Gifted

by Campbell, Jamie

  Charlie heard Blair’s footsteps disappear down the corridor. She waited by the door until he returned, the keys jangling in his hand.

  “I found it,” he declared. Charlie stood back from the door, hoping the key would work. She stared at the lock, waited to see it click around in its place. She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw it turn.

  In the next instance, she felt herself being flung backwards from the door. She had no control over her movements. Her body flew across the room and hit the wall on the opposite side. She felt her neck snap backwards and hit the hard surface. She slid down and lay crumpled on the floor.

  Blair heard the thump against the wall and hurried to turn the door handle. It didn’t move. He shook it hard, using both hands to try and pry it open. Eventually, he tried one last time in a panic. It slowly gave way and turned roughly. He used his shoulder to push on the door and force it open.

  Taking one look at Charlie laying on the floor, he raced over to her. For a moment after the impact, she was unconscious. He cradled her head, pushing her hair back from her face. She came around quickly and tried to sit up.

  “Are you alright? What happened?”

  “When you unlocked the door, something threw me at the wall,” she shook her head, trying to make sense of what had just happened. It had all been so quick, in just a second she had been propelled backwards. “I hit my head on the wall. You’re really wet.”

  “Sorry. Here, let me help you over to the bed,” Blair put his hands under her shoulders and helped her to her feet. She shakily made it over to the bed and sat down. She rubbed the back of her head. Blair stood next to her, acutely aware of how he was still dripping onto the floor.

  “I’ve got a killer headache,” Charlie said.

  “I’m not surprised. Do you want me to take you to the doctors and get you checked out? You were knocked out for a minute.”

  “No doctors, I’ll be fine. I’m tough,” she tried to smile. “I don’t like what he keeps doing to us. He’s going to kill us soon. It’s only a matter of time.”

  “I don’t like it either. Maybe Cate is right after all. Maybe the best thing to do is abandon camp and go home.”

  “Except this is Cate’s home. Where is she going to go? She can’t come back to campus with us.”

  “I know. Which is why we have to stay strong and fight with her. We’ll all get through this.”

  “I hope so.”

  “Now, do you want to stay here or go downstairs?” Blair found a change of clothes and put them on. Leaving the wet ones with Charlie’s on the floor.

  “I don’t want to be in this room any longer. The door might lock again.”

  He helped her into the hallway and down the stairs. In his left hand he was still clutching the leather satchel he had unearthed. For now, it was in the back of his mind. His main concern was Charlie and making sure she was okay.

  They made it to the living room where Blair moved the blow-up bed onto the floor. He quickly made it up with sheets and blankets. Charlie slid into it gratefully. She was suddenly overwhelmed with tiredness and couldn’t think of anything else but falling asleep. He stayed with her and kept an eye on her for the rest of the afternoon.

  When Cate arrived home, Blair dreaded telling her about the latest event. He knew she would freak out that Charlie had been knocked unconscious.

  He was right of course. She rushed over to where Charlie was asleep and felt her forehead instinctively. She didn’t stir. In fact, for the rest of night Charlie was dead to the world. The only saving grace was that her sleep was dreamless.

  * * *

  Charlie was the last one out of bed the next morning. She only awoke after Blair had checked on her for the hundredth time that morning.

  “How’re you feeling?”

  “Better. My head’s sore though. I think I need some panadol,” she pushed back the covers and sat up, testing her neck. Despite the serious hit she had received the day before, she seemed to be suffering no permanent damage. She stood with Blair’s help and slowly walked into the kitchen. Cate poured her an orange juice and cereal, topped off by some pain relievers.

  “Are you going to be okay, Sis?” Cate asked with concern.

  “I’ll be fine. It takes more than a knock to the head to stop me. What are you up to today?”

  “Rahni and I are going to go and visit Grandma. Aren’t we honey?” Rahni nodded her approval. “She’s only a half hour drive away so we thought it would be a good excuse to get out of the house today. What about you?”

  “We need to pick up the supplies for your party. The shop rang yesterday and said they were ready. I’m not sure if we should go ahead with it though,” Blair answered, looking at Charlie for reassurance.

  “I agree with Blair. I really wanted to throw you a great party but do you really think we should have thirty people here with all this going on?” Charlie looked from Blair to Cate.

  “Of course we have to do ahead with it! This is going to be the last opportunity we have to throw a party in this house. Think of it as a goodbye party. We have been through a lot of crap in the last few weeks. We need this party to go ahead,” Cate said stubbornly. “They may have won and have driven us away, but be damned if they are going to ruin my party!”

  Blair and Charlie exchanged a glance. They knew it was pointless trying to talk her out of it. In a way, they didn’t want to.

  “Well, I guess we are picking up party supplies today then,” Blair resigned himself to the fact.

  They waited until Cate and Rahni had left for the day before talking again. Now Charlie was feeling better, besides having a sore lump on the back of her head, her attention was turning back to what they were digging for yesterday. The brown leather satchel was sitting on the table in the foyer. It had been forgotten in the events of the previous day. Blair retrieved it and placed it on the kitchen table. They stared at it for a time, unsure what they were going to find inside and not sure if they really wanted to know.

  Charlie pulled it closer to her and examined the outside. It was held tightly closed by two small buckles. They were almost rusted right over. Had it not been for their distinctive outline, you could have mistaken them for plain old buttons.

  The small amount of mud that had stubbornly clung to it was crumbling away as it was touched. Overall, it was in good condition. She pulled at the buckles, they didn’t have any give to them until she pulled harder. Eventually, she managed to pry open the leather straps and open the satchel. With one hand, she held up the flap, trying to see what was inside. There was something rectangular that fit snugly in the space. She carefully gripped it with two fingers and slowly pulled it out of the satchel.

  “It looks like a book,” Blair commented as he watched on.

  “There’s nothing written on the cover,” Charlie placed it on the table and pushed the leather satchel to the side. It was a thin book, containing only a couple of hundred pages. It looked old, the edges of the paper were starting to warp and had a yellow tinge to them. Considering how old Charlie suspected it was, it was still in excellent condition for its age. The leather satchel had done a good job of protecting it over the years.

  She peeled open the cover and the first few pages until she found a sheet with writing on it. It only took a few minutes to realise exactly what she was looking at.

  “It’s Eve’s diary,” she said excitedly, not quite believing what they had found.

  “Are you sure? It can’t be. That would make it hundreds of years old.”

  “It is! Read the first page. It’s hers! No wonder she wanted us to find it. She said in one of my dreams that they had buried it. Someone never wanted anyone to find this.”

  They read through the first few pages together, still in shock at the find. The diary had started in the year of 1806, Eve had helped to bring in the New Year by celebrating with her family. She had begun the diary as a way to celebrate the New Year and the anticipation of all the wonderful things that could happen in the course
of a year. She had been full of excitement when the first entry was written.

  The second, third, and fourth entry were all along a similar line. The weather had been hot, almost too hot to bear. Eve talked about her sisters Joanne and Violet and how they had tried to stay indoors as much as possible to avoid the hot glare of the sun. She made the comment that English girls were not built for the harsh Australian conditions. Charlie got the impression she wasn’t too keen on the move from England. Something in her lamenting told her they didn’t get much of a say in the matter, nor their mother for that case. Lord Richard Reign had heard about the sheep farming opportunities in the new country and shipped his family there as soon as he could to take advantage of all the possibilities. They had been in the country for almost six years when the diary was written. In all that time, it didn’t sound like she had forgiven her father for the disruption to their lives.

  Charlie thought about the situation she must have been in. In England, they would have been a part of the high society. They would have had the best of everything at their doorstep. Their father had thrown it all away for the chance of a new life in Australia. She doubted whether he would have been thinking about his family when he had made the decision. From Eve’s portrayal of the man, he seemed to make decisions with his wealth in mind. He may have been the best man in the world, but Eve sure didn’t view him that way.

  As much complaining as there was in the entries, there was also the dreams of a young teenage girl. She had written how one day she would be married and live in a grand house all of her own. She wanted to have four children - all girls. She wanted her children to grow up with sisters just like her. At one stage she mentioned she was almost sixteen years old and very much ready to be married because she was of age. More than anything, she wanted to have the freedom to chase her dreams.

  The more they read, the more Charlie and Blair felt like they were growing closer to the girl. These were her personal and private diary entries. They weren’t meant to be seen by any eyes besides her own. With that secrecy in mind, she was free to express her thoughts and desires without censorship. In a way, it felt almost wrong to be reading the diary. Even though the girl had died more than two centuries ago, she was still a person just like them. Charlie kept reminding herself that Eve had wanted her to find it. For some reason, she wanted her to read it. It was only remembering her insistence that kept her turning the pages.

  Eve talked about how there was a boy she had been seeing. He was tall, dark, and handsome just like in the love stories. She would see him often, mostly in secret. Lord and Lady Reign knew about the boy, but they didn’t suspect how truly in love with each other they were. They didn’t take them seriously and that was fine with Eve. What they didn’t know, wouldn’t hurt them.

  He took her for a walk on the day of one of the entries. It wasn’t exactly proper to be alone together but they didn’t care. They walked down to the stream where they sat on the banks and talked all afternoon. Eve described her first kiss with him from that day. It had been ‘magical’, ‘beautiful’ and ‘tender’ and brought butterflies to her stomach. She felt tingles every time he was near her. Charlie found it so sweet the way Eve referred to him as Mr L. Even with her assured privacy, she wouldn’t be giving away who the mysterious and wonderful man was.

  Mr L made a few more appearances in the diary over the following weeks. Every time he was mentioned it was Eve gushing about how great he was. She was obviously smitten with him. Even though she claimed to be totally in love with the guy, Charlie could tell it was a sweetheart crush, probably Eve’s first one.

  Two months into the diary, Eve’s mood started to change. In one entry she talked about a man that was going to be arriving soon. Lord Reign had told her she would have to entertain him. His intentions were for her to marry the man. Eve was angry she was being forced into the situation. She spoke about the frustrations of not getting a say in her own life, how her father was only thinking about himself and didn’t have any care for her. She wrote about trying to speak with her mother and get her to stand up for her daughter’s rights but wouldn’t. Charlie suspected Lady Reign probably couldn’t stand up for her daughter, she probably held no sway over her husband.

  Eve was mostly worried about Mr L. With the arrival of a suitor her father had handpicked for her, Mr L wouldn’t have a chance to put his hat into the ring for his beloved’s hand. Lord Reign saw their relationship as nothing more than flirting, he tolerated it until he could find a proper man for her. Charlie considered Mr L must have held a good position in the town, otherwise there was no way Eve would have been allowed to have been associated with him - even if it was just innocent flirting as he had thought.

  They kept reading entry after entry until the clock on the kitchen wall chimed twelve and they realised how late it was. They had been reading for over three hours, engrossed in the girl’s thoughts.

  “We have to get to the party shop,” Blair commented.

  “Sure do. We can keep reading later, this diary is amazing,” Charlie carefully closed the book and placed it on a shelf in the living room where it could come to no harm. They were in the car heading into town in under ten minutes. Within twenty minutes, they were entering the party store. They found the counter and picked up their specially ordered supplies. There was a happy birthday banner, hundreds of streamers and dozens of sparklers. If this was going to be their goodbye party, it was going to be a good one.

  After stowing the supplies in the car, they stopped off at the cafe for lunch. The weather had eased up a little. Instead of the constant rain, there were only a few random showers around. The fact they only had to have waited another day to dig up the backyard without the rain wasn’t lost on Blair. He tried not to think about it, remembering how difficult it had been to trudge around in the mud.

  They took a short walk around town. They did some window shopping before reaching the car again to go back to Sage Manor. They had spent so much time at home it was nice to be out for a few hours. There was something oppressive about the atmosphere there. They had noticed it significantly when they visited Sydney and could still feel the difference just by being in town for a few hours.

  The drive home was fast. Charlie would have preferred it to be longer. Sitting in the cool car and watching the beautiful countryside go by was pleasant. Being in the house and constantly seeing things out of the corner of the eye was quite the opposite.

  They pulled into the driveway and collected the shopping bags out of the car boot. They walked up the few porch steps and stood at the front door. Charlie put her bags down and found her keys in her handbag. She inserted the key in the lock and turned. It felt strange.

  “The door’s not locked,” she stated, confused. “I know I locked it when we left.”

  “Wait here, I’ll take a look inside,” Blair placed his bags on the porch and cautiously stepped inside. Charlie waited for him, praying everything would be normal inside. She remembered the last time she had come home and found the place a mess. She didn’t want to go through that again.

  Several minutes passed. Occasionally, she could hear Blair calling out and asking if anyone was there. At other times his footsteps could be heard as he moved from room to room. Time seemed to creep by slowly as she waited for him to return. Eventually, he opened the front door and retrieved his shopping bags again.

  “Everything looks okay. Are you sure you locked the door when we left?”

  “I know I locked it. I have no doubt in my mind. I remember doing it because I dropped my keys on the floor afterwards and I had to pick them up. They landed in a puddle of water and I had to dry them on my skirt before I put them in my handbag. I know I locked the door.”

  They walked into the foyer and through to the conservatory where they left the party supplies. They had agreed with Cate that would be the best room for the party. It was the largest one on the first floor and would let the afternoon sun into the room to create a party atmosphere and kick off the night.


  Charlie went over to the back door in the conservatory and tried the handle. It turned and allowed her to open the door.

  “This door is unlocked too,” she exclaimed and closed the door, making sure to turn the lock afterwards.

  “It can’t be. Cate is a stickler for making sure everything is locked all the time. She’s got some weird thing about it,” Blair went over to the window next to the door and inspected the lock. “The window’s unlocked too.”

  Charlie hurried out of the room and went into the study to check the window there. It was also unlocked. She slid the lever to secure it again. Crossing the hallway, she tried the only other external door. It was located in the formal dining room. Blair followed close behind. Sure enough, that lock was also unlatched. Completely confused, they went around the entire house and checked every single window. Without fail, they were all unlocked. With each lock they closed, they were growing even more concerned.

  “He’s playing with our head now,” Charlie voiced her concerns. “It’s not enough that he’s beaten us both physically, now he’s trying to drive us crazy too.”

  “He can try, but it won’t work. He’s won anyway. I don’t know why he thinks he has to reiterate the point. Cate is moving and he’ll never have to deal with us again.”

  “We’re probably nothing to him anyway. Just another family that’s moved in and then decided to leave. I wonder when it will all stop. I wonder when he will finally release Eve.”

  “Maybe he can’t. Maybe he was obsessed with her in real life and that has carried over. If you hate someone enough to kill them, then you probably won’t just get over it in a hurry,” Blair commented as they headed back downstairs. They were satisfied they had checked every door and window and all were now securely closed again.

  “You’d think there would be a point though when he just gets too old to care anymore.”

  “Obviously not.”

  They decided to keep the incident with the locks from Cate. It wouldn’t have done any good to tell her about it so they decided it was best she didn’t know. She’d already had enough of the recent events, what she didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her anymore.