Unmasked

After accidently putting Brad into coma, Brooke must go live with her strange grandmother to flee the unforgiving people of her town. Little did she know that her life was going to turn upside down.

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Here's a glimpse at what's to come
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He grabbed my shoulder, jerking me to him. He was fast, really fast, but I was on my game tonight. A swift kick knocked him into a tree nearby and freed me from his grasp. He grunted on impact and slumped to the ground, stunned and surprised. My heart thumped in my chest, and sweat coated my skin. He sprang up from his fall with great speed and lunged for me.


I dodged him and attempted a punch, but failed when he dodged in return. His next blow caught me on the arm, and I stumbled, just barely keeping my balance. He took that chance to slam me into a tree. My vision blurred for half a second, but I quickly recovered. I shoved him back and had the satisfaction of seeing him stagger a little, and squirming from his gasp I jumped back to face him.


We circled around for a while"neither of us gaining ground on the other"and then I leapt out and kicked him. He barely budged as he reached for me, but again I managed to dodge. I looked for some opening, some place in which I had a chance to attack. My narrow capture didn't slow him down, though, and he immediately attacked again. He knocked me to the ground, pinning my arms with his rough, hard hands. I managed to slip one of my arms off his grasp and shoved my elbow up to nail him in the face. It worked, but barley made a dent.

He flinched, however, and that was all I needed. I rolled him over and held him down. He fought to push me off, but I stayed strong, gripping his arms and legs down with pressure. Behind me, I could hear voices and footsteps getting closer, but all I paid attention to was him.

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Chapter 1

 

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"I can't believe you!" I yelled after him. "You got the whole school believing your stupid lies?”

He turned around, watching me warily. “What are you talking about?” Brad replied.

“You started all those lies about Grace sleeping around just because she wouldn’t sleep with you!” I exclaimed angrily. A headache almost immediately built up behind my eyes, and I could feel my hands burning up. I had the urge to scratch the back of my neck but I repressed it.

“This has nothing to do with you-"

“It has everything to do with me! And if you don’t tell everyone that you invented the whole thing, I’ll break your neck.” I threatened.

"You and your s****y friend are psychos! You need to be locked in a cli-”

Heatedly I moved my hands up to his chest, to try and shake some sense into him, but before I even made contact, he flew 15 feet away, hitting his head on a rock nearby. I stood there frozen, trying to ignore the blood pounding in my ears. What just happened? Red liquid poured out of his wound, like a waterfall. He didn’t move or make a sound. The blood just kept pouring out, more and more, until it began forming a messy puddle underneath him.

The screaming of a girl nearby shocked me into reality.

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I woke up, panting hard, with strands of long, dark hair sticking to my forehead. It was all a dream, I repeated to myself. Except, it really wasn't. I was the reason Brad was now in a coma. My mom, who was always one step ahead, made plans for me to go live with my grandma for a while, until news about the accident settled down. But in an unforgiving and never forgetting town like mine, that would never happen.

The breeze, coming in from the cracked window, carried in the overpowering sent of white lilies. It soothed me and calmed me down a bit, making my heavy breathing slow down a notch. Having a mom that loved to garden had its advantages. I inhaled deeply, trying to appreciate it all, fast, before I had to leave it.

“Goodbye.”I whispered, my eyes fixed on the sunlight coming through my window.

No more Rollerblading down the boardwalk at Trevor Beach. No more hearing the slap of wet feet on the concrete at the public Wave pool. No more shopping at the mall with Grace. I sighed with frustration and slowly got out of bed. I was going to miss home a lot. Lazily, I began to pack what was left of my belongings into suitcases.

When I was done, I looked at every corner of my room. There was barely anything left, and it made my heart break a little. This is were I grew up. My favorite white painted dresser was now empty, and my bed, with it's misty white bed curtains that made me feel like an Arabian princess in a fairy tale, now only held it's white empty sheets that were there the day me and my family first moved here. My stereo was still on the nightstand, and so was my favorite picture. I walked towards it and picked up the picture of my dad, who died in an incident three years ago.

I felt knots twisting in my stomach just thinking about it. He was only 36 years old, young, with a family to take care of. In the picture he was holding a baby girl- me- in his arms and had a bright warm smile on his face. After a couple of minutes of staring at it, I carefully placed it and the stereo in the last suitcase.

Grimly, I made my way down the hall and into the turquoise-and-gold-mosaic-tiled bathroom. I splashed cool water on my face and stared in the mirror. The girl, in the reflection, looked back at me with sadness clearly visible on her face. She had olive skin that glowed and long but tangled dark brown hair. I grabbed it, pulling it up like a ponytail, and touched my hexagram shaped birthmark that was on the back of my neck. I always left my hair down, hiding it from everyone.

Nobody knew about it except for my parents and my best friend Grace. I let go of my hair and shook it so that it fell forward and cradled my face, hiding my birthmark and half of my cheeks. My hair was thick and long enough to completely cover my neck, and it fell down in waves down my back. My hazel-green eyes seemed slightly bloodshot from the dream, but I knew I couldn’t go back to bed. I needed something to wake me up. I left the bathroom and turned toward the stairwell, my feet light on the steps as I went downstairs.

“Hey, Mom” I said quietly, stepping into the kitchen.

“Brooke! I didn’t know you were up.” My mom replied, startled. Her emotions spiked all over the place; Confusion, sadness, anticipation, fear. All of it was too overwhelming for me to handle, and I looked away from her feeling a little nauseous. Ever since my dad past away, I could feel what everyone else felt. It was like I held this sixth sense, and it allowed anyone's strong emotions to pour into me, physically and mentally.

I rummaged through a cupboard and found a box of Frosted Flakes, grabbing it, a bowl and milk and bringing it all to the table. I ate the cereal slowly, staring out the window absentmindedly. I couldn’t stop thinking about Brad, and how his body looked pale and drained of blood. Guilt coursed through me as I remembered the puddle, and my inability to do anything about it.

When I was done, I went upstairs with my mom and grabbed the two suitcases I would take with me . Neither of us said anything as we started packing the suitcases into the back of my dad’s beat up 1991 ford.

“I’m going to miss you, Brookie.” She said, stating the nickname she always called me when I was young. I closed the trunk of the car with my suitcases inside, then went over to the drivers side, her quickly following behind. I could feel she was worried about me, but afraid all at the same time.

“I’m going to miss you too, Mom.” I replied “But don’t worry, I’m going to be fine”I assured her.

I hugged her hard, and in that one moment I was aware of so many little sensations. The faint coconut smell that clung to my mother’s hair from her shampoo, the warmth that only my mother’s arms could give me, and the love and kindness that I'll only probably ever receive until all of this mess was over.

I broke the embrace quickly, not wanting to cry. She then went over to the passengers side, and with that we headed to the airport because I had a flight to catch.

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Chapter 2

It was early in the morning when the sound of the plane touching down startled me from my deep sleep. I'd made it. I turned to my right to look out the window and get my first look at my surroundings. The weather looked miserable. It was raining and with ice covering most of the landing strip I was grateful to the pilot who had managed to land the plane with no difficulties.

 

By the time I had stepped out of the plane, fearful voices had infested my head. I was alone in a new town with nothing but my grandmother's name to go on.

 

The last time I had seen my grandmother was on my 7th birthday. And even then she had barely spoken to me. In fact whenever she did visit us, she always had a business face on, like she was coming to get something that belonged to her. I didn't understand why my mom would want me to go live with a stranger. Don’t get me wrong, she wasn’t cruel or anything like that, and she would even almost always bring me gifts but there was something that told me she wasn’t happy being there. Whenever she did visit, the evening would most of the time end in an argument with her and my dad. Then she would just leave and not show up for months.

 

I noticed when I stepped outside the airport with my suitcases that the weather had warmed up. Just as I was about to call for a taxi, someone put a hand on my shoulder and pulled me back.

 

“Are you Brooke Rivera?” said a tall man standing in front of me dressed in an immaculate suit. He was holding something that looked like a picture in his hands

 

“Uhhm.., who are you?” I asked confused.

 

“Oh, I’m sorry, my name is Felix Morgan, I was sent by Ja… Mrs. Ortega to pick you up” he replied handing me the picture.

 

It was a picture of me taken not that long ago. Mom must have sent it to grandma in case she wouldn’t be able recognize me. People did tend to change after ten years.

 

“Oh, right, where is she?” I questioned.

 

“I’m sorry she couldn’t come get you herself because she had an important meeting to attend but she’ll be around this afternoon to welcome you” he said with a smile.

 

We started walking to the parking lot, Felix a couples of steps before me. He was a big, strong man who looked like he was in his 30's and had dark brown hair and dark brown eyes with dark circles underneath. You could tell he hadn’t had proper sleep in a while.

The look on his face was intent and serious.

We stopped in front of a sleek sedan limousine with a driver standing near.

 

“Good morning, ma’am” the driver said politely. I smiled at him and with a nod I climbed inside the car.

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Almost two and half hours later the car pulled past a huge black open iron gate into a long driveway. When the car finally stopped I got out and froze. In front of me was one of the most beautiful houses I had ever seen. It was more like a palace actually. It was surrounded by a very big garden with oaks, pine trees, sunflowers, and cactuses, and down the walls hung creeping vines. A three story palace, externally structured with stone and granite, accented by black iron windows and a balcony sticking out from the center.

"Wow" I whispered.

 

"About 12 thousand square feet" Felix informed me with a smile.

I turned to him and that's when it hit me. Felix had no feelings. I mean he probably did, but I couldn’t feel it. It was weird. Ever since that accident I’ve felt what everybody else was feeling, some stronger than others, but this never happened to me. How could I not be able to feel what he was feeling? I took a step closer, eyeing him, hoping the distance was to blame but still nothing. He looked down at me confused.

 

"Come on, I'll show you around". He continued

 

I quickly followed him inside. "Your family has lived here for more than 400 years"

My family? Hardly! I haven't seen one relative from my father side other than my grandma.

After the painting room, the ballroom, the theatre room and 3 very different but all amazing living rooms we arrived in front a set of double doors with intricate designs on them. Just as Felix was about to turn the knob on the door one of the butlers came rushing in.

 

"Excuse me, Sir?" the butler interrupted him. "Uhhh .., I’m sorry, but you've got a phone call from Mrs. Ortega and she..."

 

"I'll take it" he cut him off "and can you please show Miss Rivera here to her room" he ordered him before quickly leaving the room.

 

Must have been something really important for him to go running like that. Suddenly I felt very tired and drained of energy. I turned to the butler who was still standing there waiting for me to follow him.

I decided to call him Jeffery from the show ‘the prince of bel air’. Shaking off some of the tiredness I walked to him with a smile as he led me up a long spiral staircase that was made out of marble. We walked down a long hallway, until at last we reached the room at the end. Its doors were bigger than the rest and had a very beautiful decorated pattern carved into it.

 

"Dinner will be served in 20 minutes" said Jeffery before heading downstairs.

 

I pushed open the door and looked around the room. It was huge. It was twice as big as the school studio back home. It was furnished with large pieces. Its main feature was the elegantly made king-sized bed in the middle. A matching dresser stood off to the side along with its matching mirror. Two connecting doors were on the other side of the room and a large fireplace completed the look. I walked across the thick, white carpets and looked at myself in the mirror. There were dark shadows under my eyes and my hair was sticking up in all sorts of direction. Lazily I walked towards one of the doors on the other side of the room and opened it. Inside was a very clean and polished bathroom. Everything was white. From the cabinets, to the walls, to the small carpets and even the floor was made out of the purest white marble.

 

After taking a shower and changing clothes I contemplated going to bed but assumed someone would come up to get me if I wasn’t downstairs in the next 10 minutes. When I finally found the right kitchen, Jeffery looked up and smiled politely.

 

“Did you need anything miss River-”

 

“Just call me Brooke please” I cut him off “and no I didn’t need anything”

 

“Okay Brooke, then can I show you to your table?”

 

He led me to the dining room that was glowing from the huge chandelier that was positioned in the middle of the room. It was beautiful. There wasn’t much furniture in the dining room but a long rectangle table in the center of the room with about a dozen seats. Jeffery led to my seat and he left. I sat there alone in a room in a house where I knew no one.

I felt homesick. I wondered what mom was doing right now and what Grace was up to. Did she miss me? Or was she gone off to some party with a new best friend? I reached inside my jean pocket and realized I left my phone in the other pants. I'd have to call her later.

 

A pleasant aromatic smell suddenly filled the room. My stomach growled in response. A slim tall server came in the room and set down a tray on the table in front of me. I looked at the tray for a while without touching it, unsure of what it was.

 

“Rice and grilled oxtail cutlets and soup” the server said noticing my confusion.

 

“Right” I said smiling at him. This was new. Back home, I was so accustomed to pizza and burgers.

 

I took a sip of the soup, and words cannot describe that definitive moment. I could feel sweetness, savoriness and hotness dancing in my mouth. Before I knew it I found myself enjoying every surprising mouthful.

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