Snippet #2247288

The boy who had run into her, Axel, firmly shook her hand. Her father always said that a firm handshake was the sign of a trustworthy person. Erin gave a small nod of approval before letting go of his hand. She shook her head at his little pun, rolling her eyes. And she thought her dad was bad when it came to puns. It was kind of comforting to see there was someone else with a similar sense of humor to her dad.

"Oh, really? Well, last I checked, there was this great place for running. If I remember correctly, it's called 'The Great Outdoors'." She held her hands out toward the front door as if displaying a fancy grand prize on a game show. "In any case, I should--" she suddenly stopped, a look of discomfort crossing her face. 'Gah, not now!'she thought, wincing. When her fingers began twitching, she pulled a small notebook out of her back pocket, deftly fishing the pencil out of the binding and flipping it open to an empty page. She frantically began writing, ignoring any questions or odd looks as her mind focused entirely on what she was writing. It was impossible to not see every word she wrote when she felt stressed like this. It was nearly as bad as having to watch the entire death in a vision. As she wrote, her fingers slowly began to stop shaking, though the shaking obviously had no effect on that horrible, ever-neat, type-like writing. It seemed that she had waited a bit too long to start writing this time. She hated that horrible feeling, the horribly neat writing that did not belong to her, the horrible curse that made her witness death on a daily basis.

She slammed the book closed and gathered her bag. She looked at Axel's face one more time before looking down and mumbling, "I need to go find my room." A her emotions began to roil as she stepped past him and down the hall, easily finding her room now that she had thoroughly embarrassed herself. There were three beds, but the wardrobe had a sign on it. She ignored it, leaving her bags on the bed nearest the windows before opening one and hopping outside. She had no interest in running into Axel again, or anyone else for that matter. Finding a nearby tree with low branches, she quickly climbed it, coming to rest on a high branch where she could observe those outside without being easy to see. She let the emotion wash over her, a single tear running down her cheek.