Burning Cities

When I jolted awake, my room had a dark, early morning shadow. I looked over to the white mug with half a glass of tea left inside. Then I noticed it was 7:30. A shock ran through me. I'm late for school. Running a hand through my knotted blond hair I lifted my purple comforter away from my body. I don't remember getting under my sheets last night, let alone falling asleep.

When the thought crossed my mind, I shook my head, confused. I felt a headache coming on just trying to think about this. I walked over to my window next to my closet, taking the string and pulling down, revealing a massacre of snow at least a foot and a half air covering everything. Through the trees between the neighbors house and ours I could see the road, tracks that zig zaged. If it was hell outside, school must be canceled today.

I released a breath of relief. I won't have to face Alan and his monstrous friends today. As my heart skipped a beat with happiness, I grabbed a clean pair of jeans, a black long sleeved shirt, and some undergarments. Running my hand through my hair again, I felt the hair grease at the roots. I bet I looked like a mess.

Walking into the blue tiled bathroom decorated in yellow rubber duckies, I flicked on the light and ignored the happy faces all over the strip of wallpaper around the top of the walls, the rugs, towels, and shower curtain. I hated this bathroom, because all though I've done so well to numb down the memories inside of me, I know they still existed. Giving a glance into the mirror, the morning swelling of my eyelids, my dirty hair all stringy and the tears I've must have cried last night stuck to my face peered back at me. Looking closer to the mirror, I release I had given myself a bloody nose while I slept.

I don't remember a nightmare, but I must have had one. If I think about it, my dad probably heard me, and cleaned me up as best as his numb shell could and tucked me back into bed. If that was true, it made my heart swell with recognition.

After a nice shower that deadened my memories and relaxed my stiff muscles, I pulled on my clothes and left the bathroom still steamy with a foggy mirror. We never had a fan in there to suck up the hot air, so I've always hoped that leaving the door open would do the trick. Walking down the stairs I heard voices from the television in the living room. As rare of an occurrence for my father to go into my room it was even rarer to find him home, in the living room, watching a t.v. that he's never watched, touching a remote that he's never touched before. I guess that's confusing, but he had some boys across the street assemble the television, and a cable guy set up the cable.

Why would my father do it himself? He's a hermit crab.

"Is school canceled?" I asked as I leaned against the wall into the living room. My father was watching the weather channel, and didn't glance at me once.

"No. Just a two hour delay. I figured I'd let you sleep in." His voice was deep, monotone, and still as depressing as the day my mother left us. I shook my head slightly, holding my breath for a second and releasing it after I'd walked into the bright, gray kitchen, trying to force the shaking and disappointment to stop.

"We have no more milk!" He shouted. That's alright, I told myself, I didn't want cereal in the first place. A bagel would be nice.

I couldn't make myself reach for the fridge though, something inside me, fear I think, had made me immobile. Alan...rape...his evil eyes. It all ran like a vision before my eyes before I could get my wits about me, and my hand had found it's way gripping tightly to the small grocery notepad where Devin had written his number.

No coincidences. Right?

I looked into the living room for a brief moment to make sure my father was still consumed with the television before reaching for the house phone and punched in the number. It rang and rang and I tried not to let myself think that he wasn't going to pick up, but he did, my heart rate wouldn't slow and I was a bundle mess of nerves.

"Hello? Who is this?" His voice spoke through, and I shook and shuddered with relief.

"Devin?"

"Ella?"

"I'm sorry if I disturbed you. There's a two hour school delay." I whispered into the phone.

"You sound like something is wrong." He stated.

"I don't want to face Alan today..."

"You won't. What I did to him yesterday will give him terrible body sores that he won't be able to get out of bed." Devin explained, and I narrowed my eyes.

"You hurt him that bad?"

"Rather that then having his gang beat me up and rape you." He had a point there, but there was a still a tiny bit of guilt inside of me. "Do you want my mother and I to come pick you up so we can talk?"

"Uh..." I thought about if I had enough time for the kind of things Devin needed to explain to me, but I guess that I'd rather that then sit beside my father in the living room with an unexplainable awkward silence looming between us.

"Sure. Can you come now?" I asked, biting my lip hopefully.

"Yes. We'll be there in five to seven minutes." He hung up before I could say good bye, which I found a little weird, but I ignored it and placed the house phone on it's cradle. It's useless to tell my father that a friend, a boy friend was coming to pick me up because he wouldn't care. He never will show that kind of affection and fatherly paranoia ever again.

I ran up the stairs, stumbling over a few, to grab my scarf and hat. Walking into my room, I saw the half cup of tea and sighed.

"I probably should do something about that." I whispered to myself. Grabbing the cup and running back down stairs again to rinse it out and leave it in the sink. Taking a quick look through the window, I saw the black blur of Joe's car pass the house, and fear subdued me.

They must be waiting for me to step out of the house so that they can take me.

I tried to shake that thought out of my head as I walked to the closet in the hall, grabbing my coat and laying it across my arm.

"Where are you headed?" He asked from the couch. I stopped and stared at him, eyes wide and lips parted.

"What? Oh, um, a friend of mine is going to pick me up very soon." I told him, silently rushing to the stairs and up to my room. After I had closed my door, I slid down it and held my head in my hands. Maybe it was because he was in the living room and watched me grab my coat, his curiosity begging him to ask where the person he's forced to let live in his house is wondering off to. That's all I am to him. A person...a child person that reminded him so much of the lovely wife who left him.

Okay, take deep breaths Ella. Calm yourself down. The more you think about this and Alan the more you going to break down and...you just can't do that. I thought to myself, all the calming exorcises my father's family therapist had told me to use whenever I let my father's behavior get the best of me.

The door bell rang, just after I had been able to relax the exploding anxiety inside of me. It was Devin, so I scrambled to my feet and threw on my coat, not bothering to grab for my scarf and hat. My father was answering the door while I banged down the stairs, his face puzzled at the sight of Devin's pale skin and piercing eyes.

"Yes?" He asked Devin, who smiled politely.

"I'm here to pick up Ella?" His voice was calm, but as I reached out to his emotions, he was concerned at the hurry way I scrambled down the stairs and reached the door, face flushed and hair not brushed and a skew, still damp from my shower.

"Oh, right." My father spoke numbly, and like a zombie he waddled back to the couch and sat, his face blank as he stared at the television. I'm not sure if he's actually watching it now apposed to just being the hermit he is.

Looking into Devin's eyes brought a feeling of safe familiarity that a smile broke out onto my face, even though he was staring strangely at the tears that must be glistening on my cheeks.

After I closed the front door, Devin didn't hesitate to pull me into his arms, an action that seemed almost out of character for him.

"I'm sorry, Ella. But...the closer we got to your home and I was stretching out my sense, I felt something alarming and it was you. I want you to explain to me what you were feeling, because I can't decode it." He told me, and I gulped.

"Devin, it doesn't matter." I walked down the concrete steps covered in a thin blanket of snow. My father must have shoveled, or got the boys across the street to do it.

"Yes it does." He tried to argue, but I wouldn't tell him something that personal about me when I'd only known him a little less then 24 hours.

"Can we just leave?" I asked him, my voice snappy and irritated. I felt Devin's offended negativity, and my bottom lip quivered with quilt and fresh tears. I turned around to look at him, his jaw tightened and his eyes sad. "I'm really sorry. There's just a lot about me I'm not ready to tell you."

"Well, your going to have to explain all of this to your mother." He mumbled softly, and I narrowed my eyes.

"My mother left us three years ago, she wants nothing to do with us."

"That's wrong." I heard from behind me, a weak, yet softly flowing voice. The voice of my mother. Trying to keep my wits about me I turned stiffly to look into her eyes, my face reflected in hers. She held the SUV door open, her pale hand gripping it tightly. She looked at loss for words.

"What are you doing here?" I asked, hot tears falling down my face.

"Just get into the car, we'll explain everything soon." She told me, but I shook my head, stepping back and into Devin. His hands rested on my shoulders, squeezing them softly.

With his whispered voice in my ear, he spoke, "Please, Ella. Remember, no coincidences."

I shook my head and let him guide me into the vehicle, I was too distraught and blank to buckle myself, so he had to do it for me. I felt a little pathetic for that, but there was nothing I could do. My mother was here, sitting in the passenger seat in front of me. After three damn years here she was, looking like she hasn't aged a day. Devin was beside me quickly, his eyes giving me this look I couldn't exactly put a name too. His pale pink lips, moist and inviting, were parted with a stunned look.

"What?" I managed to say, softly so as not to alarm the woman who was driving. She didn't look back, but as she started to drive, I assumed she was Devin's mother.

"You look beautiful without make up on." That sentence sent an amazing electric shock through my body, coming from somewhere between my legs. My face reddened and I looked away, a smile creeping up from wherever that electric shock had come from. I couldn't believe he had said that and retrieved such an amazing response from me.

"You to better keep it PG back there." The woman driving spoke, and this feeling turned to embarrassment quick. She felt my emotions, invaded my privacy. The only person I really felt okay with feeling my emotions was Devin, because even though I'd known him such a short time, it felt like fate to trust him.

"Yes, mother." He spoke, disappointment was evident on his face. He meant for me to feel that way, and he was obviously aware the effect it had on me. Sneaky little bastard. I couldn't help but release a slight chuckle.

Dammit, Devin.