Wingless Book Series (book 1) (2 page)

So I headed home, bumping into two
teenage kids on the way out. One of them snapping at me to learn
how to walk, his buzzed head standing out to me as he rushed by.
The second one was stocky with flaming red hair, a bunch of
piercings in his ears. He barely looked at me, saying nothing as he
kept his eyes on the store.

I shook my head, grabbing my
tossed bike and pedaling home slowly, taking my time because I knew
it would annoy my mother.

That was the day Marcus died, the
day my world crumbled beneath me. It was the day that I learned
that nothing would ever feel right again. And that I would never
heal. I would just bleed out emotionally until one day I was gone,
too. Everything went dark and never came back to light.

I remembered lying in bed
listening for Marcus’s old pickup to come rumbling into the
driveway, its low growl creeping into my room as it always did. I
remember never hearing it and feeling angry that he had left me to
take a walk.

I covered my head with a pillow,
and that wasn’t even enough to deafen my mother’s shrieks and
screams that blew through the house. I still remembered the
frightened sick feeling that instantly attacked my body.

My heart raced, my mouth went dry
and my head felt dizzy as I listened from my room, too afraid to
move, because if I did, I would become part of the
nightmare.

“
He’s been shot!” was all she
could get out repeatedly, making it more real every
time.

I bit my lip, the taste of blood
washing over me because I knew I had seen the killers. I knew
before anyone could even tell me so. I knew he was dead before I
was dragged from my room by Gray and forced to take the drive to
the hospital.

After that, the next week was a
total blur, my life was ruined. Marcus was gone and I swore to
never let him fade from my memory. I swore I would hold onto him
because losing him meant I had lost myself. I knew after that, that
people did shape who you would become.

Some people were significant and
changed you so completely. There were bonds that could be broken.
And I was Eve, but he would never be Marcus again.

I stood up ready to go home;
I felt like the visit was ending as fast as the sun was setting.
Standing up I made my way back out of the cemetery, walking
on
wobbly legs
back to my house. Tomorrow was the last day of college and
then I could breathe for a few weeks.

Chapter 2

Patience

Making my way out of classes, I
breathed a sigh of relief that I had even made it feeling as I did
that morning. I was never going to learn when it came to
drinking.

Outside, I stayed under the shade
of the tree waiting for Gray to give me a ride home. I finally
found him in the crowd, red backpack slung over his shoulder like
usual. He gave me a wave showing me I needed to move it, he wasn’t
waiting around.

I sighed, nearly running to catch
up to him. He wasn’t caring like Marcus was- he was all business
anymore. Sometimes he was nothing but mean and rude. I learned to
get used to it.

“
Ready?” he asked me, walking
toward the parking lot.

“
Yeah.” I said, following
him.

“
How were the last of your
classes?”

“
Same as usual.” I threw my
backpack in the back of his jeep and hopped in the front. “I’m just
glad it’s over for a while. I need a break.”

“
Break from
what? You barely, have a C in any of your classes.” He paid close
attention to the road as he
began
driving.

“
I just need a break, I’m not like
you who wakes up every day and is happy to go to school.” I tapped
my foot in vexation.

“
I think you would like it more if
you actually paid attention.”

“
I think I would like it more if I
didn’t have an older brother who wanted to talk to me like he was
my dad.” I turned the radio on. “God Gray can you ever lighten up,
life’s short.”

“
Yeah that it is, that’s why I
choose to make the most of it.”

“
Oh right, and is that why you
have the most depressing girlfriend?” I asked him, jabbing at his
brain. I liked to rile him up.

Gray’s girlfriend, Devan, although
quite beautiful, was stuck up and nothing at all like what I
imagined Gray to be with. She seemed like all she would do was
bring him trouble and keep his mind far away from his
studies.

Devan was tall and blonde, a big
toothy smile which she only gave to Gray. I swore she could have
been a model- she had legs up to her neck. The thing that annoyed
me most about her was that she never spoke to me, which to me was
just rude. Gray said I just didn’t understand her.

“
She is not depressing, there is a
difference between you and her, believe me,” he snapped.

“
What? I’m not depressing,” I
snapped back.

“
Why else would someone with so
much potential throw it away to just be?” He pulled into our
parent’s driveway; I glared at him slamming his car door with
enough force to rip it off the hinges. Gray followed behind me. I
was hoping he would trip or something. He didn’t of course, because
he was perfect.

“
Hey guys!” my
dad
exclaimed, beaming at the two of us- I
could have
sworn it was more for Gray
though. I threw my backpack on the bench in the
hallway.

“
Hey, Dad,” I said, hugging him
briefly.

“
We got a nice
dinner planned tonight for all of us to celebrate your end of
school, and I think your sister may be coming as well.” He headed
out the door- he must have had some kind of work to finish up
because
it was the only time he would
leave with a briefcase.

My dad
owned several restaurants all over the city. It was supposed
to be just a small thing but he had spawned it into quite a
successful project. He barely ran it now that
he had people to do that for him. He was the head guy who
everyone looked to and he expected nothing but the best out of the
people he chose to run his restaurants.

My mother
was in the kitchen chopping onions, I could tell
because she looked like someone had died.

“
Hey Hun,” she said, throwing them
in a big mixing bowl.

“
What are those for?”

“
Salad,” she said, wiping her
tears as she cut.

“
Why don’t you hire a chef to do
that, it pains me to see you cry,” I joked, grabbing a soda out of
the fridge and pulling up a stool to sit at the counter across from
her.

Although my mother
was spastic and worrisome, sometimes I enjoyed
talking to her. And although she never gave me the benefit of the
doubt, she made me feel better- occasionally.

Gray came walking in the
kitchen. Going up to my mother
and
wrapping his arms around her from behind, he lifted her off the
floor. I rolled my eyes.

“
And how are you today?” she
smiled at him.

“
Good, things went smoothly. I
pretty much know what I am doing next year and everything is set
for the summer,” he boasted, running his hand over his almost
nonexistent buzz haircut.

I always thought my brother would
be so much better looking if he grew his hair out. But he said it
was more manageable. I said he just was an idiot who had no sense
of what looked good. Or maybe his girlfriend told him she liked it
that way.

“
And what about you Eve?” she
asked me as she starting chopping carrots.

I thought about what to say
to make her pleased. Gray looked over at me with a furrowed brow; I
could tell what he was thinking. “Good Mom. I may not be like Gray
and have my life’s journey mapped out down to how many times I
brush my buzzed hair, but things are good.” My mother
smiled in amusement at me. Gray shook his head
and snatched a piece of carrot.

“
Do you ever stop?”

“
Not really, no. I like picking on
people bigger than me,” I said, snatching a carrot of my own,
instead of eating mine I threw it at his head. It bounced off,
hitting the floor. I had a big smile on my face, and he was
appalled. My mother ignored us and started on the
lettuce.

“
What time is dinner going to be
Mom?”

“
Six. Why, you do plan on being
here don’t you?” she asked me, annoyed.

“
I was going to go hang out with
Ness, I didn’t know we had any plans.”

“
All that hanging out entails for
you is sitting at some old nasty place talking,” Gray said,
chuckling to himself.

“
It’s called nature. It’s rather
nice to be outside sometimes, you should try it,” I
poked.

“
No I’ll pass,”
he said. “Besides I’m sure you and your friend are trying to scope
out the newbie’s that just moved into town. Probably hoping they
are as disturbed as the two of you.” He walked out. I think he
thought he had done his job at irritating me, but I was more
interested in who
was new in this town. I
wondered what they were like.

I sat pondering this for
some time as my mother
went on her merry
way chopping veggies, tapping the counter with a pen and counting
down the minutes before Vanessa would come and save me from the
monotony.

“
Eve, that’s
enough noise,” my mother
said, wiping her
forehead with her forearm.

I never understood why the
big deal about dinners- we all knew each other. Who were
they
trying to impress? I was here because
they were family. Honestly, if I had a choice, I would have picked
a more dysfunctional family. I was thinking maybe a drunken mother
and a gambling thief of a father. The excitement was probably
wonderful.

Instead, the most excitement they
saw was when the crease in their shirts didn’t flow just right.
They were so dry; it was hard to even believe I was one of them.
Gray was the worst. He wallowed in the fact that his parents were
known for being the best in town. I didn’t know what that did for
him, but he wasn’t all that exciting himself. I mean, him and his
friends played poker with food instead of money.

My sister, Hannah, was a little
more understanding of how I felt. She understood but wasn’t willing
to even dip a toe in my world. She was a robotic housewife; she had
stair step children, and all the shiny new things she could want.
She did parties and social events all the time- anything to make
her look good on the outside.

Her husband Mark was a CEO
of a company. I never cared to ask exactly what his company did; I
just knew that it was impressive to all of her friends and the
people around town. Mark was a good looking guy, but to me he was
just normal. He looked like another jock: dark hair, blue eyes,
brilliant smile, and a tone body. I thought he was the one who
understood me, only because I believed he was sleeping with the
nanny behind my sisters back. I told my mother
this once and she almost smacked me.

I didn’t know a whole lot about
relationships. I’d had a couple throughout my older teen years but
I knew when someone was flirty, and that was definitely Mark with
everyone. I didn’t think that even if Hannah knew she would leave
him. She liked her shiny new things too much; she liked them more
than her self-respect. And then there was the thought that if my
sister had that little self-esteem or morals maybe he did too. I
mean, those two things usually go hand in hand.

Vanessa knocked on the
kitchen door before opening it and came right in. She was used to
our house so for her to come in was no biggie- she was like an
adopted daughter. My parents always pitied her from afar, they
never said anything to her face about how terrible
they thought her dad
treated her, or how her mom and her hobbies got in the way of
their relationship. They just told me or talked amongst
themselves.

I didn’t care though, because
Vanessa didn’t- she just wanted to live in the moment. If her
parents weren’t up to par, then she accepted it. She took what she
got from them and what she didn’t get, well, she didn’t seem to say
much about that either.

Vanessa was light- hearted;
she never cared to speak of
her emotions.
I mean, once in a while she would get vulnerable, but she just
pushed it all aside. And that was something I liked about her that
was why we were such good friends.

Vanessa was on the taller side
with blonde hair and crystal blue eyes. She wasn’t all that girly
but it didn’t matter because she didn’t need to be, she was just
genuinely pretty. Slightly tomboyish, yet she knew how to pull off
a dress if she had to. She also had the habit of blowing her long
bangs out of her eyes constantly. I always poked fun at her and
told her to cut them but she said she would rather keep them
because it covered a scar she had gotten when she was younger.
Vanessa told me she was quite the daredevil when she was a kid, but
the whole town knew it was because her mom was drinking so much she
didn’t look after her and she fell down her porch steps on the
neighbor’s skateboard.