Hey guys! Sorry it took so long to write this; I'm back in school now, so things are going to be even more slow going than before. But, hopefully, you'll still want to read this. I got a new computer, too, so it's going to take some adjusting. The new computer is definitely better, though!
***Ace***
Chapter Three
"Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before" –Edgar Allen Poe
I'm aware of a shocking burst of pain in my hand as someone steps on it. Then, I'm aware of many someones screaming, shrieking, chaos enveloping everything around me.
"Report immediately to the emergency lifeboats. Check your wristbands for the correct sector and wait to get boarded in a calm manner. Everything is going to be alright." I hear the captain's voice over the intercom, followed immediately by a girl shrieking "We're sinking!"
Opening my eyes, I look up at Chase, who is waiting for me. Apparently I hit my head, because my left ear is flush against the ground, and Chase is sideways. "Anya, we've got to go." I nod and let him pull me to my feet before we're swept away in the mass of people scrambling to get to either side of the ship. I check my wristband: C19 is my sector. Chase is C24, so we scramble as fast as we can through the hallways, the floors, until we get to the C sector. "I'll get you where you need to go, and then I've got to go find my family," Chase yells in my ear. I nod, grateful that I have someone with me.
Until now, I hadn't actually realized what this all means. The ship is sinking. I search in a manic for my family once we reach C19, pushing through the throng of frantic people. I catch a glimpse of Kayla's unruly bed-head ponytail and I run towards it with ardour. Chase follows after me with on trouble pushing through the people, unlike me.
When I reach Kayla, I wrap my arms around her waist and hug her as tightly as I can. She screeches and turns around in my arms to see it's me before returning my hug. "You never should have gone out tonight." She scolds in that sisterly way that blossoms in dire occasions such as this one.
"Yeah, because I really knew that the ship was going to sink," I tell her sarcastically, forgetting about the impending doom. I turn to thank Chase, but he is already gone, and I ardently hope that he finds his family as quickly as I found mine.
Another lurch comes over the ship and tips the starboard side-the side I'm on-bowing down towards the black water. I screech, pulling Kayla towards Mom and Dad so that we can all huddle together.
As the ship rights itself again, and I try to steady my heartbeat and cease the constant flow of adrenaline being pumped into my blood vessels, one last push is given from the port side, almost as if something were pushing the boat over. It sways, the black water pulling the starboard side down, almost as if it were beckoning to us. I let out a blood-curling scream as Kayla, Mom, and Dad are wrenched away from me, and I am left clinging to the railing as the cruise ship, in all its enormity, keels over us all, and it doesn't matter whether I'm clinging on to the railing or not, whether Mom and Dad and Kayla were flung off of the safety of the ship, because, now, with the ship completely tipped, we're all underwater.
† † †
The poignant taste of salt accompanied by the constant, irregular sound of waves struggling against one another are the first things I become aware of. Second, the sore, clenched feeling of my arms and fingers as I cling onto the long, semi-triangular piece of metal that kept me afloat.
I look around frantically. Where am I? I quickly realize the sight was not a comforting one; a vast, never-ending landscape of blue ripples is all that welcomes me, and as the waves come closer, they push more scraps of white metal around me. I swivel around in a circle again, kicking with my legs. My foot tickles something smooth, something soft. I turn around and see a hand bobbing along with the current. I try to scream, but my vocal cords are sewn shut with the salt water filling my mouth.
A head bobs up and through as a wave passes over the corpse, and I am immediately able to identify who it is, even though the sun is just barely peaking over the horizon: Kayla. My older sister. Her dark brown hair floats around her like a darkened halo as her face is eerily lifted up to face me. She bobs up and down as if she were standing on her two feet, up and down, up and down. It's almost rhythmic to watch, and I get lost in the motion. That is, until she is violently yanked downwards, underneath the surface, her hair blazing a dark trail above her head for the quickest moment before it, too, vanishes from the surface. And then the whispers start. The whispers that call to me.
They whisper my name, over and over. Various voices, male and female, high and low, but all melodic, all so incredibly soothing, so wonderful. I could just fall into the sound, harmony all put together as they whisper "Anya."
No! I shake my head, and a small red dot flies into the ocean, becoming watery. I touch my hand to my head and it comes away red, some of the blood coagulated and crusty, but the buff of it is new, crimson. "Ouch," I say, my speech slurred.
I must have a concussion, I think warily, but it doesn't truly register in my mind. The voices continue, but they are not as alluring as they were before. When digits start to touch my legs, like little, sharp whispers, like fingernails, the voices take over completely and my vision goes black.
† † †
It's strange how much can go on around you without your knowledge. I'm semi-aware of blades spinning, kind of like a helicopter, and urgent shouts, voices that are in the heat of the moment. But I don't become fully, truly aware until the constant beeping of something annoys me back into consciousness.
"Stop it!" I try to scream, but it comes out as a weak slur. Damien is holding my hand, perched on the side of a bed that is not mine. The sheets are too thin, too flimsy, and it smells like a hospital.
"That's because you're in a hospital," Cara quips from beside me. I guess I said that last thought aloud.
Cara stands with one hand on her hip, her silhouette blocking the heart monitor, which has got to be the source of that incessant beeping. Emma and Colton are sitting down-in one chair-holding hands and watching wide-eyed as I wake up.
"Where's Leah?" I croak. Obviously my voice is not in the best shape.
"Running late. She'll be here in a little while." Colton answers, rubbing his jaw.
"And my family?" I ask. Damien's grip on my hand weakens, and the four of them all look at each other, completely avoiding my gaze. Emma dares a glance at me for the smallest moment before looking back at Cara pleadingly.
"Oh, honey," Cara says finally, pulling up a seat to the edge of the bed. She pats my hand, as if that's reassuring.
"Are they running late also?" I ask, looking at Emma. I can see, even from this far away and through my blurry vision that tears gather in her eyes.
"They can't come, Anya." Damien whispers. "They're not here anymore."
I look at him, confused. "So they were here earlier? Of course they're not here when I wake up. That's so great. Thanks, Mom." I roll my eyes.
Emma bolts out of the room, her face in her hands. Colton looks after her, but runs a hand through his hair and comes to stand at the edge of the bed.
"Anya, do you remember what happened? Why you are here?" He asks me, his green eyes probing mine.
"I-" I what? I was on the cruise ship, dancing with Chase, kissing Chase, and then…the ship lurching, chaos, panic, C19, Kayla…
Kayla. Her hair was around her face in the water, her once sapphire blue eyes now pale and lifeless, and then the immediate yank that pulled her underneath the waves. The large, white pieces of metal that came off of the cruise ship when we were sunk. The fingernails scraping at my legs, tickling me, the voices whispering my name.
"No," I whisper. This couldn't be happening. There was no way this could be happening.
"Helicopters came and picked up all of the remaining survivors. Neither your parents nor Kayla were found." Colton says quietly, looking down at his hands as they grip one of the plastic bumpers that are supposed to keep me in the bed if I thrash. It feels like I'm a bowling ball, stuck in between the kid bumpers they put up so there's almost no way you can lose. Almost.
"I have no one?" I croak. No grandparents, no aunts, uncles, living siblings, anything. I am alone.
"No, honey, you're not alone. You know you're parents appointed my parents as your legal guardians if something ever happened to them." Cara says, squeezing my hand. "You're coming with us."
Relief and dread floods through me. I get to go live with Cara. Her parents are like my second parents; it shouldn't be too weird on that part. I even have my own room at their house. But I'll never get to go back to my home again, I'll never get to tease Kayla. I'll never get to see my parents again.
And that's when it hits me. I'm an orphan.
The grief is too much, and the last things I hear are the heart monitor going wild and Colton yelling for a doctor.
† † †
Six days after I have initially woken up, I am discharged with antibiotics for the amount of brine I swallowed and for the deep, jagged opening I have along the side of my stomach, starting from my ribcage and descending to just above my thigh. The doctors think it's from when I was knocked off of the ship; I must have scraped my side along the railing, or a nail, or something. I was lucky, though; if it had gone three inches deeper, I would have punctured a kidney.
Since it still hurts to walk, and I've been put in a wheelchair for the duration of my healing, Cara's parents drive us back to their home…or, my home. They've been stopping by my place and gathering all of my belongings so that I don't have to move it all. It's a sweet gesture, but the house is in my name now. I'm going to keep it, despite my mother's lawyer's urgings to sell it and get more profit.
I've inherited everything, really, because Kayla isn't here anymore to inherit any. I have her stuff now, too. I just have to finish off the school year, and then I'll be off to college.
With one week left of Spring Break, I don't know what I'm going to do. I have already called the Husky breeders, and they are sending my new puppy down to me. She should be here tomorrow. Cara is more excited than I am; she researched one of the Native American tribe's languages, the Cheyanne people, and discovered their word for wolf is "Honohe." She has already begun to call the new husky by that name, even though she hasn't even arrived yet.
Everyone has come to visit me, from my group of friends to crazy popular people to the nerdiest chess club you can find in my high school, but none of it means anything. Their condolences don't bring back my family. They don't explain why I lived, and they didn't.
Jayden, one of the popular girls, came by to visit, and when she saw me in the wheelchair, put on this incredibly fake bravado that was all for the benefit of the boys who came with her. "Poor thing! So, are you stuck in that thing forever?" She asks, pointing a delicate finger at one of the back wheels. "No matter. I will totally help you look fabulous if you are. You'll be like my own personal charity case!" And just like that, she had transformed an accident that didn't concern her at all into something that she could make better, that could make her look better. It was astounding. "Nah, just until my side is feeling better. Thanks for the offer, though." I tell her kindly before wheeling backwards and slamming the front door as hard as my wheels could muster. I actually managed to re-open the wound along the side of my body, and Cara's Mother, Lily, rushed me to the hospital to get more stitches. That incident bought me four more weeks incapacitated. Luckily, those last four weeks were on crutches, not in a wheelchair.
Three weeks after school started and Honohe arrived, I was cleared to use crutches instead of my wheelchair, which I had gotten pretty deft at using. Presently, I haven't been cleared from my concussion, but it's not too bad, except for the wake-up call migraines and the inability to refocus my eyes after daydreaming. A positive outcome of the concussion-and the fact that I'm an orphan-is it gives me a lot of leeway in school. I could not do any assignments and still pass my senior year. However, the work provides a distraction from my messed up reality, and college preparation pretty much dominates the rest of the time, so I haven't had to think about what happened that night on the cruise ship, or the last time I saw my Mom or Dad or Kayla, or what happened to Chase. I never even found out his last name, so how could I ask about him? It was a mystery I would probably never know the answer to.
Cara and I decided a few weeks ago to go to Oregon State University in the fall, which means that we won't have to leave the state. We sent in our acceptance letters last Tuesday. Since we're far away from it, we'll have to move into an apartment or a dormitory, but I'm excited to go away. It'll mean I don't always have to be at this house that constantly reminds me of the fact that my family is gone.
Colton and Emma have been trying to distract me from all the looks I get, even from teachers. It's that stupid, puppy-dog sympathetic "oh-your-family-died-and-I-don't-know-you-but-I-should-pity-you" look. Completely ridiculous, in my opinion. If Kayla were here, she would be flipping the bird every which way. I don't have the guts to do that.
Right when I start to feel like maybe I can get through this, because Mom and Dad would want me to and because Kayla would kick my ass if I didn't, things start to break all over again. When the whispers come back into my head at night, when I'm sleeping, there is no way I can retain a rational thought. And those are the dangerous times.