SEVENTY FOUR: BURN

It was two years after we left Scotland that I did the thing I thought I would never do-- I destroyed the survival guide. Remember the book: Beginning and End of a girl named Nicole? The one my 'old saviour' gave to me as a parting gift? Yeah, that. I set it ablaze in the yard one fateful evening. Everything that happened to us after Scotland, I already knew about. I knew that Cameron would get better and return to his business and concubines. I knew that he'd not give up on mom, and that he would keep up the threats and letters, and he did. His threats started about two months after we left home. I'll tell you about them later. Like I was emphasizing, I knew that we'd live in another country, but I didn't know where. The book helped in a way, however. I was able to prevent few annoying incidents from happening, like the food poisoning Nicole's sister (Blaire) had at three. It happened that in the story, Blaire got some apples from her neighbours' tree when she went visiting. It was not her first time eating something from their orchard. She ate those apples, got poisoned and tah-dah. The rest is history. I didn't read what happened to her at the end though. Instead, I started to monitor my twin sisters closely. I have an habit of overlooking the end of an unpleasant occurrence especially something relating to my family. My siblings made friends with our neighbors' kids few weeks after we settled down, so they went there countless times. Sometimes however, our neighbors' kids come to our house instead. When at four years old, Pamela asked to go play with our neighbors and returned with some fresh apples, I let her go into the kitchen to fetch a fruit knife, and then I secretly hid the apples. Of course she cried, and hit me, and thumped her little feet on the ground, but I did not give her the apples. Mom returned from work(she got a job as a delivery woman at a grocery) when this ruckus was going on. She was taken aback by my insistence on throwing the apples away, and commanded me to release the fruits to my little sister. She said I was being childish. I was eleven at the time. Despite mom's attempt at control over the situation, I went out of the house and threw the apples away. "She's not going to take these" I said. "They look rotten". They didn't look rotten. I was just protecting my sister. Another instance of this guide saving us was when I told Mom to not work night shifts one day. I told her that someone was going to steal something and she was going to be framed for the theft. I told her it was going to get so serious that she would probably get charged to court. Mom stared at me with horror written on her face. She pulled my cheeks and called me silly. "Stop saying silly negative things, okay? I don't want to hear you say so anymore" but I told her I wasn't kidding. "Where did you hear this?" she questioned. "Who's putting stuff into your head?" She thought I had started reading crime fiction and whatnots. So, she ransacked my stuff in my bedroom, and took some books away, the ones she called 'dangerous'. It was funny. But thanks goodness I had my guide kept safely away, somewhere under my mattress. I don't know if she considered my words later or if it was due to a little stomach upset she developed in the morning, but it turned out that she didn't even go to work that day. She called in sick at work. Days later, she heard that someone had burgled into the store where deliveries were kept, including the safe, around 8:30 in the evening and that the thief made away with a large sum before someone could intrude his operation. The only two people at work that evening were arrested. It was crazy. Mom called me into her room later the next day, and told me this story, then she asked very quietly, "How did you find out this would happen?" There was glaring shock and unbelief on her face. "I don't know, mom" I told her, fairly honestly. She started to believe me after that day. The day I'd lose whatever interest I had left in the book soon came. It was on page 221 of the book. My alter ego, Nicole Clark had an accident when she turned fifteen. Not just her, but it included her whole family. I don't know whether anyone of them lost their life(lives). What was the most disturbing about this was that, there seemed to be no way to stop that from happening. They weren't even traveling or something. It was a normal ride. Furiously, I stormed out of the house into our yard, with a lighter and a bottle of gasoline and burnt the book into ashes. "Foolish book! Burn, burn into ashes!" Mom thought I was crazy. Not that it was her first time terming me crazy anyway. She stood at the door with her arms akimbo and asked if I was okay, if I needed a hug or something. I don't blame her because I wouldn't know what to do too, if I were her. I sat there and watched it burn, without a change of mind, as if setting it ablaze would stop the accident from happening. Then, I turned back into the house, walking past her and sulking because I regretted my action immediately.