much better for you than Kasey anyway. And I like you. I'll always be there for you." Sam brushed her blonde hair away to show her own crescent scar. The same accident had killed parents, making them both orphans. "We're sisters, after all." Melody smiled, despite her sadness, and leaned into her sister's embrace.
"You know," she said, "Sometimes I wonder what I would do without you."
"You'd be in Springfield from all of your emotional breakdowns," was Sam's sarcastic reply. Melody laughed, all of her remorseful feelings gone, and Sam smiled. She was glad that her sister was feeling better; she'd really liked Kasey, despite Sam's warnings. Breaking up with him had to be hard.
"You're probably right," Melody said, looking up with her wide, ever changing eyes. "Thanks Sam."
"Any time," Sam replied. "Now let's go. We've got a lot of work to do, and I don't want to give Claire any more reasons to be mad at me."
For Sam, the morning dragged on and on monotonously. Claire had left an incredibly long list of chores that took both girls until noon to complete halfway. Sam's arms were sore and tired from constant scrubbing, dusting, and sweeping. Her hands were red and wrinkled from the water and bleach, and her clothes were stained and tagged in places. Melody was in no better shape. Her jeans and hands were covered in soft earth from working outside in Claire's garden. When she came inside, dropping dirt on the rug, Sam snapped at her to change her jeans and clean it up.
When Melody returned, sporting a clean pair of sweatpants, Sam was curled up on the living room couch. Her hand was clenched tightly around a small sponge; an abandoned bucket sat in the corner of the room.
"What's wrong?" Melody asked, seating herself on the sofa beside Sam. The blonde looked angry up close, her cheeks flushing a bright red.
"This house is what's wrong," she snarled, dropping the sponge on the carpet. "I hate this place! I hate Claire, and everything she makes us do! I hate being treated like slaves instead of kids! I just want to run away and never look back!" Melody sighed. Sam was in one of her moods. Sometimes she would get so worked up over one thing and would go on and on about it for hours.
"I know, but where would we go?" Melody asked, wrapping her arm around Sam's shoulders. "We have no family to go to."
"Anywhere's better than this dismal house." Sam was growing more and more frustrated every second. Her anger made Melody nervous. She hated seeing her sister get so upset. Before she could say or do anything, the phone rang from a nearby coffee table. The brunette gave it a quick glance before turning back to her sister.
"You answer it," Sam said, resting her head on her knees. "If it's Claire, I won't be able to stop myself from yelling at her, and that won't help either of us." Melody let out a small sigh of regret, but nonetheless went to the phone and picked it up.
"H-hello?" she said rather nervously into the receiver. A few seconds passed as the caller spoke, and Melody's nervous frown turned into a smile. "Tim! You called!" Sam's head snapped up, her blue eyes wide and eager. Hope began to rise in her chest, vanquishing her depression as her sister talked loudly on the phone.
Tim was their foster father, and Claire's fiancé. He was tall, smart, funny, kind, and the closest either girl ever had to a parent. While Claire bullied the girls and forced them to work, Time was gentle and sweet. He would give them gifts and things that normally were banned, and he took them to nice, fun places while Claire was away. Unfortunately, Tim's work required him to travel often, leaving them alone with their foster mother. Now he was at a business conference in Tampa, but he was due to come home soon.
A few minutes passed and then Melody handed her the phone. Sam, in her angst, almost dropped the phone. She put the receiver to her ear excitedly.
"Hi Tim!" she said, practically shouting.
"Hey Sam! How are you?" asked the gruff voice from the other end.
"I'm… okay," Sam responded hesitantly. Tim caught her pause.
"What's wrong, sweetheart? Is Claire overworking you two again?"
"Not really," Sam lied. "How's your business trip going?" she asked, eager to change the subject.
"Good. I'm getting really close to breaking a huge deal."
"So you'll be home soon, right?" Sam couldn't hide the eagerness in her voice.
"Well, actually I have to go straight from Tampa to L.A., so I won't be home for another three weeks." Sam's heart sank like a rock in a pond.
"Oh…" she said. Disappointment hung heavy in her voice.
"I'm sorry, honey. Listen, I have to go now; we're about to start again. But I'll call you as soon as I get to the hotel, okay?"
"Sure, Tim."
"Bye. Tell your sister I love you and miss you both." With that, he hung up, leaving Sam with an empty receiver against her head.
Three weeks. Three weeks. Three weeks. The words echoed over and over in her head. That meant three more weeks of shouting, working, and exhaustion. Hell, she started high school in three weeks! By the time Tim got back, she'd be away all day and couldn't hang out with him. Sam dropped the phone as realization hit her like a gunshot. She felt like keeling over and crying at her sister's feet.
"What's wrong, Sam?" Sam couldn't speak. Before she even had a chance, though, a new set of footsteps entered the house. Sam snapped out of her reverie as panic filled her and she looked around madly. Melody jumped and grabbed for her sister's hand.
"Someone's here," she hissed.
"Do you think it's Claire?" Sam whispered back. The footsteps came closer, a heavy thump, thump, thump on wood.
"That sounds way too big to be Claire!" Melody inched even further behind her sister. Sam's heart pounded, and her fingers curled even tighter around Melody's hand. The two sisters slowly inched backwards until they shut themselves in the small adjoining bathroom. Now inclosed in darkness and shadows, the girls began to panic.
"What do we do?" Melody asked nervously.
"I don't know, call for help?" Sam suggested.
"With what? The phone's out there!"
"Where's your cell phone?"
"Not on me."
"God! The one time we actually need it…!"
"I never carry it when I'm home! What about you? Where's yours?"
"Mine died and is charging in the kitchen."
"Great! So we're stuck here until whoever it is out there leaves?"
"Looks like it."
"But they'll find us eventually! This bathroom can only hold us for-" Melody never got to finish her sentence. At that moment, the bathroom door burst open, ripping one of its hinges. Sam gasped when she saw what it revealed. A mountain of a man stood outside the frame, his body casting an enormous shadow. He stood so tall that his head touched the ceiling. He had a scraggly head of black hair and a thick beard peppered with greys and whites. His clothes were old, tattered, and torn. His face was shadowed, making him twice as ghastly. The only thing cheerful about him was his pink umbrella, which would've made Sam laugh is he wasn't a total stranger in her house.
The man called over his shoulder to someone else in the house, causing Sam to panic even more. Oh god there are more of them, she thought to herself. Think Sam think! There has to be a way out of this mess, but how? Unfortunately, Sam's mind shut down in her state of panic, so she could only do one thing.
Sam fainted, hearing Melody's coarse screaming in her ears.
Hey people! This is a story I'm writing for a friend of mine. We're both absolutely obsessed with Harry Potter, so I decided to make a story where she's the main character and I'm her second. Pleez tell me what you think so I know whether to continue or not. And Sam, if ur reading this, I'M FINALLY DONE!!!!! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! So u can stop bugging me about this now… right?