Unbroken
Out the door I'm a walking like a runaway
All the reasons that I count of you can hold away
More and more I'm a walking like a runaway- Red Hot Chili Peppers
Chapter 1: The escape
This is it. This is how I die. As I run through the dark alley way of an unknown street in London I'm thinking about my last moments. Will I make it? I doubt it. I wish I
could see my sweet brother once more. Focus I tell myself. Focus on the uneven pavement. Don't trip, don't look back. Focus on my heart beat. I need to run as fast as
my little heart is going. I think about how stupid it was to try to befriend such an unstable freak like him…a psychopath. Why do I have to be like that? Take in
everything that looks damaged and try to fix it. As I continue running with the sound of my heart pounding harder than any Metallica song, I realize that there is no
fixing this guy- there never was and I've realized this too late. Just as I approach the end of this alley, I start thinking that maybeI can make it. I can already see
London eye and masses of people. He can't get to me there. Ok, maybe he can but my survival rate is higher. I can yell and someone will instantly notice. I can do this,
I can-
I can't do this. A step before I break into the light and out of this dark alley way, something from the corner pulls me into some darker place. The room is literally pitch
dark except for the entrance from where I was dragged in. There's a tiny bit of gray lighting dancing on the edges, and then there's a single pure ray of sunlight
shinning in from the broken window next to the entrance.
As a hand is placed over my mouth and my wrist is yanked I tell myself to think. "Think think think." My mind rages
I keep my eyes wide open as he struggles with me. As I look down to see if I have a clean shot of his foot, I notice three bricks by the window.
"Bingo" I think.
I immediately drop to the ground and back myself close enough the window, but not near enough for him to notice the bricks.
Kneeling down, he inches closer to my face. He's so close I can smell the sweat and tobacco off of him. He zeroes in on my face and whispers, "Gotcha." As I turn my
face to catch some fresh air I notice something in the far end of the room. It's too dark to see what it is. As I try to tilt my head back a bit to see the object with better
lighting, he grabs my face with both of his hands and says,
"We could have had it all babe. You could have been my partner, BUT NO!" he yells
"You lied to me!" I hiss
He stares at me and says, "I only did it to protect you." He reaches for his coat's pocket never breaking eye contact from me. Knowing what's in his pocket I start to
tear up and that's when he says,
"Don't cry babe. Luckily for you, I still love you. I'll make this quick and painless." He whispers as if to calm me down.
As if.
Knowing that a sick and twisted part of him still loves me, I put on my A++ acting skills and cry even more. I use my fatigue to shake and fake the symptoms of a pre-
panic attack. Seeing this, he takes his empty hand and brushes my cheek.
"You were so good. Any last words?" he says
I blink the last of my tears and say, "Yes."
Dropping his head as if to wait for me to finish my last words, I plant my knee right on his chin and take a hold of his gun. I push him back and before I aim for the
gasoline tank behind the room I say,
"This is how I disappear."
*BANG*.
As the gasoline tank bursts into flames, I jump out of that room with minor damage.
I don't look back. I just take the same alleyway I tried to escape and keep running. As I fall to the ground with my tears, I notice the little puddle in front of me.
Through its reflection, I can see gray smoke forming around the sky. The building is burning down, and hopefully he's rotting in hell with it.
I get up and continue running. I can hear people shouting. Some are asking for the fire department while others are saying, "There she is."
I realize there talking about me. I can't look back. Not again. Deciding it's better to catch pneumonia than be caught by the police; I take my white coat off and throw it
in a trashcan. I look at my gloves and decide it's too risky to throw those away there. Once I'm nearing the public's busy streets. I wipe my cheeks and try to act
normal. As I walk among the crowd of people, I can feel their stares. I can smell my burnt hair. I don't even want to look at it. I continue walking until I find my
brother's house. Before I wind up where I was heading for safety, I'm grabbed by yet another hand.
Jumping, a rather smooth voice says, "Girlfriend, I can't let you walk my streets like that."
The hand pulls me into a salon and that's when I take in the hand that had pulled me. It belonged to a tall man, say 6'3 6'4. He had dark smooth skin and piercing
green eyes. His hair was about as long as mine, but it was very nicely braded into some intricate braid. Despite his hair being bright red, he topped it off with a teal
and orange scarf around his head. One arm of the scarf hung on his shoulder as the other hung loose on his black.
"Mama sit down." He said
I looked around the room and saw dancing eyes on me from every client. I would have felt very uncomfortable, but the people's stare wasn't an ugly stare. It looked
like they were curious as to what this guy was going to do with me.
"My name's Lafayette." He said
"I don't have any money." I say as I begin to get up.
He gently presses his hands down on my shoulders and says,
"Girl, I don't care. You can pay me back later, but I mean it- no one walks out of my street looking like this."
I give him a warm smile and he begins to place a cape around my neck. As he turns the chair for me to face the mirror, my eyes shoot open. Holy shit- about a good 4
inches of my hair had been singed by the fire. Lafayette stares at me from the mirror and then comes closer and grabs my face. He moves my chin from left to right and
says, "You got a nice face but sad eyes pretty girl."
My eyes begin to water and then he says, "Rough day?"
I nod. "You don't even know." I think.
Lafayette looks at me once more and says, "Alright, what can I do to you pretty birdie."
I smile at that and realize that this is perfect. I do need a makeover. I can't go back out. For sure the police is already parading the scene and if I go out someone can
recognize me and that would blow. I speak up and say, "I want to look completely different." "Turn me into something that looks kickass. Something people turn their
heads for and think, "She's badass."
Lafayette squints and says, "Yas! There's the fire in your eyes- you can definitely pull it off."
"Surprise me." I tell him
Lafayette smiles and says, "girlfriend, you gonna be fierce."
The ladies in the room smile along with the other stylists. After five minutes Lafayette comes back with a bowl and starts mixing a few things together.
"You ready?" he asks
"100% " I reply
"Alright, in order for this to be a surprise, I'm going to need you to trust me and close your eyes he says."
Before resting my eyes, I stare at myself in the mirror and think, "Good bye Jane."
I hears a bottle spritzing water into my hair and the sound of sharp scissors cutting away locks of my burnt hair. After he stops cutting my hair, I feel something like
goo on my head.
Half an hour later, I feel something being wrapped around my head. Opening my eyes Lafayette smiles and says, "We need to let it sit."
In the meantime, let's get rid of those dirty gloves." He says
I cringe but take them off.
"Can we throw them away?" I ask
"With pleasure!" he says as he dumps them into a trashcan full of bottles of dye. Full of chemicals that will surely dissolve any prints or evidence on those gloves.
Lafayette takes one of my hands and says, "Pretty hands, but could use a little manicure."
He motions me to follow him and sits me down a few feet away from the chair I previously sat in.
"Do you like plastic nails, regular varnish or what?" he asks
"I prefer gel." I say
"Great!" he replies taking out swatches
I end up picking white, and then realize that's so Jane. "You pick a color for me." I say
Happily, Lafayette smiles and selects a black nail polish and another varnish with silver specks.
"What's that other one for?" I ask
"This one's for your ring finger, to switch it up." He answers
Lafayette once again emerges in what seems to be his passion- making people look better. After two coats and two rounds of subtle radiation with that little oven
machine, Lafayette walks me to a seat and tells me to lean my head back. Once again he reminds me to keep my eyes shut as he rinses the dye out of my hair. When
he towel dries my hair a bit, Lafayette says, "Okay, I'm going to start styling it now, but keep your eyes closed." He warns
"Cross my heart I will." I say.
With that, the sound of a hair dryers roars and my hair gently slaps my face. Part of me feels relieved that my head feels weightless, and another part of me- Jane
comes to surface and I'm freaked out that the hair slapping my face brushes my jaw and not my shoulders. Did he cut it really short? I think.
After about twenty minutes Lafayette massages my temples and says,
"Ok open them in 1, 2, open!" he shouts.
My eyes become two huge moons and I laugh- I'm a ginger.
"I'm a bloody ginger!" I shout excited
"You said surprise me!" Lafayette responds
"You have little freckles in your face, and you're too fair to go dark and blonde is so yesterday and you had light brown hair meaning we wouldn't need bleach so-
"Lafayette I love it!" I say
Lafayette giggles and claps his hands.
"Really?" he asks
"Yes! You chose a nice shade of ginger. Not too blonde and just dark enough to be a little brown but more red." I say
I stare at the mirror for a little longer and take it all in. My hair is no longer light golden brown. The tips don't end near my butt anymore. There's a bunch of layers
framing my face. Some layers at my chin, some below it, and some at my shoulders. My longest hair lengths were a little bit below my shoulders. Looking at all the
layers I realized it looked very texturized and different from the flat boring hair I use to have. I look at my brows and find myself pleased that they still match my hair.
The new brown red color brings out my eyes and even makes them look brighter than before. I smile at this and Lafayette smiles too.
"Hug?" I say
Lafayette hugs me and as we pull away I say,
"I'm going to pay you back, I promise."
"I think this is some of the finest work I've done." He says pleased with himself.
The remaining ladies in the room compliment my hair and Lafayette. As Lafayette walks me outside, he says, "You come back here any time pretty birdie."
"You bet on it." I say
Looking at the streets Lafayette notices my worry and says,
"You're not from here are you?"
"Nope." I say
He smiles and says, "Do you need a cab?"
I nod and he immediately lets out a magical whistle that makes a cab pull over. He opens the door and says, "You never told me your name."
"Jane." I say
"What?" he says bewildered
"You are no plain Jane anymore." He smiles
I think for a second and say, my middle name is Zelig."
"Zelig, that's more like It."
"Go rule the world." He says.
With a smile we say good bye and part ways.
The taxi driver eyes me from the rear view mirror and says, "Where to?"
Digging into my dresses pocket I realize he took my phone. Thanking my genetics for the good memory I say, "221B Baker Street."
"Aye, not there again." He says
"Excuse me?" I say
"Nothing, I said you look nice." The cab driver responds.
Too exhausted and confused, I decide to drop it.
After 15 minutes the cab pulls out to a rather nice street. As I give the man his money, he mumbles good luck and I step out. I take in the crisp black door and beige
exterior. Sighing a sigh of relief, I climb up three steps and knock.
Almost instantly the door opens and a friendly looking woman opens the door.
"Oh, hello!" she cheerily says
"Hi I'm-
"You must be one of the clients." She happily says.
She extends the door open and says, "Follow me. I'm sure the boys will be very happy to see you- they don't normally get such pretty girls."
Walking up the stairs I look at her like she's gone mad.
She seems very friendly, and in good shape for her age but something's off about her. Just as I continue to analyze her I hear the sound of a thud and see that John
has dropped a book. A tall man with extremely dark curly hair stands looking outside the living room's window like he's contemplating the cure to cancer.
John continues to stare at me with his mouth forming a small "O" and wide eyes.
"Omg!" he says as he runs towards me and embraces me with a full on bear hug.
As John exclaims, "You said you'd be here next week, you're early!" The man who stood at the window now faced us both with a bewildered expression.
I see his piercing blue eyes staring me down and I just cock my head to the side.
"Sherlock, this is-
"Zelig!" I say before John can say my first name.
John raises his eyebrows and says, "Yes, Zelig. Sherlock, this is my sister Zelig."
Feeling uncomfortable with his stare, I look down and realize that my right leg's legging has ripped from the knee and a little bit of blood is visible. I ignore that and
focus on my shoes. Still looking at my little booties I say, "Nice to finally meet you Sherlock."
John nervously smiles and says, "Sherlock!" Sherlock seems to snap out of it and says, "Yes nice to meet you too." And then paces back and forth around the room
"He's a little weird." John says
"It's ok." I say
John still glances at his friend and then as reassurance I add, "You're weird and I like you."
"Yes but you're my sister." He replies
"Okay fine, we're weird and people still love us." I say
He smiles and says, "Oh I've missed you."
Sherlock grunts and says, "John, WE DON'T HAVE TIME FOR PARADING YOUR SISTER'S APPEARANCE, WE GOTTA FIND HIM!"
Taken a back I frown and John shakes his head," Sherlock, he's not here, he's taunting you." John says walking to his friend
"No, Moriarty's here! I can sense him, I can smell him. He's definitely here." Sherlock hisses.
The sound of his name makes me cringe. It all comes back. The previous week blurs through my mind. The torture, the experiments, the fear, everything is so real
again. I drop to the ground and both instantly turn around.
John worriedly kneels by my side and Sherlock looks at me with confusion again. He comes closer and see's my bloody knee. John detects it too and says,
"Zelig, what's wrong?"
I sincerely begin to shake. I refuse to shut my eyes for fear that If I do, being here is all a dream and I'll wake up in that nightmare of a life I lived just last week.
"No, no, no!" I say pulling my hair.
I look up at Sherlock and for a minute I feel like a science experiment. He's not looking at me with concern- he's emotionless.
He's looking for a clue. Just like him.
I look back at John and say, "Tell me he didn't just say Moriarty."
As John frowns, Sherlock kneels down and before he can say anything else, another familiar voice says, "Yes, he said Moriarty dear."
"Mycroft." Sherlock hisses
Mycroft looks at me with both disgust and sorrow. However, the closer he gets to my now trembling body, his features soften up and he says, "Don't be scared now,
you're safe with us."
"What the hell is going on?" John yells
"We have a lot of explaining to do, don't we Jane?" Mycroft says
"I, I…" I try to say something but that blackness consumes me whole. I am dead.
No, my heart's still beating.
I've passed out.