Another redundant note:
See, another chapter. As promised. I am triumphant! Yay! So, yes. Here you go. I'm so good. Anyway. I'm done with the self-congratulations.
Ego aside, I need your help, people. I am making a desperate plea. I have a few more chapters written that I am currently re-working. There's some really intense stuff coming up soon. And after that... Nothing. I need plot suggestions and advice. Sure, I have my own artistic vision. Yes, it's true that this whole fanfiction thing is a selfish endeavor. I have no illusions about that. But I would *greatly* appreciate some feedback. Where do you see this story going? Do you like the tone? How's the characterization? I am respectfully requesting your input.
Also, I'm craving criticism. Please, please, please. If you read a detail that seems inconsistent, tell me. If I misused a semi-colon, correct me. I am a perfectionist and other author's mistakes irritate me. I assume other readers feel the same way. Let me know if I'm just insane.
Um, sorry. One last thing. Oh, ye Gods, thank you to all the readers who have reviewed. Seeing a review appear in my mailbox makes me jump for joy like a little kid. From the beginning: tiger6, Sayanna The Rover, BalooFairy, draegon-fire, Blind Silence, Sahara, dreamer211, Little-Angel3, Pandora-Moo, if-666, and Xelena. You are all wonderful and each deserve your own crystal ball, complete with ballroom.
Yeah, yeah. The disclaimer still applies. Now, on to the story.
*****************************************************
She was almost there.
It had been dark for some time and the stars were peeking tentatively through occasional breaks in the clouds in the night sky. Sarah had left school as soon as she finished her last exam, driving dangerously fast on the highways in a desperate attempt to get home as quickly as she could. The sense of impending danger she felt increased with every single, agonizingly slow mile.
After a few hours of driving Sarah finally pulled into the driveway of her childhood home, her carelessly packed bags piled high in the back seat of her car. The mere sight of the house, its wide, wrap around porch with windows brightly lit, brought tears to her eyes and a sense of relief to her troubled mind. This was the place that she felt the safest. She needed nothing more right now than the feeling of comfortable security that her home provided.
It felt as though her heart had been pounding in her chest since that morning. She would begin to feel better only to have another memory surface, causing her to break out into a cold sweat. She felt physically exhausted from the constant fear. She knew that being home was the only thing that could calm her. Not that she was here those things would subside. Home was her sanctuary. Her safe haven. She could protect Toby here.
The overwhelming sense of thankful relief washing over her reminded Sarah that things had not always been peaceful in this house. Her resentment at her father's remarriage to Karen and her jealousy over Toby had caused many painful arguments to take place there. Her mother's departure a few years earlier had shattered her world of child-like innocence, catapulting her headlong into a phase of angry rebellion.
She had blamed her father for the divorce. Her Mom loved her. It was Dad's fault. What mother would choose to leave her daughter? She had idolized her mother throughout her childhood; completely blind to the flaws in the woman's character. Namely, her selfish nature. It wasn't until much later that Sarah began to understand the true circumstances of her parent's divorce, after she had spent years silently resenting her father, faulting him for their broken family.
The truth had been much harder to accept than the fiction that Sarah had created. Her mother had chosen to leave to her husband and daughter to pursue her acting career. The pregnancy had been unexpected; the child conceived when her mother was beginning to gain recognition for her professional work. Her parents had married out of a misplaced sense of responsibility and the results had been disastrous.
When her father remarried, Sarah had been crushed. Her dreams of her parents being reunited were destroyed and her anger was immeasurable. So began a the war, a struggle that had ended only after Sarah learned the real reasons her mother left. The truth changed Sarah's perspective completely. Acceptance had been hard, but the unexpected emergence of love and affection for her younger brother had transformed her. The relationship between her and Karen had improved immeasurably since then. She knew that Karen loved her father as much as he deserved, and that allowed Sarah to learn to love her as well.
Sarah turned off the ignition and unbuckled her seat belt. Breathing a sigh of relief, she allowed her body to relax. I'm finally here. Everything's gonna be okay now. She thought. She grabbed her overnight bag from the passenger seat and stepped out of the car, hardly able to keep herself from running up the front steps of her home. She didn't even make it that far. Before she could even walk completely around the front of her car a chest- high, blonde haired form crashed into her full force, sending her back a few steps and making her drop her bag.
"Sarah! You're home! I saw you through the window! Mom told me you weren't coming until tomorrow but I wanted to watch anyway." Toby cried, his arms tight around Sarah's waist, enthusiastic blue eyes staring up at her with excitement.
"Oh, Toby." Sarah dropped to her knees and hugged her brother, immensely relieved to see that he hadn't been harmed while she had been gone. The doubts that had plagued her the entire drive home suddenly vanished as she felt her body relax.
"You got so big!" Sarah laughed, pulling away to look at him, checking instinctively to make sure he was really okay. "What's Karen been feeding you?" She joked, poking the boy lightly in the stomach and tickling him.
"A lotta macaroni and cheese!" He giggled gleefully and threw himself into her arms again, hugging her with all his might. Sarah smiled, her joy at seeing Toby causing her to forget all her worries. He was safe and she was home. Nothing could spoil this reunion.
"You haven't been back since Thanksgiving! I missed you! And I'm off school soon!" Toby rambled excitedly. "And you gotta see this new game Mom and Dad got me. It's the best!"
"Okay, okay. You can show me. I promise. Just let me get inside first, okay?" Sarah laughed.
"Yeah, sure. Lemme help!" He grabbed her overnight bag off the concrete drive way, launching it over his shoulder heavily and sprinted up the front steps where Karen and her Dad were standing in the open doorway. Sarah walked across the porch and wrapped her arms around her stepmother, hugging her warmly.
"Sarah, honey, welcome home!" Karen said, rubbing Sarah's back affectionately and kissing her cheek. "You're so early! We didn't expect you until tomorrow night. How are you? We missed you so much! Are you okay? How were finals? You look stressed."
"Yeah, I'm okay, Karen. I left a little early. I wanted to be home." Sarah smiled at her stepmother and walked over to her Dad, who was grinning at her, and gave him a hug.
"Hi sweetheart. I'm glad you're here. How was the drive?"
"Oh, it was fine. A few flurries on the way, but nothing I couldn't handle."
"That's my girl! Come in, sit down. We were just about to have dinner." Her father guided her inside and took her overnight bag from her little brother, who was unsuccessfully trying to half-drag, half-carry it over the front step. She was greeting with the familiar sounds and smells of home as Toby rushed past her and into the living room, launching himself energetically into an overstuffed recliner and picking up the game controller that rested on the arm of the chair.
"It's a skateboarding game," he exclaimed. "Tony Hawk is the best skater in the whole world! He made the game! See!" Sarah watched as her brother punched a few buttons and the character on the screen jumped onto his skateboard and rode down a handrail past a set of concrete steps. "I get points for cool tricks," he beamed. A score flashed on the television screen over his character's head as it did a little victory dance. "Here, you try it!"
"It looks very cool, Tob!" Sarah exclaimed. She knew she'd never be able to match her brother's skill at the game, but just giving him the chance to try to teach her would be fun. The last video game she remembered being any good at was Mario Brothers, back when she'd had the original Nintendo. "You'll have to teach me, but after dinner, okay?"
"Aw, c'mon, just try for a minute, Sar!" Toby complained.
"Listen, little brother," Sarah teased, "you're just gonna have to wait until after we eat. I've been driving a long time and I'm starved!"
"Fine," Toby said, pouting just enough to make her laugh.
"Don't worry, Tob. I promise we'll play as soon as we're done with dinner." Sarah ruffled his hair affectionately, messing it up enough for her little brother to protest, causing a pillow to be launched in her direction, which quickly turned into an all-out, no holds barred tickle war between the two rambunctious siblings.
"What's going on in there!?" Karen called to them from the kitchen. "Come on, dinner's ready!" And the two siblings chased each other joyfully from the room.
Once the family was seating around the dinner table, food spread out in front of them, her parents began politely questioning Sarah about school.
"How was your semester, Sarah?" Her Dad asked curiously. "Did finals go well?"
Sarah swallowed uncomfortably, dreading telling her parents about her unexpectedly miserable end of the semester. "Well," she began, "everything went pretty well. It was a really stressful, with my internship, you know. Everything turned out okay. Except... Except one class."
"What do you mean, Sarah? What happened?" Karen asked tentatively, an undertone of alarm sneaking into her voice. This was not a good start to parental relations on the first night of her winter vacation. Sarah would never be able to explain the strange circumstances surrounding her failure. She didn't even understand them herself. She braced herself for a confrontation.
"Well, there was this paper... and I didn't get it done, and the professor wouldn't take it late... and..." She stumbled. Not sure how to break the news of her disappointment to the concerned faces across the table. She knew that failing her Mythology class would jeopardize her chance at walking at graduation in the spring with the rest of the seniors. She had never failed a class before. Karen erupted.
"What!? Sarah, how could you? You won't graduate!" She exclaimed.
"Maybe we should discuss this later," her Dad interrupted with a frustrated sigh. He obviously didn't want to ruin the cheerful mood of the evening.
"Sure," Sarah answered softly. She was saved, for the moment. But she knew the damage had been done, both with her parents and at school.
"How's school, Tob?" She inquired, trying to break the uncomfortable silence that had settled over the dinner table.
"It's okay," Toby answered, less than enthusiastically. He was still watching his parent's dismayed faces.
"Now Toby, you're doing very well," Sarah's father added, brightening slightly.
Karen interjected. "But you have to be better about your homework. You'll be going into fourth grade soon and it's much harder."
"It's not my fault," the boy exclaimed defensively. "It's so boring! The books they make us do reports on are stupid. And I like to read!" He declared, indignant. "I wanna read my own books. Adventures about monsters and goblins!"
Sarah instantly choked on the bite of food she had been chewing and launchd into an uncontrollable coughing fit.
"Sarah, are you okay?" Karen asked, offering her a glass of water.
She ignored her stepmother's concern and rounded on Toby, throwing herself up from her seat at the dinner table and turning to face him, her face contorted with a frightening expression.
"What are you talking about Toby? What goblins!?" Sarah was suddenly yelling at her little brother. The boy shrunk back in his chair, afraid of the disconcerting intensity with which his sister was staring at him.
No, no, no, no... Her mind raced. This is not happening. Not happening. Not Toby. She silently prayed that he was talking about some new video game. Not something that had nothing to do with their dangerous past and the startling revelations that had come to her in the past twelve hours.
Her brother looked at her blankly, obviously quite startled, confusion on his face.
"No... nothing..." he whispered quietly, afraid of her reaction to his words.
"Don't lie to me Toby!" Sarah cried, grasping her brother's shoulders forcefully, no longer capable of concealing the alarm in her voice.
"SARAH!" Her father exclaimed, "What's wrong with you?" She looked up into the faces of her parents, both filled with shock at her reckless, seemingly unprovoked behavior. They, too, were standing up, watching the scene between their children with utter dismay. It was the reality check that she needed. Sarah mentally shook herself, smothering her fear. What was she doing? They would never be able to understand her reaction to Toby's mention of goblins. They must think she had gone insane.
"I'm... I'm sorry." She released her brother and smoothed his ruffled shirt. "I don't know what came over me... I must be tired, I guess... Stressed. I'm gonna go upstairs." She hastily retreated from the kitchen, leaving her stunned family still standing around the dinner table.
Sarah rushed up the stairs and escaped into her room, locking the door behind her. She collapsed onto her bed and buried her face in the pillows, counting on them to smother the sound of her crying. She poured out her soul, tears streaking down her face. She was emotionally exhausted.
The constant dreams that had crept into her sleep each night had transformed into a more terrifying reality. Afraid to go to sleep, Sarah had resorted to every possible distraction available to her, but nothing worked for long. When she finally passed out, after hours of depriving herself of sleep, she would inevitably have the same nightmares. Voices and images taunted her, mocking her attempts to blocked them out. Cruelly reminding her that she was helpless to fight them. And now her nightmares had become real. They were threatening her family and her sanity.
She pulled her blankets around her, willing the memories to disappear.
See, another chapter. As promised. I am triumphant! Yay! So, yes. Here you go. I'm so good. Anyway. I'm done with the self-congratulations.
Ego aside, I need your help, people. I am making a desperate plea. I have a few more chapters written that I am currently re-working. There's some really intense stuff coming up soon. And after that... Nothing. I need plot suggestions and advice. Sure, I have my own artistic vision. Yes, it's true that this whole fanfiction thing is a selfish endeavor. I have no illusions about that. But I would *greatly* appreciate some feedback. Where do you see this story going? Do you like the tone? How's the characterization? I am respectfully requesting your input.
Also, I'm craving criticism. Please, please, please. If you read a detail that seems inconsistent, tell me. If I misused a semi-colon, correct me. I am a perfectionist and other author's mistakes irritate me. I assume other readers feel the same way. Let me know if I'm just insane.
Um, sorry. One last thing. Oh, ye Gods, thank you to all the readers who have reviewed. Seeing a review appear in my mailbox makes me jump for joy like a little kid. From the beginning: tiger6, Sayanna The Rover, BalooFairy, draegon-fire, Blind Silence, Sahara, dreamer211, Little-Angel3, Pandora-Moo, if-666, and Xelena. You are all wonderful and each deserve your own crystal ball, complete with ballroom.
Yeah, yeah. The disclaimer still applies. Now, on to the story.
*****************************************************
She was almost there.
It had been dark for some time and the stars were peeking tentatively through occasional breaks in the clouds in the night sky. Sarah had left school as soon as she finished her last exam, driving dangerously fast on the highways in a desperate attempt to get home as quickly as she could. The sense of impending danger she felt increased with every single, agonizingly slow mile.
After a few hours of driving Sarah finally pulled into the driveway of her childhood home, her carelessly packed bags piled high in the back seat of her car. The mere sight of the house, its wide, wrap around porch with windows brightly lit, brought tears to her eyes and a sense of relief to her troubled mind. This was the place that she felt the safest. She needed nothing more right now than the feeling of comfortable security that her home provided.
It felt as though her heart had been pounding in her chest since that morning. She would begin to feel better only to have another memory surface, causing her to break out into a cold sweat. She felt physically exhausted from the constant fear. She knew that being home was the only thing that could calm her. Not that she was here those things would subside. Home was her sanctuary. Her safe haven. She could protect Toby here.
The overwhelming sense of thankful relief washing over her reminded Sarah that things had not always been peaceful in this house. Her resentment at her father's remarriage to Karen and her jealousy over Toby had caused many painful arguments to take place there. Her mother's departure a few years earlier had shattered her world of child-like innocence, catapulting her headlong into a phase of angry rebellion.
She had blamed her father for the divorce. Her Mom loved her. It was Dad's fault. What mother would choose to leave her daughter? She had idolized her mother throughout her childhood; completely blind to the flaws in the woman's character. Namely, her selfish nature. It wasn't until much later that Sarah began to understand the true circumstances of her parent's divorce, after she had spent years silently resenting her father, faulting him for their broken family.
The truth had been much harder to accept than the fiction that Sarah had created. Her mother had chosen to leave to her husband and daughter to pursue her acting career. The pregnancy had been unexpected; the child conceived when her mother was beginning to gain recognition for her professional work. Her parents had married out of a misplaced sense of responsibility and the results had been disastrous.
When her father remarried, Sarah had been crushed. Her dreams of her parents being reunited were destroyed and her anger was immeasurable. So began a the war, a struggle that had ended only after Sarah learned the real reasons her mother left. The truth changed Sarah's perspective completely. Acceptance had been hard, but the unexpected emergence of love and affection for her younger brother had transformed her. The relationship between her and Karen had improved immeasurably since then. She knew that Karen loved her father as much as he deserved, and that allowed Sarah to learn to love her as well.
Sarah turned off the ignition and unbuckled her seat belt. Breathing a sigh of relief, she allowed her body to relax. I'm finally here. Everything's gonna be okay now. She thought. She grabbed her overnight bag from the passenger seat and stepped out of the car, hardly able to keep herself from running up the front steps of her home. She didn't even make it that far. Before she could even walk completely around the front of her car a chest- high, blonde haired form crashed into her full force, sending her back a few steps and making her drop her bag.
"Sarah! You're home! I saw you through the window! Mom told me you weren't coming until tomorrow but I wanted to watch anyway." Toby cried, his arms tight around Sarah's waist, enthusiastic blue eyes staring up at her with excitement.
"Oh, Toby." Sarah dropped to her knees and hugged her brother, immensely relieved to see that he hadn't been harmed while she had been gone. The doubts that had plagued her the entire drive home suddenly vanished as she felt her body relax.
"You got so big!" Sarah laughed, pulling away to look at him, checking instinctively to make sure he was really okay. "What's Karen been feeding you?" She joked, poking the boy lightly in the stomach and tickling him.
"A lotta macaroni and cheese!" He giggled gleefully and threw himself into her arms again, hugging her with all his might. Sarah smiled, her joy at seeing Toby causing her to forget all her worries. He was safe and she was home. Nothing could spoil this reunion.
"You haven't been back since Thanksgiving! I missed you! And I'm off school soon!" Toby rambled excitedly. "And you gotta see this new game Mom and Dad got me. It's the best!"
"Okay, okay. You can show me. I promise. Just let me get inside first, okay?" Sarah laughed.
"Yeah, sure. Lemme help!" He grabbed her overnight bag off the concrete drive way, launching it over his shoulder heavily and sprinted up the front steps where Karen and her Dad were standing in the open doorway. Sarah walked across the porch and wrapped her arms around her stepmother, hugging her warmly.
"Sarah, honey, welcome home!" Karen said, rubbing Sarah's back affectionately and kissing her cheek. "You're so early! We didn't expect you until tomorrow night. How are you? We missed you so much! Are you okay? How were finals? You look stressed."
"Yeah, I'm okay, Karen. I left a little early. I wanted to be home." Sarah smiled at her stepmother and walked over to her Dad, who was grinning at her, and gave him a hug.
"Hi sweetheart. I'm glad you're here. How was the drive?"
"Oh, it was fine. A few flurries on the way, but nothing I couldn't handle."
"That's my girl! Come in, sit down. We were just about to have dinner." Her father guided her inside and took her overnight bag from her little brother, who was unsuccessfully trying to half-drag, half-carry it over the front step. She was greeting with the familiar sounds and smells of home as Toby rushed past her and into the living room, launching himself energetically into an overstuffed recliner and picking up the game controller that rested on the arm of the chair.
"It's a skateboarding game," he exclaimed. "Tony Hawk is the best skater in the whole world! He made the game! See!" Sarah watched as her brother punched a few buttons and the character on the screen jumped onto his skateboard and rode down a handrail past a set of concrete steps. "I get points for cool tricks," he beamed. A score flashed on the television screen over his character's head as it did a little victory dance. "Here, you try it!"
"It looks very cool, Tob!" Sarah exclaimed. She knew she'd never be able to match her brother's skill at the game, but just giving him the chance to try to teach her would be fun. The last video game she remembered being any good at was Mario Brothers, back when she'd had the original Nintendo. "You'll have to teach me, but after dinner, okay?"
"Aw, c'mon, just try for a minute, Sar!" Toby complained.
"Listen, little brother," Sarah teased, "you're just gonna have to wait until after we eat. I've been driving a long time and I'm starved!"
"Fine," Toby said, pouting just enough to make her laugh.
"Don't worry, Tob. I promise we'll play as soon as we're done with dinner." Sarah ruffled his hair affectionately, messing it up enough for her little brother to protest, causing a pillow to be launched in her direction, which quickly turned into an all-out, no holds barred tickle war between the two rambunctious siblings.
"What's going on in there!?" Karen called to them from the kitchen. "Come on, dinner's ready!" And the two siblings chased each other joyfully from the room.
Once the family was seating around the dinner table, food spread out in front of them, her parents began politely questioning Sarah about school.
"How was your semester, Sarah?" Her Dad asked curiously. "Did finals go well?"
Sarah swallowed uncomfortably, dreading telling her parents about her unexpectedly miserable end of the semester. "Well," she began, "everything went pretty well. It was a really stressful, with my internship, you know. Everything turned out okay. Except... Except one class."
"What do you mean, Sarah? What happened?" Karen asked tentatively, an undertone of alarm sneaking into her voice. This was not a good start to parental relations on the first night of her winter vacation. Sarah would never be able to explain the strange circumstances surrounding her failure. She didn't even understand them herself. She braced herself for a confrontation.
"Well, there was this paper... and I didn't get it done, and the professor wouldn't take it late... and..." She stumbled. Not sure how to break the news of her disappointment to the concerned faces across the table. She knew that failing her Mythology class would jeopardize her chance at walking at graduation in the spring with the rest of the seniors. She had never failed a class before. Karen erupted.
"What!? Sarah, how could you? You won't graduate!" She exclaimed.
"Maybe we should discuss this later," her Dad interrupted with a frustrated sigh. He obviously didn't want to ruin the cheerful mood of the evening.
"Sure," Sarah answered softly. She was saved, for the moment. But she knew the damage had been done, both with her parents and at school.
"How's school, Tob?" She inquired, trying to break the uncomfortable silence that had settled over the dinner table.
"It's okay," Toby answered, less than enthusiastically. He was still watching his parent's dismayed faces.
"Now Toby, you're doing very well," Sarah's father added, brightening slightly.
Karen interjected. "But you have to be better about your homework. You'll be going into fourth grade soon and it's much harder."
"It's not my fault," the boy exclaimed defensively. "It's so boring! The books they make us do reports on are stupid. And I like to read!" He declared, indignant. "I wanna read my own books. Adventures about monsters and goblins!"
Sarah instantly choked on the bite of food she had been chewing and launchd into an uncontrollable coughing fit.
"Sarah, are you okay?" Karen asked, offering her a glass of water.
She ignored her stepmother's concern and rounded on Toby, throwing herself up from her seat at the dinner table and turning to face him, her face contorted with a frightening expression.
"What are you talking about Toby? What goblins!?" Sarah was suddenly yelling at her little brother. The boy shrunk back in his chair, afraid of the disconcerting intensity with which his sister was staring at him.
No, no, no, no... Her mind raced. This is not happening. Not happening. Not Toby. She silently prayed that he was talking about some new video game. Not something that had nothing to do with their dangerous past and the startling revelations that had come to her in the past twelve hours.
Her brother looked at her blankly, obviously quite startled, confusion on his face.
"No... nothing..." he whispered quietly, afraid of her reaction to his words.
"Don't lie to me Toby!" Sarah cried, grasping her brother's shoulders forcefully, no longer capable of concealing the alarm in her voice.
"SARAH!" Her father exclaimed, "What's wrong with you?" She looked up into the faces of her parents, both filled with shock at her reckless, seemingly unprovoked behavior. They, too, were standing up, watching the scene between their children with utter dismay. It was the reality check that she needed. Sarah mentally shook herself, smothering her fear. What was she doing? They would never be able to understand her reaction to Toby's mention of goblins. They must think she had gone insane.
"I'm... I'm sorry." She released her brother and smoothed his ruffled shirt. "I don't know what came over me... I must be tired, I guess... Stressed. I'm gonna go upstairs." She hastily retreated from the kitchen, leaving her stunned family still standing around the dinner table.
Sarah rushed up the stairs and escaped into her room, locking the door behind her. She collapsed onto her bed and buried her face in the pillows, counting on them to smother the sound of her crying. She poured out her soul, tears streaking down her face. She was emotionally exhausted.
The constant dreams that had crept into her sleep each night had transformed into a more terrifying reality. Afraid to go to sleep, Sarah had resorted to every possible distraction available to her, but nothing worked for long. When she finally passed out, after hours of depriving herself of sleep, she would inevitably have the same nightmares. Voices and images taunted her, mocking her attempts to blocked them out. Cruelly reminding her that she was helpless to fight them. And now her nightmares had become real. They were threatening her family and her sanity.
She pulled her blankets around her, willing the memories to disappear.