Chapter Three

Tea woke up the next morning in another fitful swing of her bad nights. Today she saw as another day coming and couldn't care less of whether she went to school or not.

Today she was going to play hooky.

She rarely did this but she felt considering that after last night's dream that it was time to go pay a visit to her sister's grave.

That dream, she thought recalling in every detail as to what happened in it. The dream was very.... different. She was walking in a dark room; following whatever it was telling her to go to the one room that seems to draw her near. Walking over towards a door. The door itself was old and had many ancient carvings etched and written. Written in blood.

Blood on the door, and those carvings they were very odd looking, this wasn't a very good sign, but she had to. She had to see Anzu. She could hear her from behind the door.

'Ahh.... paper flowers....'

Tea gripped the knob slowly and felt it turned under her hands and the door opened.

Ahh...Paper flowers

I linger in the doorway
Of alarm clock screaming
Monsters calling my name

Her sister was standing alone in a long dark hallway with mirrors all around, sitting there and looking straight at her with those empty eyes.

'Tea....' She whispered and Tea could tell that her sister was there somehow, she knew. The only thing that was very different was that Anzu had no weapons to kill herself. No knives or guns in hand, no noose hanging above her, no bottles with poisons or pills getting ready to be drunk.

Very very weird. Something was definitely wrong with this dream.

The shadows that appeared in all the corners of the room made Tea felt chills as if those silhouettes could see them and then she did see them. Eyes. All around, eyes watching them and staring. More than that, they seem to be wanting, reaching out to the two of them...A figure-like one stood in the back of the room, behind Anzu, standing still. Then moving closer to her...

Oh god no, they coming to take her away!

Let me stay
Where the wind will whisper to me
Where the raindrops
As they're falling tell a story

Tea saw this and tried to go over towards her sister, to keep the shadows away. Whatever that shadows are, they wanted Anzu and damn herself if she let that happened! Stay away, Anzu run! Stay away from the shadows Anzu! Tea tried to reach her sister and before she could, she saw her fading.

Fading into darkness....and into the shadows.

Along with that lone shadow following her and grabbing her, taking her away.

In my field of paper flowers
And candy clouds of lullaby
I lie inside myself for hours
And watch my purple sky fly over me

(flowers!)

"Anzu!" Tea cried out, screaming out for her to hear her. Trying to make sure she didn't lose her from her site. Anzu looked at her sadly, Tea as much as she could tried to reach her but all was in vain as she kept disappearing into the darkness, the shadows wrapping themselves around Anzu until she was not there anymore. This had been the worst of all nightmares put together, her sister was gone and been taken.

No...no!!!!!!!!!

Tea's eyes fluttered opened and stared outside to the window. Again she thought how miserable it was to lose Anzu. To feel the pain and lost all over again and again in her nightmares. Gripping her pillow tight to her chest, she wept silently in the white fabric.

Why did you have to leave me...

She remembered eight years ago, back when yesterday had only been the best birthday ever, she wanted to go and give her sister the biggest and bestest hug she would for such a wonderful gift.
Sis is so great, she does a lot of great things for me, maybe I should do something for her, she thought as she knocked on her sister's door and waited.

No answer. She knocked again and still Anzu didn't open it.

Funny, her sister was rarely a heavy sleeper and she would never sleep in too long before getting ready for work and such. Tea opened the door and stepped in. She knew something was wrong when she entered. The bed was empty and looked like it hadn't been opened. She looked about, to see if Anzu had left any notes as if to go head somewhere and what time she would come back.
Odd that she wouldn't. She headed back to her room where she found a deck of her cards outs and on top was her sister's including her 'shining friendship'. She picked up that card and looked at it while sitting down on the bed.

I wondered when sis's coming back....she waited and waited until she heard the doorbell rang. Maybe that was her now! She jumped off the bed and headed over to the door to find one out of the three people she knew standing in the hallway. The person she knew was Miss Abigail Kisbo, their neighbor across the hall from their room. And the two unknown people were police officer. And their faces were grim and sad-looking.

She didn't understand what was happening until Miss Kisbo took her to her to the side and explain what happened: her sister was dead.She was shocked and confused and most of all not believing what she just heard.

Dead...but that can't be, that can't be true. It was a lie, a horrible cruel lie! She wanted to know where her sister was and again and again Miss Kisbo said what she couldn't believe or accept it.

My sister can't be dead! She can't she can't be! My sister can't be! She cried and felt the fallen tears fell down her cheeks running. Miss Kisbo tried to calm her and to assured her everything was going to be alright before Tea ran from them and headed in her sister's room and tried to lock the door. The police made grabs at her, and she made herself struggle, scream, kick, anything she could to be possible let go. But in the end, they took her away from the apartment for 'further investigations' they said to an orphanage which she had been lasted been with her sister. But now she was all alone there without her older sister to love or protect her.

Don't say I'm out of touch
With this rampant chaos- your reality
I know well what lies beyond my sleeping refuge
The nightmare I built my own world to escape

She had yelled and wailed, crying where was Anzu, where was her big sister? What happened to her? That they lied, her sister wasn't dead, that she wasn't! She might be hurt or injure and could be in the hosptial sure, but dead, there was no way! She continued this trantrum until a doctor was called for and gave her a shot to calm her down.

They never told her of how her sister died at all ever. All they said was that she was found dead, no talk of any signs of death or anything that could have lead her to her end.

Soon later when a few days had past and Tea was calmer then, she came to realize that her sister really was dead and was never coming back. She felt so alone. Alone and uncare for in this world.

Then and now...

In my field of paper flowers
And candy clouds of lullaby
I lie inside myself for hours
And watch my purple sky fly over me

(Flowers!)

So it was left that Tea's sister died of something that everyone knew or somewhat knew of what happened except herself on the case.

How did she died, what was the causes, how could my sister leave me so soon? The little girl thought as she was taken into the orphanage and made to wait for two years until a family came and adopt her. Sadly lost and alone, without a person to care for her the way her sister did. No one but Anzu was the only one she had ever been feel freed and loved.

Tea looked at her clock again. It was close to seven and she knew she wouldn't be able to make it for first period.

Ah...who cares!

And that's when she got out of bed and changed into different clothes. She wouldn't go to school. Instead she'll go and pay her sister's grave some respect. With her mind determined and set, she took her purse and walked out and locked the door behind.

She took a long walk downtown to where a florist shop was, selling all kinds and for many occasions. Such as this, she thought as she went in, the bell chiming of her entrance. She walked from aisle to aisle, seeing the many cheerful and colorful flowers and bouquets that she saw. She went over to the rose section and found the one bouquet she wanted.

Black, black roses. They were ebony black, shining darkly among the many happy colors, seeming mysterious in that ocean of brightness. Just like she, she was lost in that sea of happy and joyful colors of what life and joys had been before for her. Grabbing the bouquet, she headed over to the counter and paid for her merchandise.

The old lady at the register looked at the rose and then at her. "You young ladies shouldn't really have those kind of flowers. I thought you might go for the more colorful ones..."

"Actually theses are for someone else." And she swallowed before saying, "My sister prefer these and I'm visiting her today."

The old woman perked up and smiled kindly at her. "Oh that's nice, where does your sister live?"

Tea looked at her annoyed but said, "Down Section three, 45ave." The old lady's face vaulted down and said, "Oh I'm terribly sorry miss."

Down Section three, 45ave was the address for the Domino Cemetery. Tea wanted to shout at her. 'I don't need pity! I just want my sister back and I want her to stop haunting me with horrid images of her killing herself which the Hell is not how she died!' That's what she wanted to say, but she kept this in to herself as she walked out, carrying the bouquet tightly in her hand.

Walking down the street to the cemetary took almost an hour and a half before she reached there than twenty minutes to find Anzu's grave. She wanted to clear her mind on everything. Everything that seem to lead her to have no ways of controlling over herself or the life that she was living.

Swallowed up in the sound of my screaming
Cannot cease for the fear of silent nights
Oh how I long for the deep sleep dreaming
The goddess of imaginary light

Tea was walking quietly, the sky overhead turning gray and a light drizzle fell on her. Before walking to the other side, she saw a limo coming over down her way. Whoever it was she could care less.

But she didn't realize who that certain someone was until the window rolled down and a cold voice called out to her. "Gardener what are you doing?"

She stopped dead in her tracks and turned to see those ice blue eyes of his.

Kaiba. Why was he doing down here, wasn't he suppose to be running his company or at school or something. She would ignore him and head her way and pretend that none of this happened. Like he would care of what she was doing.

But today wasn't her day.

"Gardener..." She heard him growl at her, but she did not turn her head as she made her way away from him. Kaiba who stared at her annoyed and ticked.
When he had been heading for a meeting down here in proposition to do business with another company, he instantly recognized the cheery blue eyed brunette walking out of the shop and heading out. Why wasn't she at school and what's with the roses? When he told the driver to go towards her. He wanted to know what she was doing but she had decided to give him cold shoulder and leave.

Who did she think she was, ignoring him like that! He told the driver to follow up to her. He did and when Tea saw this, she turned and glared. "What do you want Kaiba?" She sneered. "Get in."

"Why should I?" Why did Kaiba want her to get into his limo?

"Because it's raining for one reason and the second is Mokuba would be mad and have a fit at me if I didn't help you, now would I?"

She rolled her eyes, figures. Mokuba seemed to care a lot about her and she with him as he was lucky to have his brother, unfortunely, he was always working at school, home and office 24/7. Kaiba waited for her answer. "Well?"

The rain started to get heavy and she knew that the bouquet would get overwatered before she could rest them on Anzu's tombstone.

"Fine." She said, grabbing the door and yanking it open and stepping in. Tea slammed the door hard and the driver turned to ask where to.

"Take me down past Western C corner, then make a left turn on South central and drop me off there." She told him and the driver drove. Tea and Kaiba sat in silence, not speaking or saying a thing to each other. She stared outside the window and saw the rain plittter-platter on the windows, each replaced with a new drizzle of rain. Or tears from the sky, she thought, Anzu's tears. Anzu crying while Tea felt like crying too, but she wouldn't do it here. She would do it at the cemetary, alone with her sister, sleeping under six feet in cold hard dirt.
Anzu...you're dead. Me...having nightmares of horrors. She thought of the opposite of the way things were if things had been different.

In my field of paper flowers
And candy clouds of lullaby
I lie inside myself for hours
And watch my purple sky fly over me

(flowers!)

"Never sleeps, never dies..." She whispered. Kaiba turned from his side of the window and looked at her questionly. "Excuse me? What you say?"

Tea blinked before turning and stare at him. "What?"

"I said, what did you say?"

Oh, she had said her thoughts out loud. She looked back out the window, not wanting to look at him. "Nothing, I said nothing."

He was quieted but that quiet was again broken when she said, "Does everything you have have to be taken so suddenly?"

Now it was his turn to stare. "Excuse me?"

"Does everything that you ever had, that you wished to keep treasured with you, the very things you hold dear, the ones you love and cherish you can't seem to keep, does fate really have to take them away like that? Just to take and make you miserable in the end..."

He didn't know what she was talking about, but there was something in her voice that he detected. Something he knew from his own experince.

Pain and sorrow.

And when he looked at her, he noticed the changed in the features. Gone was the usual happy cheerleader of Yugi and that mutt and other friends, instead he saw her face as pale and white, her eyes showing hollow blue windows into her life. A glisten tear slide down her face. Was she crying? Why the heck was she crying about? He was about to say something when the car stopped and the driver announced that they were here.
Tea looked down and grabbed the bouquet that was seated next to her and stepped out.

"Well I guess I ought to thank you for the ride. So...well thanks. I guess that I'll see you around sometime. Bye." And got out and walked away.
Kaiba watched as she walked away and then told his driver to keep going where they had been heading originally.
He took one last look out the window and then at the seat where Tea had taken opposite him. There sitting on her seat, a single black rose laid.
Tea...what was wrong with her, did something happened? He didn't know but that was to remain in his mind for the rest of the day.