Devils Roses 01 - Cursed

oh, and a stalker.

    My room hadn’t changed in a week, but I felt like a stranger in it. The walls were exactly the same, but they felt closer around me. The experiences I had been through in such a short amount of time, seemed to have shifted my mind. As if it narrowed in some aspects, but broadened in others. Giselle was a new addition to my life. Instead of being besties with my sister, she seemed to prefer my company. It was weird for me, I didn’t even know how to work the change into my day-to-day. The text messages were coming every few minutes. It really was no wonder, Alise was so stupid. She had friends texting her hundreds of text messages, consisting of garbled English 24/7. She didn’t have time to do anything but underachieve.
    I sat on my bed, feeling more alone than I ever had. I decided to take a walk and go see my mom.
    My dad was in the kitchen getting a glass of water, he seemed to be humming. I stopped on the stairs listening to him hum. I didn’t know the song, but I knew this was the first time I had heard my dad hum in eight months. I crept to the front door, as quietly as I was able, and stepped out the door. I wanted him to stay lost in whatever happy moment he was having. I sent him a quick text and headed off down the sidewalk. The town didn’t look different and yet it was. The smallness of it was stifling before I was drugged. I didn’t feel that way anymore. I liked the coziness. I liked knowing everyone. I missed Blake.
    I walked and thought about the past year, and all the events that had shaped the time for me. I never noticed the trees or the road, just the seconds that fit together to make a year. Each of them seemed so different and complex, like a spider web. Some were horrid and others were unexplainable.
    I looked around and realized, I had long past my mom’s spot.
    I was about to turn back when I saw him. He walked along the side of the road and disappeared into the thick woods. His tall, strong body would have been unmistakable in itself, but his face was one of a kind. I couldn’t see his eyes but I remembered what they looked like. My heart fluttered. I should have been afraid of him but it seemed I couldn’t make myself. I vaguely remembered the weird dream I'd had in the hospital, where he had vanished.
    I almost chickened out, but then I just did it. “Wade,” I called out.
    He never came back.
    “ Wade, wait up. It’s me, Aimee, from the party the other night. Wade.” I tried to run to where he had been but my side hurt. I got an instant cramp right where my liver was located. I decided running would take me a little longer to be able to attempt.
    I walked into the dark woods, pushing myself past the initial thick and impassable brush. The bushes scratched me and pulled at my clothes and hair. I was determined to see him again. When I got inside the forest, I looked around but saw nothing. I stood perfectly still, feeling my heartbeat intensify as several possible outcomes sped through my mind.
    Possibility number one—Wade might have been the pervert who drugged us and got me naked. Though the lovely and relaxing internal examination proved I was still a virgin. Thank you, God in Heaven, a female doctor did it.
    Possibility number two—Wade might not even have been there and the poison was still wreaking havoc on my mind, and now I was alone in the dark forest hallucinating. Like I had, at the hospital.
    Possibility number three, and honestly the most likely—Wade was trying to go for a nice walk, when a strange girl he didn’t know, starting yelling and running, albeit sadly, after him.
    I thought about it for a second, while I stood perfectly still. I tried not to think about the fact he could very well be stalking me, after not getting what he had wanted at the party. I was uncertain about how to proceed, fleeing from the forest screaming like a banshee was definitely at the top of a very short list. That option was followed by pretending someone else was with me. I knew that would either scare him into thinking I was crazy, if he was watching me, or make him believe I wasn’t alone.
    I stayed frozen like an idiot instead, with my heart racing like a rabbit. I heard a crunch off to the side and prepared myself for the worst.
    “ Aimee?” the voice was unmistakable.
    I opened my eyes, which I hadn’t realized I had closed and started to breathe again. “Shane, what are you doing here?”
    “ It’s my yard.” He walked toward me laughing.