Jakayla Toney
Hide and Seek
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Table of contents
Light's off
Chapter 2: The Harmon's
Chapter 3: Our New House
Chapter 4: Rose
Chapter 5: "Sure"
Chapter 6: Nightmare
Chapter 7: I Decided to Explore
Chapter 8: Violet
Chapter 9: It
Chapter 10: First Game
Chapter 11: Some Professional
Chapter 12: Escaping the Harmon's
Chapter 13: The Paintings
Chapter 14: Back Home Again
Chapter 15: Let the Game Begin
Chapter 16: Sixteen
Chapter 17: Fifteen
Chapter 18: Fourteen
Chapter 19: Thirteen
Chapter 20: Nine
Chapter 21: Mrs. Crawler
Chapter 22: When Paintings Come to Life
Chapter 23: Abby
Chapter 24: Decision
Chapter 25: Savior
Light's off
LIGHTS OFF
I tip-toed through the hallway quietly while my brother, Caleb, counted to twenty.
"7,8,9,10."
Abby, my best friend, ran next to me, nearly pushing me into the wall. "Where should we hide, Emily?" she asked.
Before I could say anything, Abby pulled me into the laundry room.
"Ready or not here I come!" Caleb said, running down the hallway and pass the laundry room. Abby and I both hid behind the dryer.
Abby and I laughed quietly as Caleb rummaged around in our closets. I pulled Abby's head toward mine to tell her something. "Let's run to base." I said.
Abby stepped out from behind the dryer first.
There was a door behind me that led into my parent's bedroom. While Abby began slowly stepping out of the laundry room, I sneaked into my parent's room, closing the laundry room door.
"Found you!" I heard Caleb scream. "You're it, Abby!"
I ran out of the room and into the hallway to turn on the light. The look on Abby's face made me laugh. Caleb laughed too and danced around at the fact that he wouldn't be it again. He had been it like three times in a row.
Abby looked at me. "Ha-ha. Hilarious. You tricked me!" she yelled.
"Did not." I said with a smile. "I just changed my mind."
"You know this isn't the first time you've done that. You should be it." Abby argued.
I'm never it. I'm the best when it comes to hide and seek. If anyone wants me to be it, they have to find me first. It's not my fault that I'm so good at the game. My dad even told me that I should get a trophy for my excellent hiding skills. I was simply the best at hide and seek, and everyone knew it.
"Look I wasn't caught, You were. You should've heard him coming." I said, defending myself.
Abby sighed and placed her hands in her pockets. "I think I should head home, it's getting late."
"It's only 5 pm." Caleb said.
Abby smiled at him and rubbed his hair. "I'll be back a different day." she said.
"She's just mad." I said to Caleb with a smirk.
"Mad? For what?" Abby asked.
"That I'm the best!" I said proudly.
Abby rolled her eyes. I thought she'd say something back like I wanted her to, but she just smiled at me and walked away. She grabbed her bag that she had brought to the house and just left.
Abby was mature. She wasn't the kind of person who argued. Maybe it's because she's two years older than me. I'm fourteen and Abby is sixteen. We also go to the same school. We became friends by exchanging Nintendo video games and comics at school. Then we found out we had a lot in common and became best friends.
However, lately, I think she's a bit tired of me. She doesn't come over as much as she used to, but one thing she can never turn down is a good game of hide and go seek in the dark.
Abby left, leaving me and Caleb home to wait for Mom and Dad. They went out on a dinner date.I was in charge while they were out.
Caleb, being only six, went into his room to play with some toys. He asked me to play with him, but I turned him down. I decided to watch a good scary movie on TV instead.
To my luck, a movie called Murder was playing. It was one of my favorite movies. It was about these teenagers that were lost in the woods. They would also get murdered if they broke any of the rules that had been given to them by the dwellers of the woods.
I sat back and enjoyed the movie. Wishing I could play hide and seek in the woods or in a haunted house. That'd be so epic!
I thought...
Chapter 2: The Harmon's
I woke up around 1 am, startled by a noise I heard coming from outside my bedroom. The TV was off, so I figured that my parents had turned it off after I'd fallen asleep. I'm surprised they didn't yell at me for not watching Caleb.
I started to get up but then I saw the lights outside. Blue and red lights started flashing outside of my house. I got up to look out the window and saw two cop cars pulling up in front of my house.
"COME OUT OF THE HOUSE!" yelled a man from outside. "We have the place surrounded!"
Sure enough, more police cars pulled in from the road. My heart started pounding as I heard the sound of two unfamiliar voices coming from the hallway. They were getting closer and closer to my room. So I did what I do best: I hid. There were a few shots fired from outside of my door. I heard a cop yell, "Hide, kids!" There were two more shots... and then everything was silent.
***
Caleb and I climbed into the back of a police car. The sun hasn't even risen yet. I could see the silhouettes of the cops carry two people wrapped inside of white sheets. The two bodies were separately strapped onto moving carts. More policemen came out of our house. Followed by two men that I had never seen before in my life. They were handcuffed. I got a pretty good look at them. Both had blood on them. I was hoping I'd see my parents walk out instead of the two strangers.
My parents, however, never walked out of the house. I didn't realize it right away, but I was crying. It all hit me at once. I started to beat on the window, which caused Caleb to wake up after he'd drifted off to sleep. I started screaming for my mother and father, knowing they were dead now. Caleb was confused. He kept squeezing my arm, calling my name, and telling me to stop screaming.
But I didn't.
One of the cops stepped inside of the car. He told me to stop yelling and that everything would be okay. I calmed down as he started up the car and drove away from our house. Caleb started to ask me what was going on. I didn't answer him; I didn't have a good enough answer for him. I just wiped my eyes and waited until we would arrive at our unknown destination.
***
I was tired. I was cold. I was scared.
I sat in a room with a woman and a cop who asked me millions of questions. First, they addressed me about the people who broke in last night. The cop told me I'd slept through the whole thing, that two men broke in to take a few things, my dad woke up thinking it was probably me or Caleb and was shot by the robbers. My mom called 911 but was shot during the call and Caleb didn't hear anything until the cops came through, just like me. How the heck did we sleep through all of that?
Then they told me that the robbers didn't mean to shoot, but once it happened, they really had no other choice but to fire at my mom too. After informing me of all of that and me crying for another twenty minutes, we talked about my other relatives, the ones that were still alive. The cops had to make a bunch of phone calls because guess what, we had no relatives to live with. My grandma and mother hated
each other, so we had no contact with her, ever. Also, she lived in Alaska, so she wasn't really an option right now. My uncles and aunts weren't stable enough for us to stay with them.
I had fallen asleep at the desk. I was awakened by two police officers who I was told would be taking me to my new home. My new foster home, with new foster parents. Apparently during the hours I was asleep, the cops were able to find someone for us to stay with. The people were on my parent's will. Well, their first will. The police said they had found it in an old suitcase. The new will was never finished so the cops just went with the old will. Caleb and I would be staying with The Harmon's; my mom and dad's old friends.
I had heard of these people before. They had gone to school with my parents. I knew their daughter, too. I forgot her name, but I remember that we were the same age. They used to come over to our house when I was like, six years old. Before Caleb was even born. After that, they never came over again. I wonder why?
Now we were about to live with them. The Harmon's. Our new family.
Chapter 3: Our New House
We had to pack for the move, of course. I took some things that belonged to my mother and father, especially my mother's jewelry. I gave Caleb some of Dad's model cars and a few of his shirts. I don't know who it was harder for, me or Caleb. He wasn't even talking. He wouldn't talk to me or anyone else. He hadn't finished crying about it either. Sometimes, he'd cry for five minutes then stop then cry again for another twenty minutes. I felt so bad for him, and myself of course.
Abby was sad about me moving away. If nothing else, at least I got a chance to say goodbye. It was hard for me. I barely could speak to her or anyone that I said goodbye to. I just wanted my parents back. I didn't want to live with these people I hadn't seen in ages. They weren't family; they were barely acquaintances.
After I said goodbye to my friends and neighbors, Caleb and I were on our way to our new home in the back of a police car.
After about two hours of driving and twenty minutes of passing nothing but grassy lands and trees, the car finally turned into a long driveway that led toward a mansion. I couldn't believe my eyes. An actual mansion. It was huge. A dark red and milk white mansion with gold and silver adornments.
"What's that?" Caleb said, looking out of the window.
Hearing his voice again made me smile. I was about to tell him it was a mansion but that wasn't what he was looking at. Further away from the mansion, in a stock of tall yellow grass, was another house. Boy, was it creeping me out. It seemed to be an abandoned house, grey in color. Well, maybe it wasn't grey. I couldn't really tell for sure, it was at a pretty far distance.
"It's just an old house," I said, placing my arm around him. But he quickly lifted my arm off of him and continued looking out of the window.
The car stopped in front of two middle-aged people. I'm guessing this was them, our new foster parents. Man, it kills me to say that. As Caleb and I stepped out, the woman ran over to hug us.
"Emily! Caleb! You two have grown so muuuuuuuuuch." She took one look at us and then hugged us again.
Her husband, Mr. Harmon, got all of our stuff out of the car and thanked the policeman.
As he took off and the Harmon's were awwwwing and ooooing over Caleb, I studied them. The woman had short, straight black hair that covered one of her eyes. A light pink bow rested delicately in her hair. It was cute. She had brown eyes, a small nose, and very thin lips. Her skin was pale, but not too pale. She wore a sleeveless black dress with some white tights and a pair of sandals.
Mr. Harmon was a man who was in his forties or fifties maybe, but it seemed as if he was just twenty-five. He had brown, curly hair that stopped above his eyes, which were blue. His face was full of freckles. He had perfect cheek bones and a huge mouth with perfect teeth. He seemed to always smile. He wore a pair of dark blue shorts and a grey sports shirt.
Something was missing. Oh yeah. The daughter.
"Where's your daughter?" I asked.
Suddenly their gazes were glued on me. They just stood still then Mr. Harmon's smile slowly turned into a frown. He then smiled for a quick second and chuckled a bit. "She won't be here."
I waited for more of an answer but that's the only one I got.
"Oh," I said.
Mrs. Harmon grabbed the suitcases, followed by Mr. Harmon, then led us inside. Mr. Harmon asked Caleb if he liked scooters. Caleb said yes and the first thing we saw were two brand new scooters in front of us. Okay, that was nice but their house was still pretty whoa. Even Caleb gasped. The inside was so huge and fancy.
"Your rooms aren't done yet, but please feel free to ride around. There's so much to explore," Mr. Harmon said. "Unless you're tired, then you can sleep in our bed."
Caleb ran over to the silver scooter. I saw him smiling, and it made me smile. I looked over my shoulder to see the Harmon's whispering to each other, nodding an agreement to something. Once they noticed that I was looking at them, Mrs. Harmon cleared her throat and walked over to me. She rested her hand on my shoulder.
"Although, we ask that you please follow one rule." She pointed upwards. "See the fourth floor, which is also the last floor of this house?" she asked us.
Both of us nodded.
"Mr. Harmon's works are up there, so no one is allowed to go up there. There's also expensive artwork up there, and if anything gets ruined... Well, that's a lot of money lost."
Sure enough, there were art sculptures in the hall and by the wall. There were some more paintings hung on the wall. Caleb and I promised to never go up there.
"Well, good," Mr. Harmon said. "You two get some rest or go play while we get your rooms together. Some workers will be here later to paint and do some redecorating in your room, Caleb, since the other room's all girls stuff-" Mr. Harmon cleared his throat again. "Some of my wife's stuff that needs to be moved for your new things."
Before I could say anything, Caleb started to ride around the house. I called after him, telling him to wait for me. I guess I wanted to explore the new house with him but I wasn't ready to leave him alone. Not again. I thanked the Harmon's, hopped on the scooter, which was also motorized, and followed Caleb around our new house.
Chapter 4: Rose
I'd seen over twenty rooms in this house by now. My favorite had to be the library. There was a fireplace far away from the books, in front of it was a soft carpet with low chairs for reclining on. Sort of like a bean bag chair, but square and without the beans inside.
Being a mansion and all, there wasn't too much for Caleb to get into. Mr. Harmon told us once Caleb's room was done, he'd never want to leave it.
After Caleb and I finished exploring the house, we got off of our scooter and went off into the garden behind the house. The garden was huge and consisted of nothing but flowers and plants. There were even a few mini waterfalls. Of course, Caleb wanted to play around them, but I told him no out of fear that Mrs. Harmon would get upset. I wouldn't want us to start off on a bad start.
Caleb saw a couple of birds inside a cage. He skipped ahead of me toward them. I started to run after him but stopped short. Caleb stopped too when he saw her. A few feet away from us stood a tall fountain, and in front of it, watering extra plants, was a woman.
And it wasn't Mrs. Harmon.
She saw us but didn't say anything. She just continued to water the plants in silence.
"Who is she?" Caleb asked.
"Probably the maid," I said.
Trying to make a good impression, I decided to greet her. Caleb and I walked over to her. She stopped watering the plants and looked up at us. I couldn't tell if she was a maid or what. She wore a long white dress with a pair of white pants. Her hair, which was black in color, was a bit messy. She didn't smile at us, either.
"Good evening," she said sharply in a monotone voice. "Who are you two?"
"I'm Emily and this is my brother Caleb," I said. "The Harmon's adopted us."
The woman then smiled. This wasn't a regular smile. She smiled off into
the distance, like us being here was the best thing ever and she was going to be the happiest human being on the planet. Maybe I'm being weird, but her smile really struck me as odd.
"Emily and Caleb. Pleasure to meet you," she said, shaking both our hands. "I'm the gardener. I come to water the plants. It's my job here. I like to keep the place alive, you know?" She began to smell the air. "Alive," she repeated while holding her hands together near her chest. Her attention was focused on the bird that flew passed us. She sniffed the air then gazed at me and Caleb.
She seemed even odder to me than before.
Caleb scratched at his hair. "What's your name?" he asked shyly.
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