Skin deep chapter 10

Jill - Dreams

Thursday was Takura's market day, so I came home alone. I picked up the letters from the door and went to put them on the kitchen table. A shaft of light was shining through the gap in the curtain. I drew it back to look at the moon. It was beautiful, almost full. The moon was the same that night. For all Rock thought he was a big man, and not a stupid boy, when the car crashed he'd lain crying on the grass. It was left to Kai to pull me and Karen out, while Rock whispered and did nothing. He didn't have the guts to do anything.

I tried to put it out of my mind and focus on my profits. If only the mayor would stop his stupid campaign. It had alienated most of the village against Rock, and while I didn't care how that affected Rock one little bit, I did care that it kept people talking about the crash. All I wanted now was for the village to forget - as much as it would ever be possible for the village to forget Clair and Popuri's deaths.

I never did understand what Claire saw in Rock, apart from the looks of course. He thought that the world rotated on its axis for him alone and treated everyone as if they should agree with him.

I walked into the garden to the two apple trees by my vegetable patch. I'd gotten rid of my second pony when Claire died, it was just like my face. Too much for me to see. No one understood that.

I scooted back to my bedroom. I pulled the covers over my head and pretended I was asleep. I was angry now. Angry with Rock for being walking, breathing duck, and angry with the mayor for not stopping his campaign.

I burrowed my head into the pillow.

The helicopter engine buzzed loudly in my ears. Claire laughed. "Come on, do it! Do it!"

I'd had this dream before. Always the same. She always laughed. Always ran forward to open the side of the helicopter with a big grin. Flung herself out into the sky, shouting "Come on!" As she fell away from me.

And I always followed. Sick, knees weak, but I followed.

We fell through the sky together, pulling the chords of the parachutes at the same time. Hers never opened, but she still smiled, that same wild grin as she plummeted down to the deserted forest beneath, the canopy of trees a rippling ocean of green.

It looked peaceful. I always thought that.

Until Claire hit the first tree. She died a different way each time. Sometimes she hit her head. Sometimes she fell feet first. This time her neck snapped back like a broken doll as she plunged into the trees and dissapeared.

I floated after her until my parachute got caught in the branches and I hung from the harness. The canopy snapped back into place above me-nobody would see me from the air. Below, far below, Claire's body lay on the ground. But me, I dangled there. Suspended in the trees where nobody would ever find me.