Rise of Xavia

by Tara Chau

  We turn around and start walking in the other direction. Anne takes a quick glance back in Gabe’s direction and gives him a you wouldn’t understand look, along with an Ask Ty look.

  “Sorry about that.” Anne apologises, “what’s up with you and Ty anyway?”

  “I could ask you the same question, Na-Na.” I shoot back at her. Somehow even though it’s been less than ten minutes, this new friendship seems to come way too easy for me.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” She says genuinely.

  “I saw the way you looked at Ty.” I prob.

  “I-I…” Anne attempts to find some kind of excuse, her head drooping slightly as she realises she has none. “I honestly don’t know what to say.” She stutters, “Other than you have a very good eye. Ty and I have been good friends for a long time, along with Gabe, of course. But you know… you become a teenager, and you start to see people differently. But I know nothing will ever happen, I’m quite alright with him and I just being friends. All I can hope for is that he’ll be there for me when I need him, just like I would be for him.”

  “It sounds like you really care for him,” I say uncomfortably.

  I just met him, I know so little about him, and I already might like him. Finding out that I might kill everyone, including him, does not help with my already muddled thoughts and emotions, though. He has to look out for me, not because he wants to, but because it’s his job. I feel incredibly selfish, wanting him to like me, like I like him. Anne has known him for years and can’t even get him to notice her in any way but as a friend.

  “Anyway, don’t change the subject. I asked you first, so spill.” She says cheerily.

  “I don’t think that I can. I’m not sure how much you know; I don’t want to give anything away.” Anne looks at me sceptically. “Do you happen to know who Dyla is?” I suddenly feel incredibly stupid talking to Anne about a make-believe Angel, though this is also a test of some kind.

  “Damn you, Ty. You’re an idiot.” She mumbles.

  “What?” I ask, pretending I can’t hear her. She knows. She’s one of them, I bet Gabe is too.

  “Oh… nothing. I’m sorry, Di, but I have no idea who you’re talking about.” She says regretfully, her face moulding perfectly around the lie. “Here we are, now let me do the talking. These office ladies can get nasty.” Anne says smoothly, looking at me as we approach the office door.

  We open the doors, five chairs line the walls on either side. One student, a girl with big brown eyes and round glasses sits in a chair to the right of me, Anne and I walk toward the front desk quietly.

  “Good morning Alice, could I please have Dianna… Di, what’s your last name?” She whispers.

  “Reeds,” I whisper.

  “Sorry Alice, could we please have Dianna Reeds’ schedule?

  “Okay,” Alice says, sounding bored, only taking the time to nod slightly.

  She opens a draw and pulls out a folder with the initials D.R. printed on the top. Searching through the thin folder, she pulls out an A-4 piece of paper.

  “Here you are, ladies.” She hands the paper over to Anne, and Anne passes it to me.

  “Thank you so much, Alice.” She says with a bright smile.

  “Whatever, go and get ready for class, the bells going to ring in ten minutes.” She replies strictly but the sides of her mouth quirk.

  Anne and I make our way back toward the other side of the school, where I met Gabe.

  “So, Gabe and Ty are best friends?” I ask.

  “Yep, they drive each other crazy and mess around heaps, but they love each other like brothers. It’s kind of a weird relationship. Why?” she enquires.

  “No reason. Gabe just seems really nice; I want to hang out with you and him more. I don’t want to hang out with Ty, though. He’s just...”

  “I know Di, he’s Ty. Mysterious, good looking, sweet, smart, but he’s… Ty. He’s also moody, stubborn and not good with emotions. You need to give him time. With what I saw from those brief minutes, whatever he did, he’s already feeling sorry for it.”

  “I don’t think you understand. I really like Ty. And it’s not what he did. It’s what I did, well, what I’m going to do. Ty’s just being the responsible and careful one. But that doesn’t stop me from really disliking him.”

  “Di, you don’t dislike him. You just dislike the circumstance that you were put into. I know that this is hard, but you can work through this. I know you can.” She stops me and gives me a tight hug, leaving me gasping for air.

  “Wow, Anne, you’re… super…strong.” I squeak.

  “Oh, yeah, sorry about that, I forgot.” We begin walking again, and I look down at my schedule. “My first lesson is English, what's yours?” I ask.

  “Oh no way, I have English too.”

  “Thank god.” I let out a long breath.

  I look back down at my paper and…

  “Hey, watch where you’re going… Dianna?” I look up to see who had called my name.

  What the hell? Lucien? Lucien. Lucien!

  “Oh my God, Dianna? I haven’t seen you in years. God, you look really good. I-is it seriously you?”

  I look into Lucien’s dark green eyes. His hair is still the same. Short on the sides but longer up the front, swooping low to the point of nearly covering his right eye, still black and beautiful. I look good? He looks good. He has a new piercing on his left earlobe and is wearing a plain blue T-shirt with denim shorts. Again, another guy who can pull of almost anything.

  “Lucien?” I ask.

  “Yep, that’s me. How are you going, pip-squeak?” He says with a cheeky grin. I almost cry to hear the name again.

  “Not too bad. How are you going, Lucy?” I ask, laughing.

  “Old habits die hard.” He groans, laughing back at me. “Six years later, and I still have to remind you not to call me that.”

  I muffle a laugh. “And it will be another six years before I even consider listening to you,” I add.

  Lucien pulls me in for a familiar hug. I had forgotten how warm and comforting Lucy’s arms were. So, strong that you could always feel safe unless he decides he wants to try squeezing the life out of you. The familiarity of all of this is so overwhelming that it brought tears to my eyes, and my breathing becomes shallow as I search for air.

  Lucien pulls back to see my expression; he takes one look at my face, and the same worried expression emerges onto his face, causing more tears to sprout.

  “Dianna? What’s wrong?” He says worryingly.

  Another surge of laughter crashes through the tears. I have to pull back to wipe at my cheeks and try fixing my hair.

  “I just missed you. I completely forgot that you moved to England. You never wrote to me. No text, no call.” I’m suddenly feeling a little bit mad. “It was like my best friend just disappeared off the face of the universe!”

  “Oh… yeah, about that, I’m really sorry. I don’t really have a proper excuse other than I was really busy trying to settle in and make new friends.” He says sheepishly.

  I let out a breath. At least there wasn’t anything wrong, and it seems like he is truly happy to see me. A smile spreads across my face. I’m making so many new friends already. Ty, Anne… Anne! I forgot about Anne. I turn around and face Anne, who has a shocked look on her face.

  “Anne, this is my old friend. We grew up together.” I explain.

  “I know who he is.” She mumbles, cursing under her breath.

  “Gee sis, I thought you would be happier to see me. After all, I haven’t seen you since Christmas.”

  “Shut up, Lucien, or should I call you Lucy now?” Anne snaps.

  “That nickname is reserved for my pip-squeak and my pip-squeak only.” He says sarcastically, but with a slight undertone of...venom?

  “Come on, Di, let’s get out of here.” Anne pulls at my arm, but I pry her fingers off and hold my ground.

  “Sis?” I
direct at Lucien.

  “Yep, that’s partly why we moved here. Dad fancied a lady who lived in England, got married to her and then five years later, divorced her.” He says as if it were no big deal.

  “And that lady just so happened to be my mother. I am not your sister anymore. Can we go now?” she puts a hand on my back and arm and resumes tugging.

  “Hey, bro.” Another guy walks past and gives Lucien a hi-five.

  “You’re popular here?” I guess, shrugging off Anne’s grip.

  “Popular?” Anne says. “Di, he’s practically king of the entire school!”

  “So that’s a yes?” I ask again, just to be sure.

  Lucien chuckles, “Yes.”

  “So, I’m guessing that you and Ty are friends then?” I say, sounding a bit more annoyed than I was aiming for.

  “Ty? Ty…Renalds? Are you joking? That dude’s totally weird. All he ever does is sit with his friends and talk. I mean, he plays sports, but that’s about it. He has no social media, doesn’t go to the mall or to parties. That guy is basically a ghost. He’s so strange, but nearly all the girls dig him, they say he’s mysterious and good looking, but the guy’s so quiet. I’ve never heard him say a word. All he does when a girl talks to him is nod and smile. As I said, so weird.”

  I laugh uncertainly, not believing that Ty could be the silent type. “Then you don’t know him well enough. I can’t seem to get him to shut up. And he talks to Anne and Gabe. I thought he was popular.”

  “Well, not that I’ve seen. But I don’t really hang around him all that much. I just see him in the hallway. He talks to some people, and they say that he is really charming. Maybe he’s just shy?” Lucien muses.

  “Well, I can’t deny that he’s charming but shy? I don’t think so.” I say without thinking. “I wasn’t supposed to say that out loud. Can we just pretend you didn’t hear that?” I say nervously.

  “No-can-do, pip-squeak.” He says with an awkward laugh.

  “Okay, Anne’s right, we should get to class. See you soon, Lucy!” I yell as Anne, and I run down the hall towards the history room.

  * * *

  The room is plain and boring. Twenty-five seats and desks fill the room, two people to a table. Half the desks are already full. The loud voices can be heard from two doors down. There’s graffiti on all the desks and posters of long, complicated words I can’t be bothered to read. There is a whiteboard up the front along with a wooden teachers desk, old fashion. Some students are standing around chatting, and some are sitting on desks, texting or checking their social media. Anne walks to the far side of the room three rows back. She gestures to two seats, and we each take one, Anne sitting on the desk and me on the chair. The two of us talk for a few moments until the whole room goes silent.

  A girl strides in. She’s blessed with blazing red hair that reminds me of the embers of fire. She has ghostly pale skin and bright green eyes that resemble those of a black cat. Her body is fitted with a black dress that tightens around her impossibly small waist, a matching black coat and scarf hung over her arm. But what draws my focus the most is a crescent moon shaped mark, about the size of my thumbnail, imprinted into the middle of her forehead. Not much darker than her skin colour, but dark enough for it to be highly distinguishable. She looks like something extremely deadly, but she is also stunning.

  Looking around the room, I notice people are trying to avert their eyes from her general direction but not talking either. They seem to be shifting uncomfortably. As she walks past me, a shiver runs down my spine as she turns to look at me in the last seconds of her passing. A spark of some kind goes off in my head, loud and bright, making me wonder who she might be. Where did she come from? Who is her family? What’s up with her mark? Why is everyone so scared of her? What’s her name…

  “Her name is Helena, but some people call her Hell,” Anne says quietly. I quickly realise that I’ve said all that aloud. I look around and see Helena sitting up the very back in her own row exactly behind me. Helena looks up from her book and gives me a wink. I can’t help but laugh nervously and wink back at her. She gives me a little nod and a half-smile, then goes back to reading.

  “The school says she’s an orphan and now lives in a foster home. The mark is unexplainable, and as to the question of why everyone fears her, she had an accident. There was a fire in the greenhouse two years ago, and she was the only one to survive. Five other people died that day, including the teacher. Helena claims that she doesn’t know how it started, and she must have gotten lucky.”

  “Some people think she’s a witch. Some think she started the fire. All we know is that she didn’t have that mark before she came out of that greenhouse, and now she does. The strange thing is when the ambulance came. They cleared her within ten minutes. Said that she was really lucky to be alive and to come out without a scratch and no internal damage is just extraordinarily unbelievable.

  “Does she have any friends?” I ask sadly.

  “No,” Anne says empathetically.

  “Are you scared of her?” I question.

  “I…I just don’t want to take any chances.”

  “But that’s so not fair. Being shunned for something no one is even sure about. Being lucky isn’t an indication that she could be a witch. I know what it feels like to be alone.” I pick myself and my bag up, nod a goodbye to Anne and walk over to Helena.

  Anne tries to grab onto me, but I dodge away. As soon as I’m three seats away from Helena, Anne stops and reluctantly returns to her seat. Once again, the room falls silent as I come to a stop next to Helena’s desk.

  “Hi.” I begin, “My name is Dianna Reeds. I’m new here and was hoping to make some friends. I was wondering if I could sit next to you, would that be okay?”

  Helena looks up and glares at me, the glare to whither all glares. “Why?” she asks.

  Her voice is soft like silk and sounds sweet. It makes me empathise more for this girl who has been treated like dirt.

  “I was thinking it would be nice to get to know you. You seem different from all these people. All they care about is being popular and pleasing everyone. However, you look like you couldn’t give a shit.”

  That earns me a faint smile.

  “Finally.” She mumbles, “someone who isn’t blind. Nearly all the students here are so dull. Please sit.” She motions to the seat next to her, and I take it graciously. “My name is Helena Troy, by the way.”

  “Well, Helena Troy, I’m very glad to meet you,” I say with a smile. Suddenly her face goes very serious and sad.

  “Aren’t you scared of me?”

  “No, I’ve heard what happened. I don’t think it was fair for anyone to mistreat you for something you had no control over.”

  “Thank you.” She says quietly.

  “Don’t thank me I’m just-”

  “Dianna?” Ty’s voice comes booming across the room, and I suddenly feel very scared, like I’ve been caught doing something atrocious.

  “Di, what are you doing?” Ty comes to stand in front of me and Helena’s desk, a look of worry and apprehension splashed across his face.

  “I’m sitting with my friend,” I say innocently, although the way Ty’s looking at me, I don’t feel very innocent.

  “Hi, Ty,” Helena says stiffly. “I know you have to send her away now, but it was nice to have a friend for a few minutes. I guess I’ll see you around, Dianna.” Helena looks away and closes her eyes.

  “I’m sorry, Ty, but I’m not going anywhere.” Helena whips her head around and looks at me wide-eyed.

  “I want to be your friend, Anna’s, Gabe’s, and Lucien’s, but I also want to be friends with Helena. If you guys can’t be okay with that, then I’m sorry, but that’s how it’s going to be.”

  “Fire, fire burn so bright

  burn brighter, brighter in thy night,

  take the moon and cast it down,

  she shall wear it as a crown.

&n
bsp; Born to serve the depths of hell,

  dreams of death and famine we tell.

  She shall kill the one of the roses

  threats of death she doth poses when the girl comes of age,

  thy shall not crumble nor cage,

  Your gods shall write plays,

  all about the end of days.”

  Ty whispers the whole thing so only Helena and I can hear, his face grim and devoid of emotion. Helena’s jade green eyes are big and look shocked, hurt and confused. I don’t know what to do.

  “That’s her.” Ty clarifies, “and you’re the one of the roses.”

  Minutes, hours or what seems like days later, I’m still sitting stunned. His words and face burn my reality. My reality is not a place I wish to be. The constant chatter of my new class rings in my ears, though it’s all white noise. A faint touch skims my shoulder, the same light and unearthliness as when Helena walked into the room, surges through me now.

  “Dianna?” Helena’s voice swims into my mind and sinks into the vast sea that are my thoughts.

  “Just give her a moment.” I hear Ty say quietly.

  Again, the voice drifts in and out. Suddenly I snap back to life, Helena’s touch becoming firmer and shocking me back into life.

  “Ty, god damn it. Why didn’t you tell me about this? I am not going to be saving your whole entire race or fighting one of my friends to the death.” I hiss in his face.

  “Di, I was going to tell you, but-”

  “No. Do not use that excuse. But this and but that? I bet you had heaps of opportunities to tell me. I’m sick of this.” I fume.

  “Well, you did storm out of the den even after I protested. You didn’t want to talk in the car. I bet you’ve been purposefully trying to avoid me the whole day. So, no, Dianna, this is not a stupid excuse.” He hisses back.

  Great, now I’m the stupid one.

  “Sorry,” I say, feeling extremely annoyed. “And I’m sorry, Helena, I know that you probably don’t understand, but it will be okay. Ty and I will fix this.”

  “Di, Helen knows,” Ty says.