Chapter 12
I tried
Airiana was standing in front of Cameron, whom was holding the hand held punching bag. Her gloves were tight and ready.
Cameron nodded and Airiana began punching, right right left right.
"Just punch freely." Cameron said.
Airiana just started punching the bag one after the other, but Cameron didn't seem impressed.
He dropped the bag on the floor and stood up straight.
"Hit me."
"What?"
"Hit Me."
"Well, if you insist." Airiana smiled.
She softly punched Cameron's stomach to test his reaction.
He looked at her and raised his eyebrows.
She punched him harder and he swayed a little but that was it.
She punched him in the stomach three times, and still no sign of pain.
"Ok, stop. Hold my shoulder with your left hand and punch with your right. Ok, punch me anywhere."
"Are you serious?"
"Anywhere."
Airiana gripped his shoulder with her gloved left hand and aimed low. Punching right into his groind.
She unstrapped his gloves as Cameron doubled over. She threw them on the ground next to him.
She turned around and began to walk away, brushing her hands off.
"You said anywhere." She smiled deviously.
Cameron turned into his lycan form and pounced on Airiana while she wasn't looking.
"Whoo!" Airiana yelped as they fell to the ground.
Cameron turned back to human. "Never turn your back to your living enemy."
Airiana sighed and shrugged him off.
"Am I ever gonna be good enough for you?" She asked.
"What? This isn't about you being good enough for me." Cameron poked a finger to his chest. "This is about you fighting. You survivng. You saving the world."
"Why is it always me?" Airiana exclaimed. "Why can't the weight of the world be dumped on somebody else's shoulder?"
"Because it has to be you." Cameron was right up in her face. "They chose...you."
Airiana was sitting on her bed, gazing out the window upon Lakeview Prep College, the gusty rain sweeping the land. The headmistress dismissed her from class for the week. But Airiana wasn't planning to ever go to class again. And she won't have to. The daybreaker soulmates graduate on sunday, the day of the prom. She was breathing through her nose, the whole room was silent and dim. It was morning, but the grey clouds hid the sun. There were no lights on in the room. Airiana didn't move. All she did was breathe and blink. Triston and Lexi had to go to class. The headmistress was convinced Airiana was mental. Cameron would be there soon. Airiana knew there was only one way to train today. Let the anger throw her punch. Let the anger lift the weight. Let the anger out run the treadmill. Let the anger control her. She used to do that. She had to. Otherwise she couldn't punch, she couldn't lift the weight, she couldn't out run the treadmill. She held it all back all the time. Every now and then she'd explode, but she'd drag it all back in and re-build the wall, tighten the lid, flick the switch. But no more.
Knock, knock, knock.
"Airiana." Cameron's impatient voice sounded at the door.
Airiana stood and opened the door robotically.
"It's time."
"I know."
Cameron and Airiana walked to the gym, passing a few truancy students. Cameron pushed the doors open to reveal the same equiptment they'd used the same time yesterday.
As Airiana pulled the straps tight on her gloves, her hands burned hot with anger. Cameron allowed her to start with the hanging punching bag.
she beat into that punching bag, it was bending too and frow as she punch it's centre with her red gloved hand. The rope was creaking. She just kept punching, her vision was blurred, she could hardly see what she was doing. Then the rope holding the punching bag snapped and it all fell to the ground, the bag bouncing a bit, lifting the dust off the group, the sound vibrating in Airiana's ears.
Cameron was standing straight near the back wall, his arms folded tightly across his chest. He nodded. But his missing expression didn't changed.
They moved onto weights. She did fine on the bench press but then it came to the actual weight lifting. She had to lift a 150kg bar from the ground and raise it in the air for one second.
Airiana chalked her hands and pulled on the bar, it moved a little. She tried to lift it again, it went up a little.
Come, think angry thoughts, think angry thoughts.
Jeremy's gone, Sam hates you, your parents are dead, your best friend doesn't even like you, your soulmates days away from leaving again, your just weak and unwanted.
She grunted and scrunched up her face and she pulled and pushed and she finally got the bar up above her head and in the air for a second, just a second.
After that glorious second, Airiana dropped the bar and smiled triumphantly.
She raised her arms as if to ask Cameron if he wanted to challenge her and said, "What!"
"Congratulations, you can lift a weight." Cameron said, still unimpressed! "Now let's see how your fighting abitlities are holding up."
Airiana punched and punched, she kicked and kicked, but it all had minimal impact. Cameron would, grunt occasionally, take a step back, but no real damage done. Not like the damage he inflicted on that jock.
Airiana heard thoughts flying through her mind. Airiana stopped punching and stepped back.
She's so foolish to trust me. I'm the one who told Cretus where Jeremy was. I'm the one who was driving the truck that killed Sam. I'm the one who was driving the truck that nearly killed her. I told Mary-Lynette to kill Jeremy last year. I'm the one who killed her parents. I'm the one who removed her memories. I'm the one that took away her home.
They were Cameron's thoughts.
Airiana looked right into his olive green eyes.
"I don't trust you..."
Airiana hooked him on the right side of his face.
After he recovered she kneed him in the stomach, bent down a little and punched him in the face.
She kicked into the right sside of his rib cage and punched him again.
He was actually in pain. He was actually bleeding. The blood dripped fron the corner of his mouth as he rubbed his ribs.
But he fought back. Or tried to. Airiana blocked both of his punched and kicked into his ribs again.
He drew his arm back and threw the most powerful looking punch, but Airiana dodged it. And again. He did land a punch to her eventually, right in the jaw, everything seemed to go slow, but she quickly backfired as he tried to punch her again. She grabbed his arm and twisted it up behind him.
She smiled triumphantly. But then he gripped her hand and threw her over the top of him.
She landed on her back with a thud and a cry out. He was standing over the top of her and glared down at her.
He bent down a little and reached his arms down. Airiana grabbed his arms, lifted her legs up and pressed them on either side of him, throwing him to the ground and propelling her to be standing over the top of him. Mid lift, she whipped out her gun. She was standing over the top of him, gun poised to aim at his forehead. She pulled the loader back and it clicked imtimadatingly.
"Ok." Cameron said, and used the tip of his finger to push the gun out of his face.
Airiana stepped back, exhausted.
"I'm impressed." Cameron said.
"I don't care what you think anymore." Airiana spat.
"Airiana, those thoughts weren't true. I lied, to make you angry, because I knew, without proper training, it was the only way to see your full potential." Cameron defended.
"How would you know that?" Airiana asked angrily.
"I've been around you your life, remember." Cameron said.
Airiana thought for while, then dropped the gun to the ground in front of her.
"Come on there's something I want to show you." Cameron said.
Cameron parked out the front of a hall over-looking the ocean. Airiana walked up to the doors of the hall and waited for Cameron to open the doors, until he called, "Not there."
Airiana turned around to see him standing, arms folded, in an opening.
There was sand surrounding his shoes, and Airiana could hear the waves crashing on the sand.
Airiana walked over to him. He turned and began to walk down the path.
Airiana tried to sneak a peek down the path, but she couldn't see where it ended.
Airiana placed one booted foot in the sand. Followed by her other. Step, and step, and step. She began walking down the path. The trees that caniopied abover her shaded the path, making the sand cold under her feet. Airiana could tell it had been raining because the sand was damp and the trees were dripping a little. She could finally make out Cameron, standing at an intersection in the sandy path. She picked up pace, watching him in his creepy stalker stance. Arms folded, legs spread apart a little, just staring. When she reached him, she looked to her left, which revealed a damp, eery, grey beach with small waves and dull coloured sand. I'm sure it looks better in spring...Airiana thought. She slowly turned to her left, which revealed a dark and evil place, surely ridden with invisible demons and the haunting spirits from which are buried in the location. A cemetary. Airiana looked at Cameron, confused. He leaned on a wooden rail behind him and nodded his head toward the cemetary. As Airiana walked down toward the cemetary, she didn't take her eyes off Cameron, not until his figure was out of reach of her sight. She walked steadily down the path, slowly coming to an opening. The cemetary clearly had slack caretakers. Almost every gravestone was cracked and discoloured. Almost every flower was dead. And the structure of the cemetary was a mess. There was a large , collumned group of graves, but then some were scattered around the grounds in various, random locations. Airiana turned to her left and began to walk along some of the scattered graves. Mud splashing up at her feet.
Elizabeth Turner, 31. Cornelius Grover, 65. Gavin Wilcher, 17. What? 17. So young. Too young. So unfair. Too unfair.
Airiana stood still, staring down at Gavin's grave sadly, but then continued.
Brianna Richards, 43. Alyson Carmichael. 21.
Airiana looked down at the graves along the back, just under the trees surrounding the cemetary.
She saw a name that stood out like black on white. One name that would change the course of everything. Airiana walked fastly toward that grave. Just chacking if she'd read it correctly. She stood before the grave, staring at the gravestone. Yeah, she read it correctly.
Wynter Stevenson. 1992-2010. Beloved Daughter and Friend. "Like the ivy clings to the oak, our memories cling to thee."
Airiana collapsed to her knees in front of the grave. Mud splashed up as her knees made contact with the soggy ground. Airiana didn't care for her new jeans or the fact that Gary had his hand poised on her shoulder. She ran her wet fingers down the gravestone as if to admire it.
"I'm sorry, Wynter. I tried. Airiana pushed her hands under the water and to the ground where Wynter lay, forever asleep. Never to awaken. Airiana knew that if she madde contact with her, she'd remember anything involving her. But she couldn't grasp it. Not one memory. Not one.
"She's in a better place." Gary said softly.
A tear ran from Airiana's golden eyes and down her cheek.
"She can't be in a better place when the best place is here with me..." Airiana looked up at Gary.
Back in Airiana's room, Gary insisted, "Airiana, later, when you have a shower or whatever, lookat your back."
"What?"
"Just do it. Ok."
"Ok..."
Gary disappeared as the door swung open.
Lexi burst in, "OH HAVE I GOT SOME NEWS FOR YOU!"
"I have some news for you too." Airiana said quietly.
"You'll wanna hear mine first." Lexi said.
"What?"
"They found your brother."
Airiana pounced off her bed and out the door.
She ran down the dorm's stairs and barged in between a couple holding hands and out the next door. The night sky was a stary abyss.
Airiana looked along a path lined with fluorescent white peonies.
She ran into the main administrative building and through the big oak doors labelled, "Lakeview Prep College."
She was, once again, met by red and blue flashing lights. Police cars, she hoped. Please be Police cars. There were police cars, but they're lights weren't flashing. It was an ambulance.
Lexi appeared next to her.
"Lexi, you said they found him..." Airiana stared into the ambulance.
"Yes, but I never said they found him alive." She replied.
There were forensic officers scanning the bloodied ground, flashing pictures of 'evidence'.
Airiana ran up to the scene, seeing the minimal amount of blood, a clip, and a nail, which a forensic officer was placing in a resealable plastic bag.
"Any news." Airiana asked the FBI agents without turning around.
"Are you the sister of the victim?" A deep voice asked.
"Yes." She replied.
"Well, there was a note found on the body-"
"Give me the note." She whirled around and reached out for a piece of paper the agent was holding.
He pulled it back and out of reach. "No. It doesn't concern you."
"Like hell it doesn't concern me." She growled and snatched the note from his hand.
She walked away and read it.
Strike I, Airiana.
"Strike one." She told herself, running her fingers through her hair.
Airiana sighed desperately and ran over to the back of the ambulance.
She pushed past the driver and some nurses and finally reached the stretcher in the back.
She looked at the heart rate monitor. No flat line. A pulse. 69mph.
She looked at Jeremy, black and blue, bloody, but smiling at her weakly. Eyes barely open, but open.
"Your alive." She gasped.
He nodded slightly.
She felt she could cry. But she had other buisness to tend to.
And all she thought was, If I can't do it, Then atleast I Tried.