"Brianna. Bree. Wake. Up!"
Brianna had been tossing and turning in her sleep all night. He dark brown hair a tangles mess sprawled out along her pillow and sticking to the sides of her face.
Branna gasped and panted, rolling around, and wheezing, her brown eyes wide with terror.
"Elenore?" She asked. I patted her on the back.
"Was it the dream again."
Brianna looked up at me, her eyes wet and her face red, she turned and vomited on the floor.
Yes. It was definately the dream.
"We should take you to the nurse." I said, I got up and walked around the puddle of vomit that Bree had spewed on our floor boards and grabbed my tatty jacket off the hook.
"Come on." I said, meeting her terrified eyes. Poor Bree. Her life was a night mare.
Brianna and I walked down the long hall and into the lobby, of Hidden Hills foster home. This had been my home for seven years, and I still wasn't accustomed to living here.
Brianna had arrived last spring. It was snowing then and she had been only eight. She was crying as she walked into the lobby with her custody guard at her side. Her parents were dead. He had said quietly, Ad she had no one left.
Brianna was the classic orphan. She was young and small, with no one who cared for her. Her parents were gone, and she was stuck living here in Foster care.
Of course, Hidden Hills is a great place to love if your an orphan. There is food and water and beds to sleep in. You get new clothed every once and a while and the staff members are all very nice. In fact, Hidden Hills is the ideal place for an orphan.
The only problem was-I wasn't an orphan at all.
No, somewhere in New Orleans, I had a mother and a Father, and on top of that I had an older sister named Valerie who would be twenty-one this winter.
I had the perfect family somewhere far off, across the state.
Too bad they don't know I'm alive.
I walked into the nurses office, my hand on Brianna's back, she was trembling slightly. I wasn't sure if it were the cold or the left over shock, that always came with the dream.
When the nurse caught sight of the mangled Brianna, vomit caked to her mouth, hair wild and tangles, and shuddering as if she had just seen a ghost, she knew exactly what this was.
Almost every day for the past six weeks Brianna would have this terrible dream. It frightened her so much that she couldn't even talk about it.
Everyday, I would walk her to the nurse, so that she could have her temperature taken and have a nice place to lay down.
I would go back to bed, and Brianna would come back a while later to get dressed and ready for school.
The nurse called the janitor for my bedroom and gave Brianna a thermometer. Then, once I had left, she walked out of the room and into the cafeteria, to get a styrophome cuf full of black coffee and a bruised apple with the sticked stuck on.
I walked back up to bed. The janitor had my room cleaned and he place smelled like chemicals and barf, mixed in with the normal smell of rubber and plastic, that made up out desks, chairs, and even our bed frames.
I pulled on my red shirt and yesterday's jeans. I brushed my blonde hair and put it in a pony tail with a rubber band that was hanging on the door handle and I walked back out of the room, and into the lobby again, where I sat with my library book and cried.
This happened sometimes, they called it post traumatic stress, that had stayed with me for years.
IN the story that I told them, I was just an orphan girl.
In the truth that I told myself, I was the girl who's sister hated her enough to push her into a foster home, after nearly letting her die in a locked bank.
I was the most hated girl in the world. And that was the truth.
No one knew about my sister, Valerie, or my Mom and Dad, Ellen and Bob. They didn't know in the same way that Ellen and Bob didn't know that their daughter, Aurora Elenore Marx was still out there, alone and crying in a foster home.
I put my book down and tried not to sob. I hoped that none of the other kids would come down from bed and see me like this.
Gently, I wiped the tears from my cheeks. Sometimes, it seemed like they still stung from when Mr. Values would burn, my face with his lighter.
Now all that was left were a few dull scars. But, they still hurt, and they were still real.
"Elenore?"
My head shot up. It was Yeatz. The only school teacher here that I didn't like. Perfect timing.
"Elenore, what are you doing up?"
"I was taking Bri-"
Mrs. Yeatz rose one eye brow warily, "Yeah, uh-huh, sure you were. You can just go back to bed now. Brianna can take care of herself."
The thought of returning to the small, smelly room, that was a constant reminder of my tragic past, made my stomach churn.
"Mrs. Yeatz, I feel sick." I lied.
She rolled her eyes. "Don't you always. Bed. Now!" She pointed one bony finger at the stairs, and I got up and walked slowly up. My head down, and my eyes watering.
I was never good at standing up for myself. When bad things happen to you when you are very young, I think it is common to be scarred for life. My form of scarring is that I will never be able to defend myself, because, I'm always afraid of being weaker.
I was the weak one with Mr. Values.
quietly I slipped into bed and rubbed my tierd eyes. They stung with burning tears. Tears, of anger and rage, and tears of betrayal.
I try not to think about Valerie much. I was only three years old when it all happened. And, it was hard to even remember what she had looked like. When she had left me here she was only four years older than I am now. And she had hated me that much?
That was hard to believe.
I heard the door open twenty minutes later, and like usual I was burning with curiousity.
"What was the dream about this time, Bree?" I asked, thought, I knew I would never get a straight answer from her.
"Death." She said, in her small voice.
Brianna pulled on her clean clothes for the day, saying nothing more. And, than I had an idea.
"If you tell me what happens in your dreams I will tell you my biggest secret."
Brianna is only nine, and the word "secret" intigues her deeply. But, she shakes her head.
"What if I tell you my secret first?" I ask, slowly, "And, then you can decide if you want to tell me yours?"
There was a long pause, as she considered this.
What was I doing? Was I really going to tell her the truth?
For a moment I felt a pang of loalty to my sister. But... Why? Why would I keep a secret for someone whi doesn't even want me?
"Sure." Brianna sighed.
I took a deep breath and I walked up to my good friend, leaning close and whispering in her ear.
"My real name isn't Elenore."
Brianna looked at me, quizically, "What is it?"
I sighed.
"Aurora Marx. And, when I was two I was locked in a bank, with several other wemon. They did bad things to me there. And then... Then my sister cam-"
"You have a sister?" She asked.
"I had one." I said, before continuing, "My sister came, and I thought she was going to save me. Instead, she hurt me, and then she took me here and told me that I could never come home."
"Why didn't you tell?"
"It's a secret." I whispered. "And, I am afraid of what will happen if I do."
Brianna nodded.
"Will you tell me now?" I asked.
She nodded again.
"In my dreams I see things..." She said. "And then they happen." She said.
"Really?" I asked. and then she nodded.
"And, last night I saw death."
"What do you mean?"
"Tonight a lot of people are going to die here." She whispered and than she turned and walked away.
The day went normaly, and I tried not to think about Brianna's dreams. They were too scary.
But, that night I new that I would never be able to forget them again.
The fire bell rang at one in the morning.
Bree and I raced out of bed and down the hall.
"Death." She whispered, and I knew it was true. This was it.
A moment later we started hearing gun fire. People were screaming and running all through the home.
"Quick, Bree! We have to hide!" I shouted grabbing Brianna's arm and jerking her into the coat closet nearby.
"Death." She whispered again.
"Brianna," I whispered, horrified, "Was this your dream."
I watched in horror as she nodded her small head.
"What happens next?"
That's when the door wrenched open, Brianna who had been puting her wait on the un-hinged door went tumbling to the ground, and spilled on the floor.
Right at the ankles of Valerie Marx.
Valerie had grown older. She had chopped off her blonde hair and this time she didn't stand alone.
Instead a man stood by her side. Both of them clutched rifles in their arms, and pointed them at Brianna.
"What are you doing." I screamed, falling to the floor beside my friend.
"Hold fire." Valerie commanded the man, who nodded.
"Valerie?" I asked.
Valerie glared at me, and spat. "Get out of the way!" She snarled.
"No."
Valerie loaded her gun. "This is your fault, you know." She said in a whisper. "She is going to die, all because you told her..." She paused, breathing heavily. "You should have kept the secret, Aurora. We have to kill those who know."
I looked at her with dripping eyes.
"Why?" I asked, qizically.
Valerie scoffed, "Because, imbical, This is more than just spilling a realy bad secret." She laughed, "That's only the begining."
I let out sob. "Than where is the end?"
Valerie smiled down at me. "The end, dumbass, is when we die. And, god knows, that's no time soon."
With that being done. Valerie kicked me away with her combat boot.
"Remmy. Open fire." She said to the man.
"Cover your eyes, Aurora." I heard Bree whisper.
And that was the last thing she ever said.
***10 DAYS LATER***
"Rest in Piece, Bree." I sobbed into my dress sleeve, before droppong a Lilly on her grave.
"No one is going to rest." I heard Valerie whisper in my ear. "We are all witnesses. And we will be restless forever."
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