Brittney's Story

A Chapter by Zoey Balderston

Chapter 31 of Banished for Love

Two hours of napping go by and although I am waking up feeling refreshed, Jeremy is still down for the count. I won’t be surprised if he sleeps all through the night. I slip carefully out of Jeremy’s arms and off his bed. He stirs for a moment but falls back asleep immediately. I tiptoe downstairs and check the clock on the wall; 6 PM.

I check my phone to see I missed a call from Brittney almost an hour ago. I listen to the hysterical voicemail of her crying, begging me to come over. I punch the address she had choked out to me into my phone’s GPS and see that she too lives out in the middle of the forest. I text her that I’m on my way, grab Jeremy’s keys, and head outside to hop in his car. I drive smoothly along the winding roads until my phone leads me down an unmarked dirt road barely visible among the overgrown trees. I drive cautiously along the road, bumping over the uneven gravel, vehemently wishing I was in Janie's truck with its higher suspension.

I spot a slight clearing just ahead so I pull the car to a stop. Stepping out of the car and looking over the tiny, ramshackle cabin with Brittney’s unmistakable pink bug parked out front, I realize why she sounded so sad when I suggested we sleep over at her place. I step up to the front door, the porch creaking loudly as I do. I raise my hand to knock, but Brittney opens the door before I get the chance.

“Thanks for coming,” she says, her voice still thick with tears.

“Anytime,” I respond cautiously, casting a surreptitious glance at my surroundings. The cottage looks just as run-down on the inside as it does on the outside. There is a well-worn leather couch in the corner with duct tape covering up multiple tears. The kitchen appliances are caked in years of dirt, grime, and rust from disuse. Through a crooked doorway I can just see the edge of a mattress with pink bedding lying directly on the uneven hardwood floors. My heart breaks for Brittney as I move to sit on the couch.

“Pathetic isn’t it?” Brittney says in a dejected tone. “I had nowhere to go when the High Council kicked me out of my previous home. I packed what I could into my car and high tailed it out of there. Wasn’t long though before I ran out of gas. I was lucky to find this abandoned old place.”

I stare at her in shock and horror at the hardships she had to go through when she fell. I had never truly realized how lucky I had been to have Jeremy take me in. I would probably be living in a similar hovel if he hadn’t.

“So what happened? Earlier, I mean. When you called me,” I ask, trying to mask my pity, knowing she wouldn’t appreciate it.

She sighs, tears returning to her eyes. “I found these.” She places an old cell phone and a diary in front of me. I pick them up cautiously, keeping my wary gaze on her for a moment before looking at the items. The phone contained text messages and couple-like photos shared between Brittney and Devin. Brittney looked very different. There was a certain lightness in her then blue eyes and a childlike glow to her smile. She was happy. Or at least, happier.

I place the phone gingerly on the couch beside me and turn to the diary. Tucked into the pages are some photo strips from photo booths. The look on both their faces suggests they were very happy and very in love with one another. Inside the book itself are diary entry upon diary entry of the fun filled days they spent together along with impressively artistic sketches of the places and of the two of them. I shut the diary and turn to Brittney, who is staring absently out the dirty windowpane, tears silently rolling down her cheeks.

“Brittney, what happened?” I ask as gently as I can manage.

She sucks in a deep breath and turns to me. “What’s there to tell? I was happy as could be, happier than I’ve ever been in my life. And as far as I knew, he felt the same way. I was naïve, a new guardian trainee. Human emotions were so foreign to me and I became consumed by them. I met Devin on the first day of school, and it was like love at first sight. We immediately hit it off. He took me to the beach, to a carnival on the boardwalk, for walks through the forest. He even shared his special place with me, a huge tree house in the middle of the forest.” I go rigid, knowing exactly which tree house she is talking about. Her love story with Devin was sounding unsettlingly close to mine and Jeremy’s, but also even more unsettlingly close to the start of my friendship with Devin.

The look in her eyes suddenly darkens and she looks down at her clenched fists. “Then one day he just disappeared. I tried calling him, texting him, I even stopped by his house, but no one was home. That’s when I was brought before the High Council. My training partner was there, standing against the wall. The council explained to me that she had told them about my relationship with Devin. I was in disbelief. She’d been my best friend forever; I refused to believe she would betray me like that. When the archangels converged to take my wings from me, I pleaded her to help me, but she wouldn’t meet my gaze. I was helpless as they sent me plummeting back down here. I lay in the forest in the same spot where I had landed for two days, just sobbing. When I finally felt I had the strength to move again, I immediately went to Devin’s house. That’s when I learned he had truly left me. His house was completely abandoned, and I was alone.”

I stare at her, unable to restrain the pity in my eyes anymore. “Oh Brittney, I had no idea.”

She barks out a laugh that lacks humor. “That’s because I’ve never told anyone about him. Never had anyone to tell. And my bitchy exterior was easy to hide behind. Easier than dealing with the pain of it all.” Her bottom lip quivers on the last statement and she drops her face into her hands, sobbing.

I scoot closer and wrap my arms around her thin shoulders. “Shh, shh,” I croon to her, rubbing my hand across her shoulder blades. My hand passes over a ridge of skin and before I have the chance to jerk away, I am jerked inside her memory.

I am falling. I should rephrase that; we are falling. Brittney is beside me, taking her wingless plummet to Earth.

Watching hers, and experiencing it beside her, causes anxiety to claw up from inside me as it brings the memory of my own fall screaming to the front of my mind. Time flashes forward through her two days of crying numbly on the forest floor and I watch as she rises shakily to her feet. Tears still falling down her face, she staggers blindly through the forest to Devin’s house. She bangs loudly on the door, sobs beginning to rock her frame again. She yanks the door open and stumbles inside. She stares at the empty front room for a moment, blinking rapidly to clear the tears. She screams Devin’s name up and down the halls, getting more and more hysterical as she goes. She pauses before a set of ornate double doors on the first floor of the house down a hallway behind the stairs. As she reaches to turn the knob, I am slammed into what feels like a brick wall. The memory freezes, and I am unable to see any further, unable to see what had been behind the door. Slowly, almost reluctantly I am pulled from her memory.

“What did you see?” she demands of me apprehensively.

“I saw you fall, and go looking for Devin. Then it was like I hit a wall inside your memory,” I tell her, feeling confused.

Her eyes widen. “You found one of them?”

“One of what?” I ask, even more confused.

“The wall. Every time I try to think too hard about Devin, I hit a wall and can’t go any further into my memory,” she says, looking genuinely terrified. "I thought I was going crazy," she whispers, almost to herself.

I ponder for a moment, wondering what could be causing this. Looking at Brittney, I realize I need to get her to bed.

“Brittney, no offence but you look awful, you need to get some sleep,” I say, dragging her up from the couch and into the room with the bed.

“Maybe you’re right,” she sniffles. “Maybe it will help my memory if I sleep some.”

She lies down on the bed and is asleep almost immediately. I tiptoe out of the cottage and swing into Jeremy’s car. I stare out the front windshield for a while, still pondering. I dig my phone out of my back pocket and text Devin asking him to meet me at the tree house in an hour. I drive back down the dirt road and park Jeremy’s car safely at home before heading out into the forest.

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