A Sudden Stop and An Unhealthy Drop
1756 Words
Chapter One:
A Sudden Stop and An Unhealthy Drop
Have you ever met someone and clicked with them on a level that seemed beyond the body? Almost like, your souls connected and your bodies complimented. No. I don't mean s****l love or even romance, though the accusations are normal, but like a sister that isn't blood and doesn't have to be, it goes beyond blood. Just pure loyalty and unconditional love at first laugh? Then the world finds ways to bring you together again and again until you're bonded and can keep it going on your own?
That was Kaia and I when we were six. We met in a pure chance opportunity. I was going to school in Dos Palos California, the sun beating down on my red hair enough to make it burn like a skillet. When I saw a shy little girl standing near the fence looking scared. Call me a bleeding heart but I went over to the girl and introduced myself. She didn't seem to like it at first but, I kept on, I told her where me and my friends found these black beetles. She seemed grossed out yet interested. I assured her they were nice. Cause, as far as I knew they were. No biting at least. She came over with me and we scooped them up holding them in white paper containers I had made earlier that week. One crawled out and up her arm. She laughed and I found myself laughing too. She was only here while her mom talked to the school for some reason. After recess she was gone. I was still young enough that she faded from my mind.
It was three and a half years later that we met again. I was in five grade and living life. New to the Washington state school and didn't recognize the blonde curly haired girl who always looked shy and scared. I had a fellow red haired friend who I enveloped with my time. That is until the day we each had to write down our favorite subject at the time. I wrote my answer truthfully. Inuyasha, of course. I expected no one else to say such a thing but it was true, I didn't care about fashion, sports, movies, or other things. But I could talk about inuyasha forever. Well the teacher got through the class everyone bunching up together to talk about like subjects. When only me and that shy girl were left. The teacher looked at me knowing the other girl would be too shy to answer.
I wrote inuyasha, I told the teacher. The girl snapped to look at me, shock written on her face. Me too! She said. It was from that moment on that she became an essential part of my life.
Kaia: the drama queen, a bit of a hypochondriac, and the party girl (no one saw that coming). My best friend, my sister, and someone who no matter what happened, I couldn't bring myself to hate. I'm pretty sure she could stab me in the back with a legitimate knife and we would work it out.
I remember the day we made the pact. Kaia had moved away from woodbrook to go live in federal way. It was a hard moment. We had thought we would go to middle school together, high school! We never realized our first summer together spending everyday together would end in us becoming weekend friends only. And to make it worse her sister Katherine dumped her baby on us and he wouldn't leave us alone.
This memory always makes me cringe because we had no idea how sideways it was going to go.
He kept coming in and bugging us as we unpacked the room. It was beyond annoying since we just wanted to spend our last day together alone. After a full day of this her mom called out that she wanted us to go to bed in an hour. I was supposed to leave the very next morning, so we decided to play a little trick on the four year old nuisance. We silent as mice crept away into the closet and made sure not to move the doors as we did. So it would appear that we had left the room. We then waited for him to come back. He for the first time that night didn't come back immediately so we relaxed a bit.
"I'm sad that you're not going to go to my school. I was so excited." Kaia sighed and leaned her head back against the unstained white wall. The sleeve of her favorite jacket hung down in her face.
"It doesn't matter. The distance sucks but, you're still my best friend and that won't change. We won't see each other as much but, that just means the time we do spend together will be twice as important. We won't waste a minute!" I said resolutely.
Kaia looked at me and grinned from her crown of curly hair. She then slide forward so she was just a few inches in front of me. Then leaned in closer still and held out a long left handed pinkie.
"Let's make a pact!" She whisper-shouted.
"A pact?"
"Yes! A life long promise and commitment to last our whole lives!"
I grinned despite myself and sat up a bit straighter.
"Let's do it. A pact."
She nodded happily and then gestured to my hands. I lifted my left hand, the same as hers, and we hooked pinkies.
"We never stop being sister spirits. We are always gonna support each other as best we can and hold each other, like blood sisters. Family forever." she started, then paused thinking of the next words.
"We will always find our way back into each other's lives?" I offered helpfully.
"Yes! No matter the time apart, the distance away, the hardships between us or in our lives, and no matter the obstacles to do so. We will always return to each other to be a sister again. Do you swear?" she asked seriously.
"I swear, To never stop being your spirit sister and to always try to get back to you. No matter the time, space, hardships, or obstacles to do so."
Her face lite up and we shook pinkies dedicatedly.
"Forever!"
"Forever."
That's when his head popped up in my vision past her curly locks. He looked at us and his face twisted into an ugly look if I have ever seen one. He screamed the word, 'Grandma!' It echoed in our ears. Kaia kicked at him.
He was already gone. We crawled out of the closet and stood in the center of the barren room. Just in time to hear him spout lies to her conservative Christian family.
"Kaia and Rose were making out in the closet! I saw them! I saw them!"
It obviously wasn't true but we couldn't exactly say we were making a pact. We swore we were just whispering to each other. Which was true. However that day it was decided that we are a lesibian couple. Making out in closets. We were never allowed to close the bedroom door like they were afraid I'd knock her up or something. It was a horrible time for a bit. Kaia only got me to be able to stay the night and visit ever again because she broke down in tears and swore Xavier was a devil spawn out to destroy her life.
It didn't matter. Though it complicated things for us they just tried to pray me straight, and tried oh-so hard to get me to convert to Christianity. At the time I was just nothing. My father was Christian but I never went to church and preferred Shintoism and Buddhism more than any regular standard religion. I even owned a few shinto books. But me claiming that I liked Christianity bought me an every weekend overnight trip to Kaia's so I could go to church.
…
We have kept this pact, I just thought you should know, for now sixteen years. We have been broken apart only to come back together again no matter the time or distance between us. We would lose contact but remain faithful that it would be reattained someday. It always has. We have had fights. There have been times that we were so mad at each other it seemed impossible to keep talking. But it does fade, and all it takes is an 'I need you.' For any wraith or ice to melt away and to be at her side. I don't think it will ever change and since we are past the hard part. The late teens. Now we live together. I'm pretty sure we will someday be two old ladies in a retirement home bickering about if the room is too hot or cold, and… Who left the door open? Right after the other just opened it. It's something we-
"Hey do you know the name of the street we're getting off at?" Kaia's voice broke past my nostalgic musings.
I turned my attention from the absolutely drenched window of the bus to the girl sitting at my side bouncing her leg aggressively. She hates busses.
"It's so rainy you can't see a damn thing! I don't know how the driver is driving. We are gonna have to listen for the street's name to get off." She continued.
"I actually do remember the name. But we're good. We haven't even passed over the bridge yet and that's not even the halfway mark."
"Ugh! I forgot that this bus went over a bridge! Are we really going over a bridge in this rain storm!" she sighed.
"Well, yeah Kaia. Your doctors office is on the left half of town which is all across a bridge. There's no way around it." I gently reminded her.
My eyes trailed over the window view. It was true it was the worst rainstorm I had seen. It even made me uneasy and I was very easy going on busses.
She laid her head on the seat before us. The bus was practically empty. Only one other rider was on. An old man who sat in the far back playing on his phone. The bus started trudging up and I reached out and rubbed Kaia's shoulder.
"We're about to go up the hill Kaia." I warned.
She took a deep breath and nodded her head.
"Okay. I got this."
There was a sudden loud honking. It made me attempt to look out the opaque-with-rain window. What I heard next was a loud crash and the bus jerked hard, we must have slammed into something. Then the bus seemed to flip upside down, gravity seemed to pause before suddenly it all went black…
- Writer
