T-w-i-s-t-e-d : Ch. 2 - Questions (revised)

"Damn it, Donna! Get Your ass down here!"

I slammed my book, Eclipse by Stephenie Meyer, down on my bed and grudgingly walked out of my bedroom, pushing aside the sheet that served as my door and only means of privacy. I muttered darkly and climbed down the stairs to ask Arlene what she was yelling at or, more or less, ask what other task she needed me to perform because she didn't feel like doing it.

I found her sitting in the living room watching television drinking a beer. Arlene had died blond hair with dark eyebrows. She was missing a few teeth and wore way to much make up. Surrounding her was a thick cloud of cigarette smoke and she wreaked of way too much perfume. I have heard this particular aroma described before as smelling like a "French whore house". I had to stand a few feet away from her in order to breath without coughing. The amount of fragrance spray she wore was stifling. Arlene was my foster mom.

I'm sure not all foster parents were as disgusting as Arlene is. I'm sure most really care about the children they take in and provide for them as best they can. Arlene, well, she didn't. She was an out of work beautician who lived off the government checks she got for housing a bunch of orphans like me.

At that moment Tommy, a 9 year old who I could swear was the spawn of Satan, came running past me in his underwear screaming at the top of his lungs. He ran up to me and kicked me in the shin. I growled and glared at him with such ferocity he took of running in the opposite direction, screaming.

"Hey! Don't you be making Tommy scream like that! I'm trying to watch this show, damn it!" She had a house makeover show on. I kept my mouth shut and waited for her to tell me what she wanted.

"What do YOU want?" Arlene asked.

I internally rolled my eyes. "You called me down here, remember?"

"Oh right. Go take the bottles out and then get out of my hair. Shouldn't you be gettin' to work some time anyway?"

Well, if I could say one nice thing about Arlene it was that she was punctual. Well, at least when it came to getting money.

"Yeah Arlene. See you tonight," unfortunately, I added silently. I walked out the door, tugging the bag of bottles behind me. I worked down at the Walmart that was about a quarter mile from my house. I got the job courtesy of my social worker who decided having a job would help take my mind of the latest tragedy in my life. The thing about working at a check out lane was it really didn't keep your mind busy.

I was a few minutes early. 17 minutes to be exact. When Arlene had told me I was supposed to be at work, I knew I would be early. I was just desperate for any excuse to get out of the house and luckily enough, she provided me with one. I had time to return the bottles and get my receipt redeemed for cash.

My shift started at 5 pm and ended at 12:30 in the morning. The store shut down at midnight and we spent a half hour tidying up and sweeping.

After I had helped an elderly woman figure out how to use the Walmart credit card and finished scanning all of the tags on her groceries, my bag boy, Ian, loaded up her cart and pushed it out to her car for her. He was always doing stuff like that for people. I had no clue where he mustered up that kind of generosity, but he always did. He was a skinny teen with glasses, greasy hair, and skin problems.  We were complete opposites in most ways.

Maybe that's why we became fast friends.

He had quite the knack for hacking computers and gathering information that really isn't open to the public. Just the kind of guy I needed at this point. I hadn't given up following my mom's case. I wanted to know what exactly had happened.

 

So far, this is what I had gathered. My mother had been driving to the grocery store when a man had ran a red light and hit her in the drivers side of her car. She was killed on impact. The man was yet to recover consciousness. All of this information was pretty standard. The police had told me these vague details, but I wanted to know more. I was almost obsessive. Who was this man who had so drastically altered my life in so short a time? What was his story?

 

I had gotten to know Ian. I didn't want to ask favors from a complete stranger and I had to know if I could trust him. I also couldn't convince someone to help me out unless I told them why I wanted them to hack the info. I didn't want to just poor my heart out to some random person and hope they'd act through sympathy towards me. 

 

Ian had told me right off the bat he wouldn't do anything majorly illegal. He said he wouldn't hack the police's database because it was all complexly monitored and he didn't have that much faith in his abilities. He had absolutely no problem hacking the hospital files of my mother's killer however. He had taken a valiant stand and declared I had a right to know.

 

When he returned from escorting the elderly woman and her groceries to her car, he caught my eye and gave me a very obvious look. I glanced around, making certain whatever he was about to say wouldn't be overheard or interrupted by customers. When I was certain it would most likely be slow for the rest of the night I leaned over the counter to talk to him.

 

"Ok, spill. What did you find?" I demanded. 

 

He grinned mischievously. "It's about the guy who was in the other car," he said.

 

I frowned. "Isn't he still comatose?"

 

"That's the question," he continued enthusiastically. "Yesterday he apparently just disappeared into thin air. He was there for the morning check up and then when the next nurse came in he had vanished. Not a trace of him anywhere. They never even found out his name apparently."

 

My frown deepened. This was becoming way to mysterious for me. Ian must of seen my troubled expression because he hesitated.

 

"What?" I demanded again.

 

"Well, it's just that.... well..... I don't know if I should tell you this next part. I don't want to upset you. Maybe we should just stop."

 

"Don't be ridiculous!" I snapped. "I can't stop," I added quietly, almost to myself.

 

There was a pause before I continued on. "There's more? Tell me, Ian."

 

"Well, on the hospital reports I found it just said the nurse to find him gone hadn't seen anything . Just that he wasn't there." He hesitated again.

 

"And...." I prompted.

 

"Well, I did a search on the name of the nurse who discovered him missing, you know, just to be thorough. She's in the mental ward."

 

My jaw dropped. "Huh?"

 

"It says she was determined to be to unstable and was checked into the mental hospital. I looked up the documents related to it and apparently her husband agreed to the doctor's evaluation and that she SHOULD be locked up after seeing her. I realized something was really screwy right then, I mean, that's just too BIG of a coincidence, don't you think?"

 

I did think. That was just completely weird.

 

"So I hacked into her file. Apparently she keeps screaming and crying. Saying things like "Demon" and "Monster" and just going on and on about how evil this guy was."

 

I sensed he was holding something back. "What else?"

 

"Well, when the doctor confronted her about saying these things, trying to figure out a clinical excuse for what they could possibly mean, he said something that she reacted strangely to. "

 

"What did he say?" I whispered, knowing her reaction to it would carry a heavy weight.

 

"He said, 'Tell me, what did you see? How was this man a monster?'" He paused for a moment. "Then she looked right at him. She seemed to completely come out of her fit, according to the notes the doctor took. She stared him directly in the eye and said 'He was a vampire. He drank my blood.' Then, she pulled down the neck of her paper gown and exposed two small holes at the base of her throat. Naturally the doctor assumed the wounds were self inflicted and has put her on suicide watch as well. After showing him her neck the woman went back to screaming."

 

My heart stopped in my chest. Something was off. I knew something wasn't right. Vampires don't exist. This couldn't be what it seemed. And yet, I knew. I knew that I had never believed in coincidences. I knew that my mother hadn't either. And I knew that I needed to find answers. Now.