Chapter One - Rosie

Rosie

            I imagine her. This mysterious woman of which my sensitive, emerald eyes should have lingered on. After so many tedious hours of childbirth her heart should have sang its own acapella verse, her arms should have been aching with want to hold me close and to love me unconditionally.

            Instead I suppose the opposite have happened. She had taken one look at me and thought that I wasn’t good enough. Maybe my eyes had been too big for my round face, my brown hair too thin on my head or perhaps I’d screamed nonstop since I had been born. Some people might say that it’s none of those; that she simply got scared and couldn’t face her responsibilities.

            My Aunty Dionne said once that giving birth to a baby is the most precious, most thrilling experience a woman can have. She’d always say that whenever she caught me scowling at the mention of a birth of a newborn. Sometimes, when she was really poorly she would just giggle and give me a cuddle. It’s those I miss most.

            My thin, pink fingers run along the brown, polished wooden lid and I sigh softly. God must really hate me. What other explanation is there for this kind of torture? Why else would he be putting me through hell? To tell anyone about God would be foolish anyway, the fore bearers would send me into oblivion for sure. The problem with Episkopos is that only fools will believe in the simplest things.

            Records say that Episkopos was founded in 095 B.P. All those years ago two large planets collided into each other, and then another two met them head on. This split the land mass into four quarters. Far west is where we live, Poseidon’s Ocean. If you’ve read about the myths you’ll know that he was the God of the sea and a merman. Some people say they exist. Some say that it is best staying a myth. I don’t know what to think.

            I wipe my eyes then pull off the lid in one swift movement. My fingers ruffle through the bits of paper and photographs, a sense of urgency ripples through my blood like a bullet would through the air, hitting its prime target.

            Anyone else would relish this. The curiousity of the unknown, getting to track down a missing relative and discovering little details of information that was unknown before. I would rather have a normal upbringing, a loving family who’d fight for me. Instead I’d drawn the short straw. Story of my life.

            If only there was a way to stop this insanity. Once and for all I could be what I was supposed to be, not what I wanted to be. My fingers tuck themselves into the palms of my hand, trying to bestow the anger that was building slowly. If only I could think without -.

            SLAM!

            She’s home. God, she’s early.

            ‘Rosie!’ Brenda calls up; her deep, musky voice bounces of the walls and travels into my eardrums making my ears ring. ‘Are you here?’ I roll my eyes anti clockwise at her pathetic question. Who did she think was here? I could hear the rustlings of carrier bags and I smile to myself. ‘Olly, you keep your mitts off those chocolate fingers! Don’t you eat enough?’

            ‘But mum.’

            ‘No buts. Hand’s off!’ Olly gives a whimper, a sign of his despair. ‘Rosie!’ I can see her now, flicking her long, peroxide blonde hair over her shoulders, her hands on her bony hips while her left foot taps away in an annoyed fashion. I felt the corners of my mouth pull up into a grin but stop myself. Now is not the time to be smiling.

            I avert my eyes to the other brown, polished box that has been sitting beside me throughout my search; my heart skips a beat. I’d completely forgotten about it. I take the box from my lap and place the other one onto it.

            The walls have just shaken with the velocity of her sigh, now the sound of her four inch heels are making the worn floorboards creak and my heart palpitate with panic. She wouldn’t dare come in here! Not after last time. She wouldn’t! No! The image of her tearing all my treasured possessions into shreds replayed in my mind. I swallow hard.

            ‘She’ll use this as a weapon.’ A voice whispers within the walls of my brain. ‘This will make you look badly if she finds them again. Rosie! What are you doing just sitting there? DO SOMETHING!’ Running on autopilot my hands grasp the edges of the lid and place it on top of the small but spacious box which secures the other half of me. The half that no one could ever know about again.

            A creak echoes through my ears and rattles its way into my eardrums as loud as a thousand gunshots. It was too late now. She’d caught me. I shove the box underneath my bed and wrap a strand of chocolate brown hair behind my right ear. The door creeps open ajar, her eyes lingering on where my left arm had flown from. Had she seen? The lines on her forehead crease as her eyebrows furrow into a frown, making her small nose appear huge.

            ‘I hope that wasn’t what I think it was.’ I shake my head adamantly at her.

            ‘Of course not.’ I shrug half-heartedly with half a smile, hoping that it would feign an innocence that my voice had failed to convey. ‘It’s just a project for school. That’s all.’ Brenda’s chest expands and deflates as the open ocean would the golden sand on the beach. A smile flickers across her face, causing the frown lines to disappear. It didn’t reach her brown eyes.

            ‘Good.’ Her eyes roam the room, her pink tongue clicking in her mouth. ‘Speaking of school shouldn’t you be there?’

            ‘It’s lunchtime mum. Nobody stays there anymore. The dinners are just revolting.’

            ‘Right. When are you due back?’ Her eyes glitter with interest, the nerves in my fingertips prickle. Could she really care? Just this once?

            ‘Half past. Double Science too.’ I lay my head in my hands. I was a goner. Homework had been the last thing on my mind and now mentioning Science had totally propelled me back into last week when we’d been told what to do.

            ‘The whole schooling system’s a joke! Fancy teaching all you kids useless stuff like that.’ I couldn’t help but wonder what subjects she would have us studying if she was in charge. Feminism perhaps? Or maybe even Occultism? It was hard to tell with her sometimes.

            ‘They don’t see it like that.’ I pull myself from the bed and haul my black backpack over my small shoulders. I wait, hoping that the knotting in my stomach is because of the curse of being a girl rather than that of instinct. I wait. And wait. And wait.

            Nothing. She spins me around and lets out a gasp.

            ‘What are you still doing with that bag?’

            ‘I’ve always had this. It’s the one that Aunty Dionne gave me two Christmases ago.’ Before she lost her fight with Breast Cancer I want to shout but I don’t, realising that my anger is boiling up at her distaste.

            ‘That is my point. We will have to get you a new one.’

            ‘But-.’ She holds up the palm of her left hand, her way of warning that a discussion isn’t happening.

            ‘But nothing. Dionne has been gone for a long time now. It’s about time you let her go.’ I shake my head, wanting to argue the fact that Dionne had been a big part of both our lives once upon a time. There was no point. I would surely lose it anyway. I hear a giggle from the hallway and find Olly clutching the packet of chocolate fingers that he was forbidden to have. I bit my bottom lip anxiously. He was going to be in so much trouble. He’d opened them. 

            I knelt down to his level and tickle his chin.

            ‘You’re a little tinker aren’t you?’ He giggles while searching for another finger. Pulling out three he shovels them all into his mouth, chewing on half each triumphantly. The springs of my bed mould to their rightful place as the door creaks open.

            ‘What did I tell you?’ Brenda shouts as she swipes them out of his hands. His eyes fill with tears and begins to cry. ‘You can stop that for a start. If you did as you were told you wouldn’t be shouted at would you?’ Olly begins screaming uncontrollably and Brenda sighs heavily. Her eyes glower at me. ‘You should know better. A big girl like you! Really Rosie?’ She shakes her head. ‘Get yourself to school. I don’t want you getting into trouble again. You understand?’ I don’t answer her. I rise to my feet, sparing a glance at Olly who looks at me with such sadness it breaks my heart. There’s nothing I can do for him though. As usual I’m only one girl without an array of hope.