The Eventides Racer

Part one – The Silence.

1

I am slouched in bed, staring through the ceiling. Picturing the stars and their formation of letter’s and enigmatic values, somewhat painting that small image of myself and grandpa lazed head back on the tip of amity hill.

“You know why this is called amity hill don’t you?” He would ask, his voice deflated mostly due to aging and this mysterious infection that raged through his fragile body and sadly seemed; incurable.

“Why, grandpa?”

“Because Amity represents peace, something you will find one day…”

My ten year old brain could only function in a way of paying attention, and somehow attempting to suck in these words of wisdom. But he could travel beyond this; at least in my eyes. He could figure the root to every real-life situation, good or bad. He could stomp down a foot and use that sinister glare when needed; he could speak of the war days. Bring shellshock back into his life; tell me of his former self and the recreation of finding his inner boy once returning from both world wars. But most of all, at the age of eighty-one he would still be capable of finding that special time for his little grand-daughter, Raven Prescott.

My mother silently gaits through the door, giving of a recognisable odour that I have come to know so well over these past five years. The white powder has escaped onto her Egyptian cotton sweater it is bridged between the beautifully knitted patterns and the sweat on her crooked skin, noticing my curious glare; she instantly rubs it off and once again reminds me of the secrecy that has grown between me, her and the peculiar white substance that she chooses to consume into her body.

“Why are you doing this?” I ask. Tears gently settling in the outer rim of my eyelids, but I won’t cry – or more so I can’t cry, for crying is like peeling the skin of an onion; you might as well be bare. Showing the weak character that circulates inside your body.

“Doing what?” She says, here I get the drift, she’s eluding my question, going about things like the ‘question’ ceases to exist. But it exists alright, assembling the pieces together until finally it forms a monster; my mother.

Tomorrow can’t come quicker. I’m told I will start middle school, that I shouldn’t be anxious or concerned for something as common as a swirly doesn’t exist. I’m told I will make lots of new ‘friends’ and that the only person who can upset me is myself.

With an awkward glance she edges forward in an attempt of a goodnight kiss. I move away.

“I’m tired mum, just go.”

“I can drive you to school tomorrow?”

“No, you’ve made an effort I appreciate that, but this mother and daughter time, all this fake attention. It needs to stop, I’ll be the good girl I will keep your petty little secret but by no means will I be your puppet, are we clear?” I hiss undertone.

“Crystal.” She replies, finally making an exit.

Seven years ago we were sitting at the bay; I was given ice-cream because I was her special little angel, as though I was told. Today we were sitting in the diner, I was given five dollars. Not for being special, not because I was loved. Because I was harbouring the ‘secret’. I am willingly able to spot a crumbling marriage when I see one, I’m at a certain point were mentally I am older than I am. Not because I have an intellectual brain span or a higher IQ than most of my friends…, because in my short years I may see a thing or too. Some things that have forced me overcome my years.

I’m sad and I’m tired, exhausted to be a storage unit for a failing marriage and a carless woman.

My flaxen hair hits the pillow as I drift in and out of sleep, my twelve year old brain fixed on tomorrow and what it holds, where my adventure finally begins. Elder-wolf high is where I will be placed, inwards towards class B with the more- shrewder students.

I live in a town called June’s River. Occupied by ‘Hippie bastards’ or so the words of my father, Earl John Prescott the third. An air to an incredible sum of money and a plush lifestyle. One child was enough they said, once child to take care of the quantities that are left behind once my mother and father receive their ticket to the grave. I suppose I could say it’s a fairly small place that sits on the edge of the American border. Completely blanketed with everlasting fields of elderflower and cerulean streams that run in-between June’s River and Desolates shrub, like us they are small yet advanced in what they do, our competition is never-ending and has trailed back from the late BC’s. Right in the middle sits Amity hill. A place of peace and inner thought, I hear this is to be torn away and in its place will sit a new thing they call ‘Quarries’. Each night I like to sit on the balcony watch the elder-flowers whistle in the wind, watch Amity hill; oh so beautiful in its simplicity. I get a feeling most people would observe the house, the lifestyle and simply say ‘How could she ask for more?’, each year as I write my Christmas letter I am flooded with emotions. Maybe I want a brother or sister? Just maybe I need a mother and father who act like I am existent. It’s not my fault I was born by these people; it’s all by chance…

My lean body is constantly ordered to be in a formal skirt, and to top it off a buttoned shit and a pair of tedious shoes, my golden curls in a permanent bun.

How will I survive school life?

I no sooner fall into a deep sleep, thoughts of grandpa are fresh in my mind like fresh autumn mornings, and I was told one day I would find peace. Maybe I’m not normal, but hey isn’t normal overrated?

Maybe there’s a chance I could survive?