Nettles recoiled as if she’d been stung.
23
Tapestries
Hawk, I don’t know if you can hear me, but I think I’m dreaming now. Can you dream when you’re dead? Someone is whispering my name, and they’re talking in a strange underwater voice. I can’t see properly, and everything looks white and fuzzy. I’m floating Hawk, help me, I’m floating.
I’ve lost you...
‘Hawk! I’m not lost silly, just dreaming.’ My voice doesn’t sound right either, it echoes, maybe ‘cos I’m so high up. Where are you?
‘Nevaeh…if you can hear me…wake up everyone needs you…I need you.’
‘Wake up? How?’
I'm drifting downwards. I wish you could see this, feel this. There is a warm wind on my face, and I’m hovering above a vast field it seems clearer than when I dreamt it. Now I can actually smell the wild flowers, and they’re every colour imaginable – it seems to go on forever like a tapestry. I wonder if the temple is there? I feel like I’m in heaven, maybe it is heaven. The urge to run through it and grab handfuls is overwhelming. I’m so close that if I push my bare foot downwards, pointing my toe, I can almost feel it. There’s a tickling sensation travelling up my legs like fingers. I feel so energised, I just want t curl my toes into the soft soil - why can’t I?
In my dreams, I ran through these fields to the temple. I really want to do that again. I feel so frustrated - maybe I’m not totally dead. I want to stay here and make angels in the long grass. I just wish my parents could see this and Jo-Jo. I bet she’s lying on her bed listening to music – I miss her.
Jo-Jo lay on her bed listening to her i-pod as a way of hiding from her Mother. She wasn’t used to the attention she was getting; Mum had always been such a workaholic, and now she was doing the overkill protective mother thing, and it made her uncomfortable. It was bad enough that her best friend was in a coma, but now she had to deal with her mother constantly asking if she was alright. Why can’t she leave her alone? She had phoned Nevaeh’s parents most nights, and tonight was no different. Her Mum was living at the hospital while her Dad looked after the baby.
Guilt was her constant companion lately, which even spread towards Nevaeh’s family. She’d been jealous of them; they were so close, compared to hers. Her parents had been divorced since she was two and she hardly heard from him. He had his own family and step-children; while she was a constant reminder of his past.
Jo-Jo’s eyes turn towards the photo frame of them both in their rollerblades, her eyes misting up again. Nevaeh, never asked anything from her. Why was she so stupid? She could have any guy she wanted and yet she went for the one guy her shy best friend wanted. She remembered her dreams of him and blushed. Every morning she felt more frantic, wanting him for herself. Nevaeh suddenly became the competition, not her friend but the girl in her way of getting the guy.
‘Such an idiot.’ She whispered to herself. Ever since the accident, she had fought with herself about it constantly, wondering why, why she was like that? She groaned then, pulling a strand of limp hair forward. He wouldn’t look twice at her now – no-one would. Nevaeh’s hair was beautiful, and she wished she had told her more often. She caught sight of herself in her mirror and rubbed her forefinger under her pale eyes. Another face she didn’t recognise. She bit her bottom lip, willing some life into it, but the effort was too much. She just didn’t care anymore, the guilt was slowly eating her up bit by bit, and she distanced herself from everyone. Before they broke up for summer holidays, she had started to sit under Nevaeh’s tree. It felt a little creepy at first, and she fought the urge to leave, especially with all the bugs and stuff. Everyone else kept away from her when she sat there. No-one wanted to be reminded of something sad, when they were heading for their holidays, including Jay and Paul.
Jo-Jo sunk back into her pillows then, pulling the duvet over her. She had been to the hospital once and once only and only took Josh because he insisted. It didn’t feel right standing there with the one guy her friend had liked, but she wasn’t in the mood to argue. He had been so comforting then, holding her, almost cradling her in his arms. A small whimper expelled from her, and she closed her eyes. It didn’t matter anyway, he was history – gone. He didn’t turn up the next day at school or the days that followed. She even sent Jay and Paul to be school detectives and check what was going on, but they didn’t find a thing. The teachers said that he had moved for personal reasons – family business. Deep down, being dumped wasn’t a surprise. He still seemed too interested in Nevaeh and was always asking personal questions. She wished now, that she’d never told him about the adoption side.
‘That makes sense,’ he had muttered. Even then, she remembered thinking how weird it was.
‘What do you mean?’ She had asked.
‘Well she doesn’t look like her parents - that’s all,’ he shrugged, before ambling away.
Jo-Jo frowned at that; when had he met her parents? Now, she played the conversation over and over again in her head, damning herself for not asking him to explain himself. She shivered. Now that she thought about it, he was always watching her, even when she was with that weird group of hers.
Jo-Jo buried her face in the pillow screaming silently. She’d heard things through Jay and Paul of that night. Some said they were devil worshippers, and Nevaeh was the sacrifice. That, she’d been running away when she was hit. Ever since then, her dreams were filled with frightening images of her friend screaming. Sometimes she even felt the darkness probing her dreams from the edge questioning her subconscious.
Why did they all have to look like that anyway? They all seemed so knotty and dishevelled when they stood together. She couldn’t understand why Nevaeh hung out with them, they didn’t seem her type. Jo-Jo closed her eyes, imagining them that last night, and wondering what really made her friend run to the house in such a hurry. It didn’t feel right, unless, her mind flashed to the mystery guy. She remembered how he had to be convinced to stand back when they put her in the ambulance. He had looked at her then, his dark eyes piercing right through her and she felt another shiver of guilt. She had really let her friend down.
‘Nevaeh, I’m so sorry.’ She rolled over miserably, wondering why she was talking to her like she was a ghost. But it felt like that. Nevaeh, her friend since they were five years old, lay like a ghost, reminding her of their favourite movie when they were little – Snow White.
