The image of the medieval king struck my iris and blurred Black and white images flashed across my mind of something that appeared to be a party, a group dancing on the dance floor, and the same king sitting on a throne. The images had barely ended when a name formed across my lips effortlessly.
“King Eric the third, of Windsor Castle, who was mainly famous for his unique style of fighting with his trusted dagger and rarely a sword,” I blabbered automatically, without even realizing what words escaped my mouth, it was as though someone had forced the words out of me. The entire class gazed at me in absolute shock, with their mouths wide open as though they had just discovered a horrifying alien lurking inside me.
“Brilliant!” cried Grey, giving me a wide smile as though Christmas had arrived a month early. “A round of applause for Miss Parkinson here, full marks!” he exclaimed, and the crowd smacked their hands together in a cold and uncaring manner.
“Brilliant!” cried Judy, in a mocking imitation of Grey's rigid voice, as we walked home from the bus stop. “Now somebody here actually did study for History but didn’t bother enough to let her ‘friends’ know about it.
“Judy I didn’t!” I snapped, without looking at her. She had bitten off my head with her sulking the entire bus ride and couldn’t stop now either. But more than her bickering the thing that was feasting my mind was the brief vision, and the answering spontaneously coming out of my mouth. My mind was so full of the incident that I turned a deaf ear to Judy's noise completely.
The vision wasn't the only thing that ached my mind, but since the starting of the day, I felt as though someone or something was tailing me continuously. My intuitive feelings were alarming constantly that some sort of a being was closer to me than my shadow, struggling desperately to engulf me. I dropped Judy at her house (we were neighbours), making no further attempts to reassure her, and went home.
“So, how was school today princess?” asked dad, as we munched on our pot roast which mum had prepared as always, making it the juiciest dish ever. Dinner seemed rather a quiet affair today, as the euphoria of my birthday had evaporated like the morning's dew.
“It was okay dad, nothing great,” I responded, as I dug into my favourite lemon meringue pie. My mind was still filled with the day's bizarre events.
“Umm, has someone died?” inquired Jared, in a horribly sarcastic tone, causing James to snigger in his pie. “Why the hell in the world are we sitting as though attending a funeral dinner? Let’s have some dinner celebration it’s still Ellie's birthday,” saying that he rushed to pull a bottle of Lemon Basil Mojito from the refrigerator and uncorked it. The family sang a series of birthday songs, hugging me continuously and sipping on the icy drink. James turned on the stereo and the three of us danced to some hip hop music from the eighties while mum and dad cheered for us, lying on the sofa. Eventually, the party died out and the lights off, as mum ushered us to our rooms past midnight.
“Ellie, don't be nervous, you’ll do great!” assured Judy, as the crowd began howling across the gymnasium, waiting for my performance to begin. I had always been pathetic at gymnastics and had never achieved a single medal in it. However, I had been practicing thrice a week that whole year, to prove to everyone that I wasn't just competent at swimming and possessed other substantial athleticism. Moreover, since it was my final year in school, I was more than ever determined to attain some sort of glory before passing out. Miss Hart, our gymnastics teacher nodded at me approvingly with an encouraging half-smile and blew the whistle.
Instantaneously, I took a thunderous run, adrenaline gushing through my blood and placing my hands onto the smooth mat, performed a side handspring, followed by three lightning speed back handsprings, and ended it with a quick backflip. The crowd roared with frenzy at the backflip and began chanting my name like that of a goddess'.
My heart got overwhelmed with bliss at their craze, so many supporters and even my haters had a glimpse of approval on their otherwise sour faces. It was the last stunt that I had to perform before the juries could arrive at a judgment. That's it Ellie, my mind, heart, and soul kept repeating, one last run and the glory that you sought for so many years is finally yours. I closed my eyes, imagining the faces of mum, dad, James, and Jared, as they were my source of strength, I was accustomed to picturing them, whenever I had to make a tough decision or when I was on the verge of any achievement.
I opened my eyes, released the deep soothing breath that I had taken in, and with the deliration of a ravenous lioness ready to pounce on her prey, I zoomed forward like lightning. Performed three forward handsprings, followed by two back handsprings, and with a massively ecstatic effort, sprung high into the air with three spinning backflips. My mind was in heaven, I couldn’t observe anything around me except stars and my ears had gone deaf, ready to land with jubilation, when suddenly, amidst my leap, my eyes travelled towards the far end of the gymnasium, and among the crowd, I noticed a black hooded figure whose face was concealed,
I would've assumed it to be a person when instantaneously it removed its hood….revealing a pale white bald face with pupil-less bloodshot eyes and razor-sharp vampire shaped teeth.
This scenario had an explosive effect on me as my pupils expanded in inexplicable terror, toppling my concentration, as I collapsed onto the ground and heard a cracking sound which mostly was something that I had broken. My vision turned blurry and my limbs became unequivocally numb, and I couldn’t realize who was crowding around me or whose hands were holding me, all I knew was that I was falling into an intense oblivion.
“Ellie don’t fall, Ellie concentrate, no matter how hard he hits you, just stay put,” shouted Judy from the stands in the empty gymnasium, as I stood on top of a pyramid made by the school's cheerleaders and the black hooded figure kept hovering above, attempting to push me down but I moved sideways cautiously, maintaining my balance. The figure made a dozen more attempts but in vain. In the end, it sped towards me at a rocket's speed and unveiled his face, exposing the spiky incisors and bloodshot pupil-less eyes. The fiend gave its best this time and I swerved to avoid its attack, hence, losing my balance and causing the pyramid of cheerleaders to tumble, and I fell terribly through never-ending blackness….with a scream which could prob
New Year’s Eve seemed to be unnaturally sunny and a lot less cold as compared to the previous year. Was that a result of g1obal warming? Or the mass air pollution that spread across the city due to the endless fumes emitted by cars? No one could figure out, nevertheless, the weather was pleasantly snowy. The plaster on my leg had been finally removed and I could walk normally and I had been strictly prohibited by the doctor against and physically straining activity, hence, Alex and Matt postponed our trip to the Forest of Dracon to the end of January, or at least till the time my leg got completely healed and I could run. In the meantime, the three d
Despite his serene words, I started getting gravitated towards it out of sheer inquisitiveness. The stall guy’s smile dissipated instantaneously as he watched me walk away from the stall, and in the direction of the tent. I reached the entrance and felt warm air blowing from inside the place. The interior appeared dark from the entrance, intimidating me slightly, nonetheless, I still plucked up the courage to enter it purely to satisfy my insatiable curiosity. I walked through the darkness, no idea in the world what I would discover at the end. A distinctly strong, but arousing essence of lavender diffused through the warm air, teasing my sense of smell. Abruptly, a massive glow of light punctured through the blackness, and a large clearing came into view, causing
The sun had concealed back in the clouds and the temperature seemed to drop drastically as evening fell. Astonishingly, three hours had passed since I entered the tent. I had lost track of time inside the mystical place and gotten so engrossed in the future that I nearly overlooked the present. Shoving all the events that occurred in the tent to the back of my mind, and adrenaline rushing through my blood, I ran as fast as my barely healed legs could take me, my brain thundering and heart pounding like a pendulum. I reached the place where I had left Matt, panting atrociously I looked hither thither but discovered no sign of the three anywhere. I took out my mobile from my handbag hoping to call them but the battery had been completely drained. Clenching my teeth
The rest of the day passed ordinarily exuberant as well as relieving, as I returned to the hustle and bustle of school and felt born ready to shift my focus back to academics which had gotten substantially neglected as a result of the dreadful events of the last few weeks. The last hour was Psychology for Judy and me, which was predominantly my favourite subject, while Judy loathed it and thus, was pretty terrible at it. Miss Clarissa, who along with being an erudite professor of the subject was also quite an amiable and fortunately lenient teacher who genuinely cared about the students and their grasp on the subject.“Good morning everyone!” Miss Clarissa greeted zestfully, with a dynamic beam that radiated the face of every student and they all
My eyes shuddered open, wet due to a sprinkle of water on my face. And the face I noticed was of Holden, bending down on me. Immediately, I attempted to punch him but he held my hands as I struggled like a fish out of water to hurt him. “Ellie, please relax, I am not going to hurt you,” he assured, holding my hands, in the fit of fury I spat on his face desperately, and he backed off with disgust.“Ellie just calm down!” shouted Judy, as she entered the room carrying another glass of water. A splash of relief broke ove
The arrival of March marked the end of gloomily snowy weather, as spring took over, bringing with it a vow of joy and a picturesque scenario. The streets of London seemed to illuminate with breathtaking beauty as the local trees blossomed with an exotically motley bunch of flowers of variant colours.Mum appeared to be rejoicing heartily at the change of season, as she busied herself in watering the ravishing bunch of flowers in our backyard. I helped her mow the lawn while dad brought out the gardener in him and skilfully chopped the plants using his trusted pruning shears, thus, resizing them efficiently. James and
“Ellie, get up!” yelled James, shaking me hard. I found myself lying in James' car which was stationary, as my eyes fluttered open. Utterly confused, I peeped out of the window to find dad and Jared standing on the roadside as a mechanic replaced the car's tyre.“Where are we, and what happened?” I muttered, my head aching terribly.“We are at Tottenham Court Road, you lunatic. The front tyre got punctured while you were luxuriously dozing off, perhaps dreaming about your boyfriend Matt,” James teased, sniggering loudly. Waving aside his playfulness, I placed my hand on my fore