by Ian Withrow
Lauren's muddy sneaker slipped across a rain-slick rock, rolling her ankle and sending her tumbling and scrambling into the brush beside the trail. She felt branches whip across her, and catch her hair as she crashed into the underbrush, and she gasped in pain as a particularly sharp twig lashed across her cheek. Her arms windmilled as she tried to halt her momentum, and finally she managed a tenuous hold on the trunk of a passing oak tree.
Deep breath, take stock, she thought to herself. Her ankle was twisted and swelling, and she felt a warmth running down her cheek in contrast to the chilly raindrops. Reaching up she wiped her face. Pulling her hand away she could see it was speckled with blood.
“Dammit,” she swore as crimson dripped onto her gray tank top. Lauren fought back the urge to cry and waited impatiently for her gift to kick in.
Within moments her ankle let out a popping noise and she winced as it reset to its proper position. Similarly, she felt a familiar tingle as the cut across her cheek closed up.
Lauren, a tomboy, was no stranger to the kinds of injuries most outdoorsy children sustain. Bruised shins, cut fingers, poison ivy, and the like. Of course, Lauren didn't experience these exactly as other children might. She learned early on that these would, for her, be passing issues, destined to last no longer than a few moments.
That didn't change how uncomfortable they were, though.
She still felt pain. She felt it twice over, in fact. For every injury she sustained she also felt the discomfort of her instant healing. For minor cuts it was a tingle, the kind of pins and needles you might experience from having your foot fall asleep. More significant injuries caused a more severe reaction. When she broke her arm at a public playground at ten years old, her parents had to carry her back to the car and leave, for fear her screaming would cause someone to call the police.
Lauren looked down at herself, checking her clothes for damage. Sure enough, there were several small tears in the soft jersey material of her shirt. It was one of her favorites.
Her evening soured, Lauren set off for home once again, albeit at a more reasonable pace.
Night had fully fallen when she at last entered her yard. Yard was a bit of a misnomer. It was more like a clearing in the woods, a few acres of empty grass surrounded by a low barbwire fence. In the middle sat the family home, a pair of double-wide trailers that had been connected together. They wouldn't look like much to a casual observer, but to her they represented sanctuary.
Yelling emanated from the house as she walked the last few dozen yards to the door.
“What the hell does it matter if she gets back in by dark, John?” her mother's voice. “It's not like literally anything could happen to her, for god's sakes!”
“That's not the point. She's our daughter and it's our job to make sure she's--”
Her father's voice cut off sharply, accompanied by the sound of breaking glass.
Lauren hesitated, her hand inches from the door handle and she debated staying out longer.
Sanctuary indeed.
The decision was made for her. Allison yanked open the door.
“I'm going for a drive,” she said acidly, looking over her shoulder at John. When she turned back to the door she saw Lauren standing there uncertainly.
“Um, hi, sweetie,” stuttered her mother. “I'm going out for a quick drive. Don't wait up.”
Allison gave her daughter a quick peck on the cheek, and Lauren tried to ignore the smell of wine on her breath.
Lauren reluctantly moved aside as her mother walked past, one hand on her pregnant belly and the other on the railing beside the back steps.
“Mom,” Lauren began to say, her voice meek with doubt. “Maybe you shouldn't... y'know...”
Her voice trailed near the end as Allison didn't even turn around while replying.
“Baby, don't worry, I just...don't like being cooped up in the house, that's all. Besides, I've still got four months before your brother is due, anyway!”
Allison slid into the driver's seat of their old pickup truck, another new addition to the family since the move. The SUV had been well suited for the conditions of the back-country roads, but it was also expensive. John had pointed out that it was going to be important to have a durable-and-cheap, vehicle when Lauren finally learned to drive. The twenty-year-old Ranger certainly fit the bill. Lauren wasn't even sure if plastic had been invented back then.
Lauren stood in the rain a few moments longer, watching her mother turn the vehicle down the long driveway towards the road and set out. Eventually though, the rain pouring down her face and soaking her clothes chilled her to the bone and forced her inside the house.
Her father was still standing where he had been when Allison walked out, his eyes glazed and his gaze distant. He was hunched over slightly and had the posture of a man defeated. He shook himself as Lauren entered and tried to put on a brave face but Lauren could tell he was hurting inside.
They hugged. The long deep hug you give a friend whom you cannot help, but can only hope to support.
“So,” he began a little lamely. “Are you, um, ready for school tomorrow?”
She had never felt less ready. Her worries flooded in, now that she was away from the peace of the woods. Would she be able to make friends? What if someone recognized her? What if her gift was revealed and the torturous reality that was her early childhood returned? Would she do well in school? Was she going to be behind her peers? These and more bogged her down, filling her with dread. Not to mention the fears she had for her parents and for her unborn brother. But her father had enough to deal with.
“Yep,” she said in a cheery tone, smiling reassuringly at her dad. “I'm thinking tomorrow will be a great day.”
He smiled, a genuine smile this time. She knew she was his pride and joy, and to see him happy she would endure anything.
“I'm really tired, though, so I'm gonna hit the hay, OK, Dad?”
He nodded and tousled her hair gently.
“You might consider a shower first, Lolo.”
She hated that nickname, and was going to remind him of that when suddenly he froze.
“What happened?” he exclaimed in a worried tone, touching her shoulder where the blood had stained her shirt.
Damn it. She had hoped the rain would wash it all out.
“Oh, I took a tumble on the trail running home,” she said lightly, hoping to avoid a scene. But her father was intensely protective of "his little girl."
“You were running in the rain? You could have broken your neck,” he scolded. But his words had no bite of anger, only the fearful tone of paternal concern.
Lauren refrained from mentioning that as far as they knew, it wouldn't have mattered if she did. She doubted he would appreciate the cynicism. She opted to nod her understanding and simply reply with what she knew she needed to hear.
“I know, Daddy. I'll be more careful,” she gave him another hug and walked past him to her room. As soon as the door was shut, she breathed a deep sigh.
Her room was dark, except for the faint glow of the stick-on, glow-in-the-dark stars still clinging to her ceiling, relics from an older time. In many ways she enjoyed the darkness as much as the light. Where a bright sunny day could lift her spirits and encourage her, the cover of darkness lent her a feeling of true privacy, a comforting blanket of anonymity and unfeeling. In the darkness there could be no expectations of her: she was truly safe in her solitude.
Tears came unbidden to her eyes, suppressed these past few months and brought out by the stress of the evening.
For a while things had been good again. The family had been using a pseudonym, Corbeau, since they'd arrived down here. It was her father's idea. He'd been studying French when he first met Allison, and it was the translated version of their family name. The change of scenery brought a wave of relief from the stresses and pressures of the celebrity lifestyle she had grown up in. Not once did she miss the attention or the fame, the endless hours of talk-shows and the media circus. H
omeschooling allowed her to spend time with her parents, and being an introvert, she didn't really miss the company of others her age. Even when they had started going to town more regularly in recent years, she hadn't felt the need to make very many friends.
But the rosy glow of a new home in a new place couldn't cover the fact that her mother's drinking hadn't stopped. It couldn't repair her father's heart every time she left to "take a drive." They still tried to hide it from her, and deep down, Lauren was fairly certain that if it weren't for her they likely would have split years ago.
Or they would still be happy with each other, like they were before she came along. The thought came unsolicited, as it always did when she started to dwell on the broken nature of her home.
For a while, when they found out Allison was expecting again, the family had felt whole, unbroken. The drinking had stopped for a few weeks, the fighting was at an all-time low, and Lauren felt less need to escape to the wilderness to decompress. But within a month her mother was reminding them that, "Some doctors say you can have a glass of wine each night through the second trimester..."
Lauren slipped out of her sopping wet clothes. One advantage to the home was that she had her own bathroom, complete with a shower and a gigantic cast-iron bathtub. The heat of the water stood in stark contrast to the chill she had felt before, and it did wonders to help her relax.
As she rinsed the suds from her long hair she contemplated the morning to come, running through mental checklists of the items she would need to bring to school.
By the time she was toweling herself dry, she was consumed with the lists in her mind. Did she have enough notebooks? Was one going to be enough for each class? What if her classes were across the school from each other and she didn't have time to go to her locker? Maybe it would be smarter to have a larger notebook and split it between two classes that were back to back?
It wasn't until she started pulling on jeans that she realized she hadn't gone to bed yet. She put a palm to her forehead, feeling foolish. Lauren, you're a ditz, she thought to herself. She took the jeans back off, opting for fuzzy pajama pants and a light tank-top instead.
Lauren's bed was huge, a king size. It was one of the few material possessions she truly treasured. It had cost a fortune, she was sure, but as she rarely asked for things, her parents had been happy to oblige. Snuggled beneath a mountain of blankets, Lauren was in the lap of luxury, but sleep still eluded her. Minutes ticked by, turning to hours as she lay still, her mind restlessly wandering from one worry to the next. Sometime around 3:00 a.m. she heard her mother come home. She could finally let go of the tension she didn't even realize she had, and drifted fitfully off to sleep.
Lauren awoke with a start to the blaring klaxon of her cell phone alarm. Bleary-eyed, she reached out, smacking the cell phone repeatedly until, finally, it was silent again. Grabbing hold of the offending device, she pulled it to her face.
7:35.
Panic overcame her. Class started in 25 minutes and she lived half an hour from the school. Lauren leapt from the bed, tripping over her mess of tangled blankets and banging her shin against the side table as she did so.
Cussing was frowned upon in the Corvidae home, at least officially, but the creativity with which Lauren was currently swearing would make most men blush.
John looked at his watch. It was getting fairly late and Lauren still hadn't come out of her room this morning. He couldn't be certain but he thought he could hear her talking to herself in there. Suddenly, a loud bang rang out through the house from her direction. Cautiously he approached the door, aware that disturbing a teenage girl was akin to poking a lioness with a stick. He knocked softly.
No answer.
Slowly, ever so slowly, he eased the door open. Lauren was hopping around on one foot struggling to jam her other one into a sneaker. A rapidly fading bruise adorned her forehead, and he couldn't help but notice she was haphazardly dressed. Her cargo shorts were hardly a match for her mid-calf striped socks and sneakers, still muddy from the night before. She was wearing a hot pink cami she usually slept in, and seemed to be trying to throw on a dark gray hoodie while simultaneously tying her shoe. It wasn't going well.
“Dad,” she screamed at him as though everything were his fault, and he barely dodged the black and white converse sneaker that sailed past his head. “I'm trying to change!”
John ducked out, feeling lucky to survive.
“Oh, ok, honey. Um. I'll get the car ready. You know school starts in twenty minutes, right?”
Lauren's reply was caustic. “Yes, I am aware, thank you!”
Exactly three minutes later, Lauren was running from the house, her hair unbrushed and her backpack flapping behind her. She tossed her bag into the bed of the truck and ran for the door. Midway to the cab she froze. She looked in the bed to see over an inch of standing water soaking into her backpack.
Lauren made a sound like steam escaping a teapot mixed with a growling animal, her face conveyed such apocalyptic rage that her father didn't even look her in the eye.
It was a very quiet and uncomfortable car ride to the school, and when they finally pulled up at 8:12, she wordlessly exited the truck with a defeated sigh.
“Hey,” John spoke to her as she began to plod away, “Chin up, Lolo, you're gonna do great."
Lauren almost didn't turn around, she was so consumed by worry, but she knew it would matter to her dad. Turning and waving she forced a smile.
“I know, Dad, thanks for the ride.”
She faced the school once more. It was a squat, single-story affair of red brick and black window frames. Sighing to herself, she covered the distance to the entrance and pulled the big glass double door open.
To be fair, the lobby was considerably friendlier in appearance than the dull exterior. It had a nice white and red checkered tile floor, and the walls were covered with murals and plaques. Off to the right was a desk, where an elderly woman sat behind it reading a newspaper.
Unsure of how to proceed, Lauren approached her.
“Excuse me, ma'am, I'm--”
“Late, and on the first day, no less. Not the right impression, young lady.”
The woman's tone was sharp, like a librarian who had just caught you writing in a book. Her piercing blue eyes bored into Lauren's from over the classified ads.
“Yes, ma'am, I'm really sorry. I-I've never been to a public school before. I don't, um, I don't really know how this works.”
Lauren was foundering, and something in the woman seemed to sense that, because her tone softened considerably. She introduced herself as Margaret the receptionist, and after looking over Lauren's paperwork, she directed her to her first class. Room 117.
Lauren looked at her cellphone. The bright digital display read 8:19. The door before her was covered in a mirror finish, and had the words “Smile! You're our brightest treasure!” written across it in childlike block letters. She stared at her reflection. The girl looking back at her was too skinny, her socks were both striped and colored, but an unmatched pair. Her shoes were filthy. Her hair was a mess, though untangled at least. She silently thanked her parents for giving her hair that tended to behave.
Another minute ticked by before she finally got the courage to reach out to the door. With one hand she tucked a strand of loose hair behind her ear as the other struck out to grab the handle.
She squeaked in surprise when the door opened on its own. A tall, handsome man in dark slacks and a hunter green button-up was looking at her expectantly.
“Are you coming in?”
She looked like a fish out of water, taken entirely aback. From where he had pushed the door open, she could see it was a one-way mirror, and the class had been able to observe her uncertainty the entire time. She was mortified.
The class erupted in laughter behind the man, obviously her teacher, until he glared back and scolded them.
“Guys! That's no way to treat a new student!”
Turning back to Lauren, he sp
oke warmly.
“Welcome to Biology, the reason you're blushing!”
Clearly he thought his joke would make her feel more comfortable. It didn't. With yet another imperfection to obsess over, Lauren felt her face grow hotter and hotter, and she was afraid if she blushed any harder her cheeks would combust.
“Yes-thank-you,” Lauren's words were rushed and she moved past the man into the classroom. The only open seat was in the front row, close to the middle of the room. Of course, she thought to herself. She took her seat as quietly and unobtrusively as she could, an impossible task given its location.
“Everyone, this is Lauren Corbeau, she's joining us this year from out of town! I trust everyone will make her feel welcome.”
Lauren read the blackboard. It was covered in horribly penned chalk writing. The most legible section was the top right: "Mr. Harrison's BIO 107 – Rm 117."
Mr. Harrison was still talking, but Lauren was in a fog. She was clumsily getting out a notebook and fishing around in her soggy bookbag for a pen when he broke through her daze.
“Lauren? Hello?”
“Y-Yes, sir.” Lauren knew he had been speaking to her, but was shamefully unaware of what he had been saying.
“I was just saying we're going to be starting the year with a discussion about birds.” He looked at her as though this should hold some special relevance or meaning to her.
She was clueless.
“I, uh, thought that might interest you, given that your name--Corbeau, that is--is the French word for crow?”
Lauren was at the same time interested in hearing more and desperate that he should turn his attention, well-meaning or otherwise, to literally anyone or anything but her.
Perhaps sensing her discomfort, he did return to the lesson, and spent most of it discussing the Corvidae family of birds. Lauren felt her ears burning well into the class, and couldn't help but suspect that the fervent whispering from the rest of the students were about her.
The rest of class was interesting enough for her to forget some of her embarrassment. Apparently the crow family included rooks and ravens as well. If her name had to be a group of birds, it figured she would get the ugly, carrion eating ones.
