Chapter 6: Silence is Everything

Chapter 6

Silence is everything

A miracle, pray for a miracle…

 

 

       The next morning we got up at around six o’clock. Well, at least I got up. It was unusually chilly that morning, but I thought nothing of it then. That day I was the least perceptive Protector there ever was.

 Yawning, I stretched and got up off the sofa. I glanced over to Taylor, who was still sprawled out on his bed, and told him to get up. Rubbing the sleep out of my eyes, I ambled off in the direction of the bathroom to take my last hot shower of the week. An hour later I walked back into the room to find Taylor in exactly the same position as I left him.

            ‘Taylor!! Wake up!’ I shouted in his ear.

 No response. I crossed the room to the window and pulled open the curtains; the rays of sunrise shone straight onto my friend. This time, he groaned and pulled the covers over his head.

            ‘Hmmm…’ I thought. Then I went over to his bed and pulled his duvet off him. ‘There’s hot chocolate in the kitchen!’

That provoked a response; he shot out of his blankets and looked around.

‘Hot chocolate!!!  Where is it?!’ Then he saw my expression. ‘What did you do that for? There isn’t any!’

‘We have to get up early today, remember?’ I reminded him.

‘Oh yeah,’ his face fell. Then a thought occurred to him, and it brightened up again. ‘I’m gonna make some anyway. Do you want some?’

‘Okay,’ I laughed, and then asked. ‘Um… where do you keep the camping stuff?’

‘In the kitchen there’s a door to the left of the cooker that leads to the garage,’ he instructed me. ‘Make a left after the green toolbox and it should all be there.’

I thanked him and followed his directions. I had never been in his garage before and I was apprehending what I would find a little nervously, it was twice as big as the rest of the entire house! How bad could it be? I reasoned, recalling that I thought exactly the same thing on the subject of Taylor’s mum.

I took a deep breath and walked into the dreaded room. It was enormous, and packed. It looked like different piles had been balanced on top of each other to make just enough room to walk around them. Spotting a bright green toolbox sitting on a table under a couple of bags of nails, I made my way over to it, taking care not to knock anything over. Once there I peered through the bags of I don’t know what just behind the box to see a piece of tent poking out of another massive pile of stuff.

Squeezing between the two bags of soft stuff, I reached the tent. Carefully holding the pile, I eased it out, expecting the pile to fall on me at any moment. Eventually, I managed it. Phew, I thought, pretending to wipe sweat off my forehead. Looking around I spotted various things you would bring for a camp out: flashlight, sleeping bags, backpack, matches, pillows etc…

I stuffed everything into the backpack, picked up the tent triumphantly and proceeded to direct myself to the exit. Once I got to the two huge squashy bags, I was so proud of myself because I didn’t knock anything over that I didn’t notice that they were open at the top. Trying to cram myself, the tent and a rucksack in between them they tipped over and the contents came pouring down on me.

On the plus side, I now knew what was in them. On the downside... it was flour. Shaking my head so I could see better, I spat out the disgusting stuff that had found its way to my mouth, then continued my way to the exit.

 As soon as I got to the kitchen, I put my load down. Taylor was already there, making cocoa as he had promised. He turned around and burst out laughing when he saw me shaking white dust everywhere.

‘May I ask you,’ I said menacingly. ‘Just what is so funny?’

In return, he just laughed even harder, tears streaming down his face. I waited patiently for him to get his breath back, as he turned off the gas.

‘What happened? You look like a ghost!’ he chuckled, pouring the cocoa into three mugs.

‘I knocked over a couple of bags of flour, (he started to smile again). It’s not funny!’ I retorted indignantly. ‘But in my defence, who keeps flour in the garage? And why have you done three cups?’

‘Didn’t I tell you? It’s a garage, cross larder, cross odd things room. So in there are biscuits, flour, sugar, meat… basically everything!’ He told me as the doorbell rang. ‘As for the third mug, Ashley’s stopping by here before going to the woods, while Alyssa rings Selene to see if she’s coming or if she still wants to be alone for a while.’

‘Oh, now you tell me,’ I muttered, shaking my hair with my fingers to try and get rid of the flour.

‘What was that?’

‘Nothing!’ I said brightly, before abandoning my attempts.

Just then, Ashley walked in with her knapsack in hand. As she saw me she dropped it in shock and started snickering with her hand over her mouth.

‘What happened to you?’

Taylor explained that I had been attacked by flour, saving me the embarrassment of having to say what happened.

‘O…M…G, but don’t worry! I know just the thing to fix it…’ Ashley exclaimed after the fit of giggles had subsided. She rummaged in her bag until she found what she wanted: her battery powered hairdryer. ‘Stand still.’

She put it onto full blast and started blowing all the flour off me. I screwed up my face as all my hair blew over it. A couple of minutes later she stopped.

‘There,’ she said putting the hairdryer away. ‘Good as new.’

‘Thanks Ash, you’re a hero.’ I hugged her gratefully.

‘I know, I know,’ she joked, and then turned to Taylor, who was still suppressing his laughter. ‘So where’s this hot cocoa then?’

He handed out the mugs, muttered something about marshmallows, and disappeared into the hateful garage.

*************

 

The three of us arrived at the small clearing right in the middle of the woods around 9 o’clock, just as we said we were. Alyssa and Selene were nowhere in sight, so we dumped our stuff at the edge of the area.

‘Should we start on the tent right away? (It was an eight person tent)’ I asked.

Both Ashley and Taylor nodded, so we started throwing all the twigs and branches out of the way.

‘Aw, do we have to chuck stuff away first?’ complained Ashley after only five minutes.

I thought quickly before replying slyly: ‘You do know you’re going to sleep on that? So every stick you throw makes it more comfortable for you this evening.’

She immediately went back to work, and when only the little twigs were left, she unfolded a broom out of her bag. Taylor looked on in amazement.

‘What…How…where on earth did you find that?’ He spluttered.

‘Oh, it was lying around,’ she replied looking pleased with herself, sweeping a big space for the tent. Ashley’s wardrobe/makeup room was almost as big as Taylor’s garage. ‘There, we should sleep fine now.’

We then proceeded to take all the pegs and poles out of my bag, and in about three hours �" and with much arguing about what went where - the tent was pitched on one side of the clearing. As we finished rolling out the sleeping bags and had just stepped outside to admire our handiwork, Alyssa ran in, out of breath. Hmm… something’s strange about her, but I don’t quite know what…

‘So now you come!’ teased Taylor. ‘Of course, it's just as we finished pitching the tent! Well guess what? You came just in time to collect firewood!’

Alyssa contented herself with shooting him a look and sat down on a log we had rolled out of the way. Then it sank in. Alyssa had come alone

‘Where’s Selene?’ I asked.

‘I don’t know,’ she replied worriedly. ‘I phoned her at least ten times before going to the little cabin where she lives. She’s gone.’

‘Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on a minute. Do you mean she’s just gone? Or has she gone, gone?’ Ashley frowned.

‘Gone; gone. When I went over to her place, it was a mess. All the clothes had been pulled out of her drawers and half of them have disappeared. Her suitcases and accessories have gone too, but her bags of blood are still all in the fridge,’ Alyssa gave us all the details. ‘Then I looked everywhere, I even ran to the beach and back!’

‘And?’ urged Ashley.

‘No sign of her. No note, no nothing. I have no idea where she is.’

There was a pause when all we could hear were the birds twittering, as everyone tried to think of where Selene had gone, and why. I was the first to break the silence.

‘She was extremely close to Kaylee, maybe she just needed some alone time? You know like that time when she got a cat, and loved it so much that one day she accidently bit it?’

‘Poor Tittles,’ agreed Taylor forlornly, looking up at the sky. ‘I’m sure he has his place up there in heaven.’

‘Yes, but we’re talking about Selene!’ Ashley whacked him on the arm. ‘She went to have some “alone time”, and came back a week later. She said that she needed a bit of a holiday, and that she had gone to a deserted island in the Pacific so as to not hurt anyone if she got upset. Her eyes were a bit bloodshot when she got back, probably from lack of sleep, but she seemed ok.’

Then it was Ashley’s turn to be hit on the arm. ‘What?’ She asked, rubbing it.

‘Vampires don’t get tired or bloodshot eyes. Well, that is unless they’ve just drunk blood, and we all know that Selene...’ explained Alyssa, before realising what she had said and snapping her fingers. ‘Oh my gosh, Selene gorged herself with blood!’

‘…which means she lied to us!’ I finished. ‘But that means…’

‘…that we don’t know what she’s gonna do this time,’ finished Alyssa. ‘For all we know, she could be in Japan, Europe, or somewhere worse.’

We all looked at each other, each person gauging the others’ reaction. Eventually Taylor broke yet another silence.

‘Come on guys; don’t go about imagining the worst before you know the truth. Maybe she just drank too much of the stuff in her fridge? After all, blood is supposed to be on any vampire’s list of top ten things. Besides, even if it is true �" and I’m not saying that it is �" Sel’s our friend; she must’ve had a really good reason from keeping this from us. I say that we should stop worrying about her, she can take care of herself, and at the moment, we aren’t doing too well on the preparation front, it’s almost afternoon!’ he said brightly.

Reluctantly, we all nodded. The sun was well up into the sky, which was beginning to cloud over; it must’ve been about twelve thirty. Damn Taylor, always thinking positively, and in a way so that we can’t complain, because it’s always true! I thought. We divided into groups, Taylor and Ashley going to get firewood, while Alyssa and I went in search for stumps for us to sit on around the fire.

*************

 

That day was spent getting everything to the clearing, like whetting stones for our knives, suitable oak sticks for sharpening, a pile of firewood for the night, etc… At dusk, we were all sitting around a little pile of wood blazing merrily, warming ourselves up - for the day had not grown warmer as it wore on - eating sandwiches, and discussing on what we should do.

‘I think we should still patrol around school a bit, you know, just checking that everything’s ok. Even though I know what the book said, I’m not taking any chances,’ I declared between mouthfuls of my delicious peanut butter and jelly, made with loving care by Alyssa �" she was our food provider. Then I saw Taylor try to open his mouth in protest (he had some kind of caramel cementing his teeth together). ‘We don’t all have to go at once, just one at a time, for a couple of hours, then he or she would come back and someone else would take their place.’

‘But what if the vamps come back? What can one of us do against at least three of them?’ asked Ashley. Alyssa nodded in agreement next to her, chewing on her cheddar cheese sandwich.

‘Well,’ countered Taylor, having managed to swallow his very sticky substance (I never want to know what he has in between those two slices of bread!). ‘A, if we all go, and they’re all crescent, we’ll stand no chance anyway. B, one person will draw less attention, and C, there are only four of us. Last time we were up to twelve! (Most Protectors moved away to deal with vampires in other places in America, the sort that don’t come back.)’

Ashley still looked unconvinced, but Alyssa then intervened:

‘He’s right; we’ll not stand a chance against them just the four of us,’ then she turned to me with a concerned look on her face. ‘But even if we were twelve, it still might not be enough.’

‘Then we’ll just have to pray for a miracle,’ replied Taylor.

Once again, silence reigned in our little circle of flickering firelight, and the wind whistled and sighed as if it understood our troubles. Pray for a miracle, he got that right. If miracles existed, then vampires wouldn’t, I thought, but still a part of me was clinging onto his words, wishing with all its might for the miracle that would just tip the balance, so we could just have a chance to save some people from a lifetime of eternal pain. I was so concentrated on wishing this, that I didn’t notice the strong scent of oak that was carried on the breeze.

Around an hour later, Alyssa excused herself and went to the tent to sleep, followed by the other two soon after. I stayed up and reached for my IPod, I always had to hear a song or two before going to sleep. Usually I listened to one and then the second one would always find a way to have something to do with my life at that moment. I lied back, letting the sound of the song wash over me:

It started out as a feeling,

Which then grew into a hope…

 

I smiled, the song was called The Call, by Regina Spektor, remembering that I wouldn’t stop listening to it when no-one but I knew anything about Chaos. I listened to it while preparing myself to tell my best friend all about it. Taylor knew everything about me except the songs and how I needed them. That sounded like something any teenage girl would say I know, but I couldn’t explain it, if I hadn’t had this song, it would’ve been another one, and if I didn’t listen to it all that time, I was sure that I would’ve gone crazy. I needed them like I needed to breathe, just not so often. The songs were a part of me that was secretive, I could talk through them without thinking about being judged; I wasn’t ready to give that part of me up just yet.

 After wondering if I was going mad that first year, I began to read. It was there that I met the librarian for the first time; who told me everything about Protector, and stated that she was a Keeper. Keepers were extremely important, they were the ones born with the knowledge, and they were given the Books to read. They knew everything about anything from one plane. Luckily Ms Chauveau knew everything about the seventh plane, the one where the lunar vampires reigned over all the sorts of horrible creatures there, and they in turn were ruled by the higher classed vampires. She told me that the lunar plane was always tinted with blue, lived in eternal night, and had a permanent cold temperature. Nothing else is known about the plane itself, because no-one who set foot there has ever returned.

I shuddered, and then another song came on. I listened to it, picking out the voice and every instrument, and then finding out what they were doing. Once I had done that, I settled down to listen to the lyrics:

Boy meets girl

You were my dream my world…

 

            I found that a bit strange, I didn’t see anything to do with my feelings. Then the chorus came along and it hit me, I need a miracle. Ok, so maybe me and Cascada were on different wavelengths, but we both needed the same thing: a miracle. Boy do I need a miracle, I thought. We’re gonna need one just to survive these couple of weeks!

I smiled a sad little smile, turned off the iPod and stuffed it back into my bag. Then after adding more wood to the fire, I went into the tent and joined the others in blissful unconsciousness. I had absolutely no idea how much I was right.