-Author's Note: Brianna was only three/four months old when her parents died. Not a year old
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"GET UP!" said a familiar but thoroughly irritating voice. "Get up, you freak, and stop that awful shrieking."
Brianna sat up in her narrow wooden bed, sweat pouring from her small, overly thin body, her heart beating so fast it was as though she had just run a gigantic race. Brianna forced herself to take deep breaths, in an effort to calm herself. She knew it was only a dream, but it always felt so real, as if she had really lived through it.
Shielding her eyes from the soft, buttery sunlight that streamed into the small room, through the single, narrow white window beside Brianna's bed, Brianna turned her head so she could see the angry, fuming figure that was her cousin Victoria, who was glaring straight at Brianna. Victoria huffed before turning to the mirror and applying her favourite watermelon flavoured lip gloss, Victoria's perfect blonde hair was neatly brushed and pulled back with a navy blue headband. She was already dressed for school, with her uniform and coat on.
Although Victoria was only a month older than Brianna she acted more mature than her eleven years. Many people assumed Victoria was at least thirteen. Brianna on the other hand looked a lot younger than she actually was so that people received a great shock when they found out her age, most assumed she was six going on seven, rather than a few months off eleven.
"It's eight o'clock, Brianna," Cornelia said. "Get up. We are so late. I don't want to get into trouble because of you again. We've already been late seventeen times this half term Ms. Holden is going to have a fit." fumed Victoria, she then looked at Brianna, her annoyed and irritated expression turning into a sick, twisted smile"And, for I swear to god, if you don't stop this awful shrieking and screaming thing that you do every night. I will gag you! I just can't bear it anymore." She huffed and turned back to the mirror and resumed her preening. Smiling to herself in the mirror.
"Maybe you need to see a shrink," she added as an afterthought, glancing at Brianna before once again turning back to her perfect reflection.
Brianna resisted the urge to punch Victoria in the face, and balled her hands up, managing, with great difficulty to keep her anger in check.
"Okay, okay, I'm up. Give me five," Brianna muttered as she rolled out of bed. She grabbed her towel and matched across the small landing and into the bathroom. Intent on having a shower.
Maybe she did need a shrink, she thought as the water washed over her. Brianna couldn't control the nightmares, and she had no idea why she kept having the same dream over and over again.
She had had the nightmare ever since she could remember but not usually this often. Ever since she had come to live with her Aunt and Uncle a year ago she had the nightmare every single time she closed her eyes.
Brianna could see her mother standing in a small room, holding a baby Brianna in her arms. Brianna could see her mother's face as she was placed into an old fashioned crib. She could hear her mother crying as Brianna stared up at the mobile roaring softly overhead the four animals changing each other.
Brianna could feel the tension in the room double as the door to the small room was blasted open with a loud splintering noise.
The shadowy figure entered the room, casting a dark shadow over the crib when Brianna lay. She could hear her mother's screams, see the flash of green light and then she heard the cold cruel laugh…..She never knew what happened next; it always ended the same way, with a second flash of green light and Brianna screaming, the odd lightning bolt shaped scar on her forehead burning.
Brianna had been separated from her birth parents when she was just a few months old. She didn't know anything about them. But she knew the woman in the dream aas her mother. Brianna couldn't understand how she knew that the small, slender woman, with her fiery red hair and jewel-like green eyes, in her dream was her real mother.
Brianna was adopted when she was barely four months old. She had been found abandoned at the base of a statue, she had been fortunate that the blanket she had been wrapped in had her name embroidered on them when her adoptive parents found me; otherwise, she wouldn't even know what it really was.
The warm shower shook off Brianna's fears, and after wrapping the towel securely around her she went back into her bedroom hoping Victoria had left. To her horror Victoria was still there.
Brianna, still holding the towel securely, struggled to get dressed as fast as she could.
Victoria was pacing up and down the small room as Brianna quickly pulled on her ill-fitting uniform, which consisted of a white shirt tucked into a pleated green tartan skirt, under a moss green blazer. She stuffed her feet into the worn out scruffy black shoes and gathered her books and homework sheets from her desk where she had left them last night.
Brianna hadn't finished all the questions she had been set in the maths workbook nor had she finished yesterday's English homework sheets. As Brianna stuffed her things into the worn out leather satchel she sighed in irritation, she couldn't find the loose bits of paper that were filled with all the word problems they had been set as homework.
Brianna wasn't surprised because her side of the room was an absolute mess, as per usual.
"Come on," Victoria said impatiently, huffing and puffing, she stood with her arms crossed and tapping her foot "hurry up" she hissed.
"Where's my homework?" Brianna asked, frantically looking around for the lost sheets of paper "I can't find yesterday's homework sheets and I know I left them here last night. I was working on them before I went to bed."
A sly smile settled itself on Victoria's face, and she shrugged. "The piles of crumpled sheets lying on your desk?" she asked, putting her hands on her hips.
Brianna turned to look at her and nodded slowly.
"I threw them out with the trash last night after you went to sleep. Mummy said to clean the room, so I did," she said, grinning slyly.
"But that was my homework," Brianna ground out through clenched teeth, trying very hard to keep my anger in check.
"Well, you shouldn't leave them lying all over the place if they are so important," Victoria said, dismissing Brianna with a wave of her hand.
"They were not lying around. They were on my desk," spat Brianna raising her voice. She was so angry, she wanted to slap the stupid smirk of Victoria's picture perfect face, but there was nothing she could do. Brianna had long since discovered that arguing with Victoria never got her anywhere. Victoria always wanted to have the last word and would go to any lengths to make sure that she got the better of Brianna.
Sighing, Brianna resigned herself to the fact that she would have to make up some plausible story about the lost homework and hope that her teacher would believe it. It was highly unlikely they would however, as losing Brianna's homework was one of Victoria's favourite tricks to play.
Their teacher was not going to be pleased with Brianna and both girls knew it.
Brianna looked in the mirror. There was no point in bothering with the unruly tangle of raven coloured curls that was her hair, which had now grown so long it was touching her elbows. Just tying it in a rough ponytail would have to suffice.
"Mummy's going to drive us to school," Victoria said as the two girls rushed downstairs. "You know how she hates to be kept waiting."
Brianna's adoptive Aunt Charlotte was standing in the kitchen, drumming her peach coloured false fingernails on the counter, looking extremely irritated. Her dark, wispy hair was pulled back in an elegant bun, and her sharp, beady eyes glared daggers at Brianna when she walked in.
"Can't you ever be on time, Aurora?" said Aunt Charlotte scathingly, she was obviously in a very bad mood. "Tardiness is not tolerated in this house, Brianna"
Brianna was in a bad mood herself, just gave her adoptive Aunt a sulky nod.
"For the life of me, I cannot figure out why my husband agreed to take you in." Her aunt continued picking up the car keys as she spoke "If it were up to me, I would have sent you back to the slum you came from." aunt Charlotte shot Brianna a glance, her lips turning upwards in a sneer "I see now that while we can take the girl out of the gutter, we can not take the gutter out of the girl"
Victoria erupted into gentle giggles smiling at Brianna, nodding her head, and agreeing with everything her mother said.
Brianna flinched at her aunt's harsh words but chose, with great difficulty, to ignore them. Ignoring her aunt and uncle and cousin was the only way to deal with them when they got like this. Aunt Charlotte was currently waiting for Brianna to react, so she could hyrl more insults at her. It wasn't the first time she had said something like this to Brianna nor would it be the last. But for right now Brianna decided that it was too early in the morning for another fight.
Brianna knew her aunt hated her and didn't want her around. Brianna had tried being courteous and respectful. She had tried to be helpful, when she had first come to live with them she had cleaned her room and completed any chores that had been set without complaint but it changed nothing. Her adoptive relatives were still nasty, vindictive and cruel to Brianna whenever they got a chance. After a while Brianna had given up trying to please them and instead tried to keep herself to herself as much as possible.
Brianna kept her mouth shut and got into the backseat of Aunt Charlotte's battered blue Volvo. She was astonished when her aunt handed her a piece of toast before she started the car.
"I Don't want you fainting in school because you had no time to eat breakfast," said Aunt Charlotte, shooting Brianna a withering glare.
"Thank you," Brianna said, taking it, she was surprised that her aunt seemed to care about her.
"Don't thank me," said Aunt Soohie, meaning every word and glaring at Brianna as if she was an absolute idiot. "I didn't do it for you, I just don't want to be called into school to pick you up later today. I have a very busy day ahead, and I don't have any time for your silly fainting spells."
She started the car, as unruly tears welled in Brianna's eyes. Brianna brushed them away quickly, before anyone could see.
It had been a little under a year since Brianna's adoptive parents had died in a horrific car crash, and since then Brianna had been staying with her adoptive father's brother, his wife, and his daughter at their London home ever since. Brianna considered herself lucky that they agreed to be her guardians; she didn't think they really had to, since she was not actually family, just adopted. But anything was better than being put in the foster system.
Although saying that Brianna couldn't wait to turn eighteen; only then would she be free of the tyranny of my Aunt Charlotte and Victoria, both of whom were also probably counting the days until Brianna left their house. It was just a shame that she would not turn eighteen until eight year later; it seemed like a lifetime.
School was a disaster.
Brianna had to hand in her incomplete homework because of Victoria. Their teacher punished Brianna by revoking breaktime privileges for the rest of the week. Brianna knew Victoria hated her just as much as her Aunt did, but she was much more clever and sly about it.
As the day trudged on, things got steadily worse. Brianna failed the mental mathematics test, got kicked off the netball team, because she was late to practice again, due to the fact that Victoria had hidden her trainers, and then to top it all off, since she had no friends, she had been forced to sit on her own in the school dining room at lunchtime. Just another crappy day in her crappy life.
As Brianna was sitting on one of the small wooden benches outside the main building of the school, minding my own business and watching the others play in their various friend groups, a mousy girl with huge glasses whose name Brianna couldn't remember came up to her and handed her a note. Brianna took it and looked up at her, confused.
"What's this?" she asked. No one had ever given her a note before.
The girl looked embarrassed but didn't say anything. She just avoided my eyes and walked away.
Frowning slightly Brianna opened the note and glanced over it hurriedly. She couldn't believe this was actually happening.
The note was not an ordinary note. It was from Alexis Carrington, the most popular girl in school.
Brianna scanned the crowded playground quickly. Alexis was sitting at one of the picnic tables in the corner, chatting animatedly with a group of her friends. Her hair was icy blonde and cut stylishly short, and she had baby blue eyes.
Suddenly Alexis looked up, and her eyes locked with Brianna. Alexis was a little taken aback, but she gave Brianna a small smile, which Brianna could only interpret as reassuring. Brianna looked away quickly, embarrassed that she had been caught staring at Alexis.
Inside Brianna's chest, her overjoyed heart started doing somersaults; she was ecstatic. Could it be possible that Alexis Carrington had actually noticed her?
Her note said that she wanted Brianna to go to her house for teq on Friday night. But why would Alexis send Briannw a note? She could have just come over and asked Brianna herself? Brianna thought as she mulled things over trying not to let her excitement get the better of her. Alexis did not seem to be the note-passing type. But Brianna could have been wrong about that little fact, she mussed, Brianna gathered her courage and walked across the playground, mentally preparing herself to talk to Alexis.
Alexis was surrounded by her friends. They were a gaggle of giggling girls, whom Brianna recognized as some of Victoria's friends as well. In fact Victoria even sat with them. As Brianna approached, Victoria's smile widened and a sink feeling settled itself into Brianna's stomach, however Brianna pushed it to one side.
"Hi Alexis" she said abruptly, as she reached the group, she was standing awkwardly a little apart from them.
Alexis stopped and turned.
"Oh, um, hello," she said, seeming a little embarrassed and unsure
"Um, I got your note," Brianna said, a little flustered, looking down and shifting from one foot to the other. This was the first time she had actually talked to any of these girls and she desperately wanted to make a good impression.
Alexis raised her eyebrows. "My note?" she said, looking slightly amused.
"Yes," replied Brianna, ignoring the giggles from the girls and hushes and shushes. Brianna, not sure what was happening, hesitated then thinking that maybe Alexis was a bit shy and that she didn't want her friends to know about the invite, lowered her voice and spoke quietly.
"To go to yours for tea on Friday," Brianna said softly. "I just wanted to tell you in person that I would love to come to yours."
To Brianna's utter dismay, Alexus looked highly embarrassed as the rest of the girls erupted into laughter.
"Why would I want you to come to mine for tea?" Alexis said, ignoring the giggles from her friends .
"But the note?" Brianna spluttered and she handed the note that was still clutched in her hand to Alexis. Brianna was very confused, although a growing dread had started to creep into her bewildered mind.
Alexia took the note from Brianna's shaky hand, stopped laughing and scanned it quickly. Finally, she looked up.
"I didn't write this. I'm sorry, but I don't even know your name," she said, more gently this time.
Briana flushed scarlet, someone had played a cruel joke. And it didn't take a genius to figure out who it was.
As even more raucous laughter erupted from Victoria and the other girls. Brianna looked around, at them, her heart beating a thousand times faster than normal. Victoria and her friends were laughing their heads off at Brianna's utter humiliation.
Unshed tears welled up in Brianna's eyes and threatened to spill down her cheeks. She turned and fled across the school playground. She dashed into the main building and hurried along the maze of corridors and finally, disappeared into the girls' bathroom, with the dissipating sounds of Victoria's evil laughter ringing in her ears.
Briqnn was crushed, her already wobbly confidence stamped beneath Victoria's perfectly manicured feet. Brianna knew she wasn't considered a popular girl in school, even when her adoptive parents were alive. Brianna was far too strange for that. It wasn't like it was Brianna's fault, Brianna thought as she allowed herself to cry. It wasn't her fault that strange, unusual and odd things seemed to happen around her. It wasn't like she made them happen.
But now Brianna ould be the school joke, the person everybody whispered about behind their backs.
After crying and feeling sorry for herself for the rest of their hour-long lunch break, Brianna finally managed to dry her tears and wash her face.
She had to try and pull herself together so I
could get to her next class, she thought as she splashed even more cold water on her face. Brianna looked in the mirror. Her face was all blotchy, and her usually bright jewel-like green eyes were dull and bloodshot.
After dragging herself out of the bathroom, she raced towards her classroom and managed to slip into it without drawing too much attention. Brianna sat at the back, where she would not attract undue attention, and tried to listen as Mr. Roberts warbled on about the life cycle of a butterfly but my mind wondered elsewhere and she switched off from the monotonous voice.
Brianna knew her grades had slipped drastically, and knowing that in a few short months' time at the start of September she would be attending the local comprehensive Brianna was working on improving them, but there were some days that she still could not function properly.
Brianna would just lie in her bed for hours, thinking about her adoptive parents and all the good years when she had a real family. They may not have been her birth parents, but they cared for her as if she had been their real daughter.
Brianna's mind was filled with memories that she held on to like a lifeline. Picnics in the park, holidays by the sea, people who actually loved her—and then she would realize that it was gone, that she was all alone and nobody wanted her. And she would cry into her pillow at night, muffling her sobs so that nobody could hear her.
Brianna had more or less given up wondering about her birth parents: who they were and why they had given her up. Why they had just abandoned her the morning after Halloween. No one ever had any answers, and soon she stopped asking altogether. But now that she was having this dream more regularly and not knowing if it was a real memory or just a figment of my imagination. She had begun to wonder about them once more. Brianna tried not to think about it, but the mysterious shadowy figure in the dark ribes who held a long twig in one hand, the tip pointed at her mother's heart seemed all too real.
The amulet Brianna wore around her neck was her only link to my birth parents, and she ever took it off. It was all she had with her when she was adopted. She turned it around between her fingers. It looked like a small gold coin. But
the carvings on it were in a script that she could not recognize. It was her lucky charm, and, although it wasn't much, just having it with her made her feel a lot safe.
"Brianna Fairdale," came the crisp voice of Ms. Holden, the headmistress of the primary school, snapping Brianna jarringly out of her reverie. Brianna looked up. She hadn't even noticed her coming into the classroom.
What had she done now? She wasn't exactly the best student these days. She knew that. But she had made it a point to scrape through just enough to stay out of the headmistress's office until now.
"Brianna, I'd like to see you in my office," said Ms. Holden. She nodded perfunctorily at the bespectacled Mr. Roberts, who looked utterly terrified of her, and walked out of the room.
Brianna gathered her things, stuffed them into her bag and got up from her desk. A few girls sniggered behind me, but Brianna was used to it. Ever since her adoptive parents had died, everyone spoke to her in hushed voices, as if she might crack any minute, or they talked and whispered about her behind her back. Brianna had learned to ignore then and move on.
Nothing, however, could be worse than the humiliation she had experienced earlier that day at the hands of her horrible cousin. Now Brianna knew exactly what everyone was laughing about. She hung my head and hurried out of the classroom.
Headmistress Holden's office was much smaller than Brianna had expected. As Brianna closed the door behind her, she noticed a man was sitting in one of the chairs with his back towards me. Ms. Holden went and sat down opposite
him and directed Brianna to the chair near the man. She walked forward and turned to stare at the familiar face of her adoptive uncle, Christopher Fairdale.
He had a long, angular face, with dark brooding eyes hidden behind horn-rimmed glasses. His hair was a dirty blond color, like wet sand. He was wearing his usual grey pinstripe suit and was dabbing his sweaty forehead with a crumpled handkerchief, which he dug out of his pocket.
What was he doing here? Was she in trouble?
"Good afternoon, Brianna," said Unvlr Christopher. Brianna nodded at him.
Christopher didn't hate Brianna like her aunt and cousin, but most of the time she treated Brianna like she wasn't even there. He wasn't mean to her, but he never stood up for her either. They barely said two words to each other, and Brianna only really saw him at dinnertime. He worked at a bank or something and was out of the house before she woke up.
Ms. Holden cleared her throat before she began.
"Brianna, my dear," Ms. Holden said, in a voice so different from her usual rude, clipped tones that Brianna was momentarily taken aback. Ms Holden always had a sour look on her face, as though she had just eaten a whole bowl of lemons. Brianna had never even seen a flicker of a smile on her face, and now she was grinning away like her life depended on it. Brianna stared at her and then turned back at her uncle. What was he doing here? What had she done now?
"Now Brianna," said Ms. Holden, "your uncle has requested for you to take a leave of absence from school."
"What! Why? Right now?" Briannablurted out. No one had said anything about this.
"Let me finish," said Ms. Holden sternly. "Your grades have been steadily slipping and you have barely passed most of your exams this year. Nevertheless, I have decided to grant you leave this time, since your uncle has explained the circumstances. I believe this absence will be beneficial. You are starting at secondary school in September and really must start thinking about your future aspirations and ambitions"
Brianna looked at her uncle, wondering what the circumstances were, he remained quiet.
"I am sure this time away from your Studies will help you reflect and reprioritise," Ms. Holden said.
It was strange; Brianna's uncle hadn't mentioned anything last night at dinner. Brianna decided she would ask him later. And she wasn't too disappointed; after all, missing so many days of school would be great. And that meant she would be away from all the pointing and whispering, which had been happening since the whole school heard about the incident with Alexis Carrington.
Ms. Holden and Uncle Christopher stood up and shook hands.
"Thank you," said Uncle Christopher to the headmistress. "You have been most helpful. I will have her back in a few days."
He walked across the room and opened the door. "Come on, Brianna, we have a busy day ahead," he said, exiting the principal's gloomy office.
Brianna remained silent, as she followed her uncle out of the school. Brianna had no idea what was going on, but she was sure she was going to find out soon enough.