by Akaku Red
It looked peaceful, and beautiful.
Hearing the birds singing, made me breath out slowly, they already had new family members, little birds were jumping on the meadow.
Seeing this made me think that I should build a bird table for them and place it at the corner of the flowerbed.
Yeah … I should do that.
I looked at my phone, seeing new messages from Linette.
And not just hers!
Two other numbers, which still weren’t saved in my phone and a request for a group chat…
‘Sorry Jenny! But Charlotte wanted your number, so I gave it to her.’
Was the last message coming from Linette!
Damn! I forgot Charlotte.
I opened up the other messages.
And realised the two unknown numbers were from Amy and Charlotte.
I saved their numbers before, reading their texts.
Charlotte also made a group chat with the name ‘TheKittens’
‘What the fuck? That’s an ugly ass name!’
Was the first message, in the group chat, from Linette…
‘Ugh! I feel the same! That’s disgusting!’
Coming from Amy!
‘Well, well! WELCOME TO THE GROUP! Ladies this is our secret chatroom. All secrets, all shit is going to happen here. And be glad, that I even invited you guys in -.- !’
Charlotte made me laugh.
It was so pleasant to read their conversation, it was like I was with them in a room seeing them haggling about the name.
And the funny thing was, that they were online and still writing now.
‘WOOOW! JENNY IS ONLINE! READING AND DOSEN’T ANSWER!’ Amy wrote.
‘Acting like a Ninja! I see.’ Charlotte replied in a minute.
‘Hey guys! Sorry, I was still reading your conversation and saving your numbers. Thank you for the invitation Charlotte. The name is okay!’
I felt like a child, having her fist tea party.
Yeah, that’s how I felt.
‘Finally ! Someone who acknowledges my creativity!’
‘And I hope you have a good reason, answering now.’
She added.
‘Sorry, but I was with Tyler, I just got on my phone.’
Not even a second passed, before an incoming call from Charlotte was flashing on my display.
I took the call, even though Linette and Amy were typing some things in the group chat.
“TELL ME EVERYTHING!”
Charlotte screamed, I pulled the phone away from my ear, because she was too loud.
“Calm down, nothing happened!” I assured her.
“Stop lying! Since school ended you’ve been with Tyler, and you want to tell me that he didn’t do anything?”
Her voice sounded disappointed.
“Well, yeah … but he sweet talked again.”
I heard a noise, thinking it was coming from Charlotte.
“What did he say?”
I looked down, hearing the creepy noise again, it was like a little knocking on some kind of wood.
“He said… that he wants me, but he knows that I need time.”
She screamed out of joy.
“I TOLD YOU HE WANTS YOU!”
-Crack-
A loud sound, made me startle, even Charlotte heard it.
“What was that?”
She asked.
“I thought you made that sound!”
But now I was sure, this noise must have been around me.
“No! That sounded like something was broken.”
I started looking around the garden, but there was nothing.
We didn’t have wood around but— the garden shed!
My body got up automatically, pressing the phone harder against my ear.
I needed to check this out!
“Jenny is everything okay?”
I nodded, forgetting that she couldn’t see me.
“Jenny? Answer me!”
“Yeah … I think it came from the garden shed. I need to check this out.”
While I said that, I walked over the meadow and started heading to the corner.
“Maybe it was just an animal. Where are you now?”
She asked.
“In the garden...” I whispered.
Charlotte’s voice was getting dull, as I got closer, only to find that the door from the garden shed was wide open.
My heart beat was louder than Charlotte’s voice, I stopped listening to her, my whole body, my whole mind was focused on the door.
Why was it open?
Who opened the door?
It couldn’t be the wind, because the door was normally locked – even if the gardener had forgotten to lock the door, it couldn’t open up like this by itself. But I shouldn’t go in there, the best thing to do now was to turn and to run back to the house.
Never go to creepy places, especially when there was a creepy noise!
Yeah … I won’t look.
“S-Some one left the door open.” I stuttered.
“Okay … That’s Creepy! Are you alone?”
Charlotte asked. Before I could answer, I felt something behind me.
My body froze in place, I was afraid to turn around.
Charlotte was still speaking, but I didn’t hear her talking.
My mind was screaming.
>>MOVE! JENNY MOVE!<<
I tried to get control over my body, and somehow I managed to turn around.
But then everything happened fast: As I turned, I got pushed brutally into the garden shed, I collided painfully with the lawnmower and some other stuff which was stored in there.
My phone crashed on the ground, hearing its screen cracking from the brutal fall.
The sharp edge of the mower met my back, hitting my problem scar. I felt the pain through my veins, like a knife stabbing into me.
My body started to tremble, I couldn’t scream. By force of habit I bit my lip hard, till I tasted blood, just to dull my cry of pain— I was like this, because of Thomas and Daniel.
They loved my screaming voice, and the only thing I could do at that time, was not give them the pleasure to hear me scream, they had everything else, but not my voice!
Tears of pain, started dripping down my face.
My back was hurting a lot, I felt dizzy from the harsh movements— but it wasn’t over.
The person came in, grabbing the collar of my shirt, to heave me up.
“He … will … get … you.”
The muffled voice said. Muffled because the person was wearing a mask, looking down … the clothes black.
“W-What do you want?”
I pressed heavily, since the person was giving me a hard time breathing.
My arms were powerless, hanging down on both sides, I couldn’t even hold them up to protect myself.
I was too weak! Way too weak…
My body started pounding at the same speed my heart was beating, I couldn’t breathe anymore.
The person tossed me away. Crashing against the table, my head hit the edge, my body fell down on the hard ground.
I started breathing in and out, fast! Gasping for air!
What should I do?
My body didn’t want to move.
I pulled my knees against my stomach, holding myself.
“I am not here to talk. I am here to show you … That you aren’t safe. I am here because, he will get you … too!”
The voice … I never heard it before.
The stature of the person – I couldn’t tell if it was tall or if we had the same height.
My point of view often changed...one time I was standing, then I was on the lawnmower, after that I was held up high, just to be tossed on the ground again.
I couldn’t tell how tall the person could have been.
And the voice was too raspy and muffled, the person was clearly disguising the voice.
Was he/she someone I knew?
A man … this is a man. How else could someone hold me up li
ke this? This was a male.
My head was aching badly, the scar on my back was still hurting like hell.
I felt how my sweater got sticky, dewy on the side, surely bleeding.
This situation creeped the hell out of me.
Who was this person?
I felt their stare on me, making all my scars ache.
Am I going to die?
The person turned around, clearly looking for something, but he didn’t take anything.
“This … is important.”
Pointing at a box which was placed over the wooden shelve.
“Very important-”
The sentence couldn’t be finished, because a siren stopped him.
It sounded like the police.
For a moment he froze in place … but then he sighed loud.
Gritting his teeth!
Due my pain, I couldn’t move at all.
Well, before that – I couldn’t move either, but now I couldn’t even give it a try.
“Stupid girl!”
Coming closer to me, he pulled out a cloth from his pocket, he poured something on it, before he pressed it against my nose and mouth.
The stabbing smell went through my whole body with just one breath.
It felt like I was suffocating.
My lids wanted to close but I fought back, I didn’t want to give in.
“Don’t tell anybody about what happened. If you do … I am going to kill your family … your friends one by one.”
But in the end I lost my consciousness.
At least I didn’t feel the pain anymore.
**
“Don’t listen to them, they are all bad people who like to bad mouth. They are sad human beings.”
Everything was pitch black, I couldn’t see but I could hear a voice.
No … not just one voice.
There were two people talking.
“Alice… don’t you think, we should runaway?”
This Voice … Dean?
Dean and Alice?
“Jenny, you also think it is better to run away, right? My father is getting on my nerves and … we could live our life without any rules.”
Still a dark room.
But this time, I could see a younger version of Dean sitting next to Alice.
“Be thankful, that you have a father, that you have a family!”
Instantly he stopped smiling.
“Sorry, I forgot. I just wanted to start a new life. Without me ending up in the same position as my father – I want to be a child too.”
I wasn’t sure what was happening now, but my body wasn’t under my control.
In fact, I was just a bystander; I saw my younger self sitting with them both together, writing something on a paper, I was just watching this scenario from far away.
“Yeah, that is right Jenny! I will be better than my father. I should be glad, that I have the chance to get a high status, without doing much.”
Dean looked sad.
“But are you sure, you heard right? Are you sure, that the guys … Thomas and Daniel had a good connection with the lawyer and your father?”
He nodded.
“I heard him saying— there was another case, he needed to clean up before. Linked to one of the men, and this time it was harder to help him out.”
Alice wrapped her arms around me.
“We shouldn’t talk about this matter anymore! We all know that Jenny was unfairly treated and that there was no justice for her. But now she is here with me, she is safe! This case sounds dangerous, we shouldn’t go deeper, we’ve already gone too far. We should live on and do our best to be better.”
My younger self started nodding again.
“You are right! I just wanted to talk about it with you guys. Since… I didn’t know who I could speak to about this.”
Alice pulled Dean over just to hug him too.
“You did the right thing. You can always relay on us, we are here for you.”
“It would be better to forget this and never remember anything about it.”
She stopped for a moment.
“We can’t tell anybody about what we know. We need to keep this a secret. We can’t trust nobody! And we should be carful… I have the feeling, that … it isn’t over.”
What wasn’t over?
What happened?
The memory slowly faded away.
Alice, Dean and my younger self vanished before my eyes.
I was left alone in the darkness.
Getting angry at myself!
WHY DID I ONLY REMBER THIS PART! WHY DID IT STOP THERE? WHY?
What happened?
I don’t understand!
I needed to order my thoughts.
What did I know?
What did I miss?
It was a blurry memory, as I tried to remember the time in court. My memory only started to get clearer as I recalled Alice. And we didn’t talk about anything related to the case, nothing… We had our own dreams and hopes.
We had a beautiful time together.
But something was off!
What if … Oh wait!
I suddenly remembered, my encounter from before!
I was attacked! A person stunned me!
What if I wake up and find myself in a dark place?
What if he is going to torture me?
‘He will get you too!’
What did he mean with ‘too’?
He already killed somebody?
Wait …
My father was murdered!
This could be it!
The murderer of my father wants to kill me too.
This is the only possible solution.
But why would he do this?
I always had the feeling of being watched.
Was he the one who was observing me?
Well, the feelings were different.
Maybe I was crazy … but the glare I had felt the other days was hateful … with detest that made my body shiver just remembering it.
The person that attacked me, stared at me … but not with hate … more like he was doing it … just because he was told too!
Or I was just going crazy…
**
But now … I should try to open my eyes.
Chapter 11
The first try was rather painful.
My eyes were blinded by dull light, which was why I closed them again quickly.
The next attempt was bitter, too.
But after I blinked several times, I got used to the light.
Bizarrely, the atmosphere was calm, pure silence as I stared at the white celling above me.
My throat was dry, it was still hurting from the rough grip, yet, the pain was bearable.
I looked around; everything in here was white, and I noticed that I was on a bed. The room had a table, some chairs, and a balcony— I noticed the grey sky, the thick clouds … it started to darken outside.
My heartbeat was calm.
I didn’t feel unsafe.
My gaze jerked away from the balcony, and I looked down on my left arm.
On the inner side of my elbow there was a white plaster and a tube.
Following the thin transparent tube, I saw a bottle hanging over me— I was on a drip.
On the table beside my bed, there were a phone and a button with a label on it.
`Emergency Button`
I was in a hospital!
My body started to shiver, I hated hospitals!
I really disliked them because of my past. I started smelling the familiar scent.
In every hospital I had been in, there was this recognisable scent, which was heavy and swallowed all your senses.
How did I end up here?
I clearly remembered my encounter with the scary guy.
He was the one who got me unconscious.
Why would he bring me to a hospital?
Or … did he get caught?
There was a serene … The police were there!
Maybe
they caught the culprit and brought me in here?
But who called the police?
I tried to lift myself up, yet the back pain made me stop.
Damn! That hurts!
“Good thing! You are awake.”
A male voice startled me.
I looked up just to find a man standing in front of the door.
He was wearing a white coat with a name tag on it. Holding some papers in his arms, he smiled. And then I recognised this doctor!
It was Jeffrey!
Jeffrey Diamond, the doctor who had helped my body heal in the past.
He was a doctor and also a psychologist.
We both had known each other ever since I got admitted to the hospital for the first time.
I was eight years old that time.
“It is nice to see you again. Just the conditions aren’t!”
With little steps, he came closer.
“You have grown up, Jenny.”
A small smile crept onto his face.
This familiar smile he only gave me when he wanted to cheer me up.
Jeffrey had been my doctor and psychologist until I was adopted.
I had lived with him for a whole year for my therapy.
I had given up on life; he took care of me until he was sure I wouldn’t do anything to myself.
Jeffrey also had a dog named Rex. The two of them and the police officer helped me get through my trauma and my depression, they made me take the first steps.
Alice was added to my world after the year. And I was slowly getting better again.
“How are you feeling?”
He stood next to me.
His icy blue eyes were checking my facial expression.
It took me some time to find my voice again, but in the end, I couldn’t hide my stutter.
“I-I feel okay. My back is just hurting a bit.”
He sighed.
“I can imagine…We disinfected the wound, hopefully it won’t get infected, like all the other times. It was always your problem scar.”
To remember my problem scar … to remember me.
“You look shocked,” he stated before he took a chair and lowered himself onto it.
“I-I… just wouldn’t have thought that you would remember someone like me.”
After I said it out loud, I suddenly felt stupid, and his emotionless expression made it even worse. He was known as the Doctor without any emotions, since he never shared his thoughts or expressions that made him human.
But … I liked him, because in the past I did spent a lot of time with him, he helped me to get through my misery.