Beauty (4 page)

I thought she’d left already…
Where did she get the water from anywa
y
?

My head lifted as the outer door creaked closed behind her, my eyes watching the t
endrils of smoke as they curled up from the burnt spot in the carpet
. Tiny droplets of wa
ter dotted a trail
leading from the RA’s master bedroom to the pitiful pile of ash in front of me. That door was locked…
How had she gotten in?

Of course there was a bathroom in there. All the resident advisors bedrooms had their own bath. And a tub… I realized, looking down at the blood that stained my
thigh and crotch area of my skirt. If ever there were a better way to die. I heaved myself up from the floor, my eyes closed as I walked stiffly back into my bedroom. I didn’t need to look to see that there was a trail of blood –my blood-stained in a dark streak down the side of my comforter. My normally neat bed looked as if I’d had a nightmare, the fitted sheet pulled from the mattress and hanging to the floor.
I couldn’t go near it. Luckily I had more of what I needed
hidden in the box between the closet and the desk and I grabbed it quickl
y, locking my bedroom door on the
way out.

My roommates would suspect that our living room had been crashed by other drunk students. No one would think t
o look for me in the RA’s room.
I
didn’t bother to knock before I entered
, there was
no need;
it had already been cleaned, checked and locked for next year’s occupant
a week ago
.

It was
as if the witch
had
left the door open on purpose…just for me. I
already knew what I had to do to ease the overwhelming pain inside me. My heart pounded as my feet carried
me
towards the dripping sound
coming fr
om the bathroom. The door creaked as I pushed it with my foot and I froze
under the harsh fluorescent lighting. Razor in hand, I let my eyes wander around the tiny space
until it fell
on the pristine white tub. It wasn’t very big, but it would d
o.
Anything to get rid of this feeling.
Death
would be welcomed.

**********

Everything burned…my lips, my face, my arms, my body…
I was on fire!
Reality jolted me awa
ke as I bolted from my bed in a
frenzy. Something gripped tight around my wrists and I swung wildly, memories of Brice on top of me fresh and vivid. Standing on top of my bed I almost laughed as my gaze swept my bedroom.
How long had it been since I stood on my bed?

Wait…I was in my bedroom…
How did I get here? The last thing I remember was… Oh Shit the tub…my wrist, the blood…so much of it.

Bits and pieces of the night before floated together, my mind reeling as my eyes landed on the massive wad of gauze wrapped around my hand and arm.

Someone had found me, not called the police, but instead, wrapped my arm and put me in bed?! What?! It didn’t make sense!

“Evelyn?! You in there?! We’re leaving now! You still sleeping?!”

June’s voice reached me from the living room, her knocks deepening the migraine that suddenly appeared just behind my eyes. My mouth opened to call to her as I jumped from the bed onto the floor but something stopped me. Two things should have happened that didn’t, and panic settled. There hadn’t been a loud thump f
rom the floor registering my weight
, and I was suddenly off balance, my legs wobbling as if I’d landed on a pair of stilts instead of my cankles.

The fuzziness of sleep was fading fast, my brain finally processing more than just the strangeness of waking up in my room. My eyes were on the floor, and that’s where I started, shock holding me in place as my gaze traveled from a tiny pair of feet up slender long legs. My hands moved without any command from me, my fingers sp
laying widely over a super flat
toned tummy, down over the slender curve of hips and back up again to cover firm perky mounds.

Holy shit! Holy Shit! Holy SHIT!

This was some voodoo type stuff. I ran my name, my age, my parents’ names, and my home
town through my head, confirming that it was me…at least on the inside.

But if this was me…then whose body did I have…? What happene
d to heaven and hell, becoming C
asper the friendly ghost, or even fading into nothingness?!

Those things I’d prepared for. Watching my blood drip into the full tub of water
last night
I’d gone over each scenario, banking on the fact that I wasn’t good enough for heaven, my bad deeds hadn’t been bad enough
to put me in hell…surely?! I didn’t really believe in ghost
s
, but I’d eventually settled on hoping for that or nothingness. How good it would have felt to not really exist anymore. Death had been wet and warm. I’d felt it sucking at me. I’d felt the blackness take hold and ooze it
s
way all the way up from the insides of my toes to the very nerve endings of my brain. It had opened for me, and I’d gone with it…glad
l
y! How then was I standing here…me…but not me….?

Reincarnation…
?

One step to the left, and my head lifted higher, the full length mirror attached to m
y closet directly across from me
now. This was my bedroom. In the reflection I could see the bottom cor
ner of my blood stained comforter
, my wall of hopes and dreams
to the left of that
–pictures of Italy, France & Europe plastered in a giant circle
-
, the empty be
d
my old roommate had left behind. Closer…I allowed my eyes to focus. Dark brown hair…highlighted just as my mothered suggested…check. Chocolate brown eyes…dull but still mine since the day I was born…check. Even straight white teeth, the top fourth one from the left –chipped from the day I’d falle
n off the merry-go-round
because I was pushed by Sherri Dodd- …check.

Oh Shit!

That’s where the similarities ended. My face was mine, but not mine… In it I saw the face of the four or five year old girl that sat proudly displayed above my parents’ fireplace.
That
was me. I know for sure because one day -sometime in the summer when I was seven or eight-I was playing on the floor in the living room and I looked up and asked my mother: “Who’s that little girl mommy?” I’d been hurt when she laughed at first, pointing at me as if I’d just said the funniest thing. But then it was my turn to be shocked when she finally answered: “Why honey…that’s you!”

At the time I’d weighed around eighty or ninety pounds, but being that large compared to a classroom full of fifty and sixty pound kids…
and a
girl no less…I was already starting to get teased. I looked nothing like that pretty little skinny girl in the picture.
But she was right… That
was
me. And
that
was the girl I saw reflected back at me now.

Much older of course… Taller…
Definitely
more mature…
God she was gorgeous…

The little indent in a slender woman’s tummy, leading in the center from the breastbone just down to the belly button…she had it. Defined, but still soft abs led down into a toned V shaped pelvis and that’s where my gaze hovered. If I didn’t believe it before
,
I believed it now. My birthmark, I could only remember seeing in my baby and toddler pictures. By the time I wa
s old
enough to wonder where it was, my tummy had hi
dden
it from sight
. I could see it perfectly now. It was
just inside the top crease of my inner thigh.

I was almost embarrassed to be looking at this woman’s private area… But… It wasn’t as if she were a stranger… This was
me
....somehow…

I shook my head in hopes that it would bring something explanatory to mind…but nope… nothing. Even retracing my steps, I got as far as putting the first beautiful slice in my wrist and that’s where things went fuzzy.

“
Ok…” I sighed
in determination
, my eyes fixed on the ones reflected back
at
me in the mirror.

My fi
st
s
were clenched,
my lips drawn into a tight l
ine. I had to snap out of this…fast….

“
Your name is Evelyn
Renee Barns. You are nineteen years old.
Your parents are
Joel and Cindy Barns. You were born and raised in Pickens, Alabama…”

See… I knew who I was. I didn’t feel crazy… But…
There was no denial in those features either.

She looked at me in awe… No one had ever looked at me like that before… Not even my own mother.

“You
r
name…” I started, and then froze, June’s voice reaching to me through the door again.

“Evelyn…it’s me… June… If you’re in there…I just wanted to say goodbye, and…don’t forget to request the same room for fall semester. I…I don’t know how I would get through this without you as my study guide. Thank Ev…” she paused, sighing
and then growing quiet.

I almost jumped out of my skin when a tiny slip of paper swished under the door, landing harmlessly on my welcome rug.
Was it even locked…?

“See you next year…” she murmured just as Cassie –one of our other roo
m
mates-called her name.

My heart was about to explode. I could feel it thumping way up into my throat, my neck hot and my palms suddenly sweaty. The witch. It was coming back to me now.

“
Your wish has been gran
ted…”

But I hadn’t made a wish… Or had I?

Chapter 4*

I bolted from my bedroom exactly forty-five minutes after waiting for June and her parents to leave with all her stuff. Out the inner door and down to the end of the hall, I burst into the stairwell like a rabbit on speed. My feet were going so fast
that they slipped from under me
around the bend leading to floor five, and I rolled the rest of the way down, banging my elbow on the iron banister, and getting h
opelessly tangled in the size twenty-four
nightdress I’d found buried in my ‘small drawer’. Most of the dorm suite doors were open, indicating that the students were already packed and gone. The witch lived down here somewhere….

I turned backwards and then around full circle as I ran down the right side of the long hallway first. I could hear music blaring behind one of the doors, marijuana stenched smoke trailing from another. I was nearing the end, when I caught
sight of
the swipe of black paint over a door near the end. A matching black crucifix
-
pain
ted
r
ight on the frame-stopped me cold
, goose bumps suddenly covering my arms and legs.

“Your wish has been granted…”

Her words whispered through my th
oughts, my closed fist
s
lifting to the closed door, a
nd then settling back at my waist
without knocking.

What would I say…? Thank you…? How dare you do this to me?! Was I supposed to be angry…? Happy….? Upset…?

“Evelyn…?”

A soft voice made me jump, my head whipping back towards the way I’d just c
ome. There she was…dressed all in black
save the dark green bac
k pack tossed over one shoulder. Her hair was different
, the mass braided loosely behind her in a fishtail that curved down her front to just above her elbow
, but it was still just as messy as ever.

“I… You… I….”

Shit!
My words were stuck. Jumbled. My mouth snapped shut, a sigh escaping before I could stop it. How I must look, naked underneath this humongous nightdress. Bare dirty feet because I hadn’t had any shoes that fit…

“You’re in shock…” she nodded slowly, closing the distance left between the two of us.

I inhaled sharply as her hand lifted up past my face, a key slipping into the lock and turning. A soft click sounded and she turned the knob, pushing the door open before motioning for me to go in
ahead of her
.

A quick peep ins
ide, and I almost laughed. I didn
’t know what I’d expected. The room painted black maybe… Incense and odd trinkets lying about perhaps… A dorm efficient cauldron, bubbling with her latest concoction…
Sure why not…? That’s what witches used right?

Her suite lo
oked just like mine. Four rooms:
two on either side, a living room in the middle… Nothing strange about that. She moved past me to the door in the left corner, and I followed
,
into her b
edroom. Once again, no surprise: a few pictures on the wall, a laptop on the desk, e
ven the bed was plain. Black spread, black pillow…