Chapter Four: WanderingA Chapter by Joshua DonahueForbidden. Evan is slowly succumbing to Hale and he is mad at himself for doing so and leaving San Francisco behind in the process. However, his new friends are making it all the more difficult.
Previous Version This is a previous version of Chapter Four: Wandering. FORBIDDEN
BY: J O S H U A D O N A H U E
Chapter Four Wandering The day wore on,
seeming to never end until I ended up finding myself on my nice bed in my
strange new home. I merely remained stationary, however. I had homework from
several of my classes that I needed to work on, but I didn’t. The bedroom door
was shut, the blinds were blocking out all sunlight, and I was relaxing on my
bed while staring up at the dark ceiling. I was going to be lazy for the moment.
After all, I had been through a lot throughout the entire weekend, which is why
my mom offered to make me my favorite dinner tonight: Italian pasta; my stomach
was very pleased by the sound of it because I was starving. My mom was
downstairs working on the dinner, and yet, here I was: doing absolutely
nothing. I’m crazy,
I thought to myself. Not only did my mind keep floating back to when that girl
walked into history class, but I kept thinking of every aspect about her. The
way she glided over the floor as if hovering. The way she kept perfectly
motionless, and yet, moved so delicately. Her gold-embedded eyes kept flashing back into
my head, allowing me to see her even longer. She seemed familiar though. It was
something in her actions and her appearance that was oddly similar to someone
else, but I couldn’t exactly point it out. I shook my head
in hopes of releasing my brain from her chains. Whatever. I need to do this homework. In hopes of
refreshing my thoughts, I rolled to the edge of my bed and snatched up my book
bag, dumping all of its contents beside me so that I could begin. I began flipping
the pages of my history book browsing for the right page number that I had
scribbled down for my assignment. But I stopped on a particular page that had a
picture of the Golden Gate Bridge with a glorious sun behind it in a blue sky. I groaned. Damn! I threw the
history book across my room, colliding against the wall, and I fell backwards
onto my bed. How could I let myself get so wrapped in Hale? I asked my stupid self. I felt like I had betrayed
San Francisco and my friends back home. Here I was beginning to enjoy my new
friends and family and my new life, while San Francisco remained on the other
side of the nation missing me. I felt horrible inside. Smashing in on
my guilt, my mom called me down for supper. I obliged, not really feeling up to
Italian pasta anymore. At first, there
was mere silence looming in the room. Both my mother and I sat at the dinner
table with her on one end and me at the other. Our forks clanked against the
glass plates of food, with mine not even bothering to stab the food onto the
end, but merely slapping it around a bit. I knew it was only a matter of time
before she finally--- It started. “So, how was
your day?” she asked me. I had a feeling
in my gut that this terrible moment would come---that I would be bombarded down
with loads of questions about my day. Of course, I wanted to spill out everything! All of the friends I made.
All the people I talked to. My classes. The school. But she was my mother. How
the hell could I ever tell her those things? Again, I was disgusted with myself
for even thinking of those things and enjoying them. I gave myself a mental
slap. Being the
reasonable teenager that I was, I simply said, “Fine.” “Did you make
any friends?”Another question of purgatory. “Yeah.” I wanted
to keep the answers short and mysterious because these were things that I would
have to deal with alone as a sixteen-year-old. No adult supervision anymore. “Mm…I see.” She
pursed her lips, which she seemed to do quite often lately. “How were your
classes, then?” “Fine.” Finally, it
seemed that she had gotten the picture because she backed off for a few minutes
with a hint of distraught on her expression; although, she hid her feelings
quickly---as always. I didn’t want to hurt her emotionally, because she
was…well, my mother. But that was also the reason why I had to hurt her feelings. This was something that I needed to face
by myself. Meaning if I made a mistake or if things were a bit too tough on me,
then so be it. But this was how we learned, wasn’t it? So, to help her
shrug away the feelings, I tried to turn the tables by saying, “So, how was the
interview?” Immediately, I
realized I had succeeded; her face lit up like a light bulb on Christmas. “I got the job!”
she squealed delightfully. Obviously, there
couldn’t really be any competition for her considering the limited population
that was in the area. So it was a no-brainer. But I still acted surprised and
ecstatic for her which made her all the happier. “Yeah. I
couldn’t believe it. It’ll be fun! I get to be a waitress at Golden Nugget! I
sampled some food, and it tasted pretty good. I start tomorrow, which means I
can swing by on my break and pick you up after school, bring you back home, and
then make it back to the restaurant in time.” She seemed to be calculating the
time in her head. I agreed to the plan and continued to fumble with my Italian
pasta in silence---thankfully. * * * Here I was jammed yet
again in history class with me and Jessica murmuring back and forth---well,
Jessica was murmuring, I was just listening to her remote voice. My eyes kept
spying on that mysterious girl every so often, but she never looked back my
way. Other than that, however, it was any other school day. However, lunch
was a bit of a different story earlier today. While at lunch, I saw the girl.
She had just left the machine with a bottle of water as she headed to sit down.
Only I had no idea where she was headed to because there were no tables on the
second level except where they sat.
And as my gaze followed, she sat with all of the nature girls. Shock and pure
disbelief had stung me, because I had no idea. There was something oddly
familiar about her that I couldn’t place when I first saw her, and now I knew:
she resembled the nature females. She was one of them. But in some exotic way,
she was different. There was just something---and I couldn’t quite place what---that
caused her to stand out from the crowd. I couldn’t explain it, nor did I want
to. My new friends,
who were then seated around me at our lunch table, noticed that I hadn’t answered
Austin’s question about music---Greenday, I think that’s what he was talking
about---, so they followed my eyes as they stared up at the so-called “chick
band”. All of my friends stared at them, realizing that the table was now full.
The girl that had been missing yesterday was now there assuming her rightful
role. What was her name?
Why couldn’t I
remember it? “The wicked
witch is back,” Mitchell had muttered just loud enough for only our table to
hear. “Damn straight,”
Cheyenne had replied. “That Summer girl is here.” Summer! Finally,
I remembered her name. Thankfully,
nobody in the group noticed the intensity of my interest towards Summer, so I
had just glanced away nonchalantly as if I hadn’t even been staring at her at
all. I pulled myself
out of my thoughts about lunch earlier---which was perfect timing, because Mrs.
Miller was staring at me waiting for an answer. “Um…,” I glanced down into my
book hoping to get a quick answer, “Anne Frank?” “Exactly. The
Holocaust, you see, was…”she continued on with her lecture. Thank God I had
remembered that from my previous school. I slipped a
sideways glance at Jessica that said Whoa!
That was a major close one along with a smirk. She returned the same look,
but I didn’t pay much attention, because something else caught my eye. It was a
pair of eyes that were glistening intensely and were filled with leprechaun’s
luck that shimmered and appealed to me. They were Summer’s eyes. At first, my
slow brain didn’t quite register what they were seeing, so I did a double-take.
But when I looked up again, her eyes seemed to be glued to the chalk board that
Mrs. Miller was now scribbling on. It was as if she hadn’t even turned her head
a single inch to look at me. Maybe my eyesight was getting the best of me. I came to the
final conclusion that it was in fact an act of my imagination and that I needed
to push her away and out of my confusing mind. Later, I found
myself residing in literature class when a note fluttered down onto my desk in
the form of a paper airplane. I glanced into the direction that it had come
from: Austin. Cheyenne was
smacking on bubble gum (even though Mrs. Stanley had caught her twice in the
past twenty minutes and ordered her to dispose of her previous pieces);
Mitchell was doodling on notebook paper, making funny impressions of us around
him; and Mrs. Stanley was paying the least bit of attention to us at the
moment. She was too busy writing literature assets on the blackboard. On the airplane,
there were letters on the one of the wings that instructed me to open it.
Inside, I saw: Hey, we’re gonna
hang out today after school (me, Luke, Chey, Jess, and Mitch). Wanna come? With enthusiasm,
I scribbled back the simple reply: Sure. Just text
me. Then I jotted
down my cell number below the message. I folded it back up into its original
shape, and flew it back to my right---while Mrs. Stanley wasn’t watching, of
course. He read it, wrote something else, and flew it back. Ok. We we’ll
walk over to your place and get you, and text you when we’re almost there. Luke
knows the way. We can give you a little tour of the place. Sound good? Typically, a
good child would consult with an adult before making plans to go out, but right
now, that was at the farthest crevice of my mind. Perfect. It flew back
across to Austin. He gave a smirk after he read it. Then he stored it into his
pocket, and he began making other paper shapes from his notebook paper. Now I
really felt terrible for allowing Hale to easily consume me in its joyful
people, but I couldn’t back out now. * * * I received a text from
Luke and the gang not long after my mom dropped me off at home and rushed back
to Golden Nugget to resume her job. They were just around the block, Luke informed
me via text, so I did a quick change of clothes to go roaming the town in. I
was done within mere seconds. Then I eagerly awaited my friends. I sat on the
living room couch flipping through the channels of the cable just like a book
when the doorbell rang. I chunked the remote down, leaped up out my seat, and
opened the door. It was in fact my friends. I locked the
door behind me and joined them. As we walked
down the sidewalk, my friends pointed out all of the neighbors’ names, their
houses, relatives, and people from school, and so on. We walked all through
town and down the side streets. I was officially introduced to: the town’s
church, the post office, Golden Nugget, the movie rental store, the hardware
shop, the mechanic shop, and two gas stations (where, at one, we stocked up on
junk food like sodas, candy, chips, and ice cream). Not to mention, Cheyenne
and Jessica snatched a few extra pieces of bubble gum and stuffed them in their
purses, while Austin and Mitchell took a pack of fire balls and crammed them into
their pockets, and Luke snatched a Snickers bar. Me? I wasn’t in the mood, so I
didn’t take anything. But all along the entire tour of Hale, potentially every
pedestrian that we saw (whether they were going for a jog, walking a dog, or
riding on bicycles) they seemed to know Luke and them. That was the biggest
clue ever to truly knowing the size of Hale. Eventually we
made it to the town’s park---astonishingly, it had one of those too. Everyone
made their way towards the picnic tables while I sat down on a nearby bench. “So, what do you
think of the town, Evan?” he asked me, sitting down beside me. I gazed out over
the park, looking over the small town. “It has a lot more features than I
thought, but…” “But still not
like San Francisco, huh?” “No.” “Don’t worry.
It’ll feel like home soon enough.” “I hope so,” I
muttered. “Just give it
some time. Trust me,” he reassured. “Now let’s go see what everyone else is
doing.” We walked over
to our friends who were all looking down at the picnic table they were residing
at for some unseen reason. Jessica and
Cheyenne had apparently carved a graphic into the wood picnic tables with their
nail files. I saw a poorly drew creation of a wolf on the table. It was a
little odd, so I asked: “What’s with the wolf?” They equally
shrugged. “We’ve both been hearing about them lately. People have spotted a few
of them, you know,” Jessica answered. “I haven’t heard
anything about a wolf. I think you girls have been sniffing on your perfume too
long,” Austin said. “Oh, hush! My
cousin saw a wolf in her backyard a few weeks ago. And Cheyenne says her aunt
saw one run across the road in front her car,” Jessica said. I glanced at
Luke with a questioningly look. At first I saw an unknown expression on his
face, but then he caught my eye and said, “Aw, those are just rumors. People
just want a little excitement around here, that’s all. Everyone knows wolves
don’t live around here.” “I know! That’s
what I keep telling Chey. That’s why I think it’s not a wolf at all!” Jessica
said. Austin then said
sarcastically, “So it’s not a wolf, eh? Then what the freak is that a picture
of? A rabbit?” “No, stupid.
It’s really a picture of you!” Cheyenne giggled at Jessica’s joke. “But seriously,
I don’t believe it’s a wolf. I think it’s a werewolf!” “What!?” I,
Austin, and Mitchell all said as one. “That’s right. A
werewolf,” Jessica said. “But those
things aren’t really real. Everyone knows that, Jess,” Mitchell said to her. “Well who said
so? Just because a stupid scientist can’t prove it, that makes it a myth?
Hardly,” Jessica argued. Once again, I
looked over at Luke and he had that same expression on his face. Something was
definitely up---something secretive. But the instant Luke saw me looking
suspiciously at him again, he seemed to compose himself. He said with a
steady voice, “It doesn’t matter if it’s a dog, wolf, or even a werewolf. Why
would they come here? To go to the huge mall down the street or to go dine on
homeless people?” He chuckled at his own joke. This seemed to make everyone
else loosen up as well. My suspicion
grew. There had to be a reason that he was changing the subject all of a sudden,
and I was going to find out what that reason was. I was hoping
Jessica would continue the argument of werewolves and their existence, but she
seemed too consumed by further smart remarks by Austin and Mitchell. I didn’t think I
was going to get any farther with it, so I nudged it aside, bringing in a new
thought. Since I had found out where everyone at Hale High currently lived at
with the help of my friends and their guided tour, I wanted to know about a
special group in particular. So I asked, “What about those nature girls, where
do they stay at?” Everyone stopped
and looked at me. At first nobody
seemed to want to answer, but it was Austin who said, “We don’t know. They go
to school with us, but nobody ever sees where they live or anything. That’s why
everyone thinks they live in trees or something.” “Oh, you were
serious about that, huh?” Mitchell nodded. “But they must
ride the bus or something.” “Well, that
leader girl…What was her name?” Cheyenne said. “Summer?”
Jessica said. “Yeah. Summer. She
drives them all to school. Go figure right? What with the pollution a car might
cause and nature freaks all about ‘preserving the forest’ and all. But anyways,
she drives them to and from school. Nobody’s ever really taken the liberty to
find out where they stay at.” I didn’t
respond. It was weird.
There’s never been a situation like this before in San Francisco. But then
again, this place was utterly different when it came to contrasting the two
cities. So I mentally shrugged my shoulders and pushed it to the back of my
brain. “Okay. Enough
talk of werewolves and nature girls. Who’s up for a swing?” Luke said with a
grin. Immediately, our
inner child erupted from us. We dashed off the picnic tables and raced for the
best swing with me leaving behind my steadily growing suspicions that I had of
this town and its never-ending secrets…for now.
© 2010 Joshua DonahueAuthor's Note
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5 Reviews Added on July 21, 2010 Last Updated on July 21, 2010 Tags: forbidden, chapter, four, wandering, love, high, school, romance, relationship, supernatural, werewolves, paranormal, nymphs, teen AuthorJoshua DonahueJefferson, SCAboutUPDATE! 06.27.13 Hello, WritersCafe! I realize that I have abandoned my account since the summer of 2013. Since then I have started college, and I have experienced... a lot. However, this does no.. more..Writing
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