Night Tide

Okay sorry for the delay. I need to get inspired for this chapter, its a bit shorter than I wanted it to be, but it\'ll do. Thanks for the hits and cmments. I didn\'t expect this to be as popular as Night Walker. I should update that soon. Well anyway enjoy this chapter. Please leave comments or questions. ^.^

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Two years passed and I didn’t defy my grandparents anymore. Actually, I didn’t feel much of anything anymore. I had become the shell of the fiery girl I once was. On the brighter side, I was no longer punished. My grandparents became warm and friendly towards me. They would smile and give complements like any other parent would. Hell, I even got to wonder outside, watching the workers go about their tasks. However, even though life seemed okay, I wasn’t okay. I didn’t feel like myself. A shy, obedient, and quiet girl is not who I am. In short, I was living a lie, denying my nature for the sake of my sanity and well being. It was like all my emotions are a raging river, wild, free, open; but a dam is suppressing the water. My river wanted to be free but just couldn’t break the dam that my grandparents had built. However, sometimes one small crack can turn into a hole, and a hole can always expand. Somewhere was a crack in the dam, and all it needed was some force to make a hole. I got my last push, surprisingly from my uncle.
Of course, my uncle had kept in touch with me over the two years. Although, our conversations became more routine, not in a constant kind of way, but in that the conversation always went the same way. He asked how I was doing? I would reply fine, and so on and so forth. I guess every passing mouth my responses became mechanical and redundant. So at some point I guess he got worried and started to poke around. His call on a humid afternoon started the first event in that day to catch my interest.

Like I said it started as a humid day, suffocating and sticky. Still, by the afternoon a strong wind had come in. Before the faithful phone call, I was on the back porch, looking at the sea. The house itself was on a large hill, so at the back of the house you can see the ocean clearly. At the time the wind was blowing the wind chimes, making them sing. The waves were rushing at the shore hard, and black clouds were slowly coming in from the ocean. A violent storm was coming in.
While I was gazing at the once calm water turning violent the phone had rung.
“Alana, Your Uncle Carl would like to speak to you” my grandpa informed.
I silently nodded and proceeded to the study. I still wasn’t allowed to talk on the phone without supervision. My grandfather, however, became more relaxed with watching me on the phone during the years and mostly read his newspaper, half listening to what I said.
“Hello, Uncle Carl it is nice to hear from you” I replied politely yet blandly.
“Hi honey, so how are you?”
“Good, thank-you for asking, uncle” I replied.
“Alana, are you sure everything is alright?’
“Yes”
“You don’t sound like yourself, honey”
“I do not understand. Everything is good here”
“ Hon, for the last year I can’t help but notice that every time we speak, you sound…”
“Like what, uncle?”
“Dead”
“I do not understand”
“I knew your grandparents would be stricter with you then I was, but…”
“I am all right”
“I know, you say the same thing over and over again,” his voice sounded tense. “It feels like I am talking to a robot and not my niece”
A robot? Do I really sound like a robot? I thought to myself. “Uncle…”

“Hon, I know that I wanted you to shape up a bit, but I don’t want you changing yourself completely…”
“Have I really changed,” I said more to myself than to my uncle. I was feeling confused.
“Yeah, you have. Before you…well…sounded alive. Laughing, joking, being a smart- ass, heh heh, you reminded me so much of your father. Kai was just like you. I used to get so frustrated with him, but I also envied him. You see I was the stuffy one, the mature one, but your father wore his heart on his sleeve. He spoke his mind and damned the consequences. Our parents always tried to tame him, but he never broke, not like me. He was so open, not afraid of anything. Gods, I wish I was like that, he was my inspiration, and too bad I never got to tell him that. When you came to me, Alana, you were just like Kai. I thought I had gotten my brother back. Maybe that is why I was never too hard on you. I couldn’t bring myself to be like our parents. Wow, I am I rambling or what?”
Unknown to my uncle or grandpa, uncle’s ramble about my father had made me smile. Not a fake or half –assed smile, but a true to goodness smile. I loved my parents greatly, even though I didn’t know them long. Finding out that I once acted like my father, made me swell up with pride, but then…once was the magic word. According to my uncle I no longer processed the light that was my father. I was dead. In any case that was the key point of the conversation. I’m not the one to beat around the bush, so I will be blunt in this story. So don’t go trying to find some hidden meaning because I am telling ya straight out. Sorry to disappoint, but anyway back to the other events of the day.
The phone conversation went back to the routine and ended. What my uncle had said about me changing had bothered me, but I passed the thoughts off. By the late afternoon I was in the music room practicing on the piano. At the time I couldn’t concentrate on the piece I was playing because of a damn bird my grandmother had just got.
It was a canary and the creature had been banging on his cage all day. I finally gave up on playing and watched the bird, to try figure out its problem.
The cage was hanging on a stand facing the open window in the corner. The little yellow creature was flapping furiously, chirping like mad. I noticed it was attacking the same place, the part of the cage that faced the window. At some point I had risen from my place and went over to the cage.
“What is it that you want? Do you wish to be free?” I asked the bird. Kind of weird but I bet some you people talk to your pets too.
The bird continued its fevered antics, not taking notice of me in the least.
“Do you want to be free? Is that what you want? To get out?” I asked. At this point I too began staring out the open window. The wind was making the curtains dance, a butterfly was landing on a flower outside the window, and wild birds were singing. It seemed the little canary had the right idea. The outside world looks pretty inviting and if I was in the bird’s position I would fight to be free too.
Wait! That…that is what I did when I first can here… I thought. It was a scary realization. I was just like that little bird, caged, but one small difference…I had given in and the bird, a creature ten times smaller than me, still kept fighting.
In the end I opened the cage and the little canary flew away, out the window to freedom. I suppose I didn’t want the thing to end up like me. In any case that was the second event of that day that started me to think. The third event would set it off.
By the late evening the outside looked like midnight. The storm had come in and it was a big one. I had retired to my room early, not feeling up to finish dinner.
My room was nice, in an old fashioned Hawaiian theme, located in the back of the house so I could see the ocean. It was big with sky blue walls, a canopy bed, and dark wood furniture. My room also had a balcony, a small one but it was nice.
The power in the house had went out, sending me and my room to pitch blackness, except for the lighting the illuminated the room ever so often. It didn’t really bother me.
I could hear the rain beat down on the windows and the glass door. I do really remember what processed me to venture outside on the balcony, but I did anyway. It didn’t take long for the heavy rain to soak my white nightgown, till it clung to me like a second skin or for me to start shivering from the drop in temperature, but I didn’t notice that. What I experience was the loud claps of thunder assaulting my ears, and the sight of the raging sea with lighting flashing in the sky. The scene reminded me of something my mother had said, “ The ocean is wild and free, Alana. Even God cannot tame its feral nature. When we see violent storms come, it is a battle between God and the ocean. Both the shy and the sea fight fiercely, but in the end the sea always wins. The sea cannot be tamed”
Right then! Realization hit me. Some force was telling me I was caged, tame, and I am not supposed to be. I wanted to be free. Emotions, thoughts that I had blocked out for two years finally came back to me. I had never felt so alive, and then the time I was standing on that balcony witnessing the battle of freedom and dominance between the sky and the sea. It was then all sense left me and I acted on instinct alone.
I don’t know what came over me, but I think the best way to describe it is that I lost my mind. I bolted from my room like a bat out of hell, down the stairs. My grandpa happened to be at the bottom of the stairs, holding a candle. My sudden appearance startled him.
“Alana, what’s wrong?” he asked. But I didn’t pay him no mind, I passed him, threw open the door and ran.
“Alana!” I heard him scream, but I didn’t care.
I stopped a moment in the front yard, plotting my next move. I knew from passed experiences that running wouldn’t work; the servants that lived around the estate would catch me. I needed something fast to outrun them. An idea popped into my head, good thing too because my grandpa and a servant were coming after me.
I ran as fast as I could to the garage where I knew would be two vehicles, a car and an old truck. The old blue pickup came into view first. Lucky the door was unlock, so I launched myself in. I quickly locked the door before the servant that was right behind me slammed into it. He pounded the door and begged me to get out of the truck. I didn’t listen, wow my old self was coming back quickly. Well, I didn’t waste time; I looked under the dashboard looking for the bundles of wires. Yes, I have hot-wired cars. A rebelling teen can learn many things when her uncle hides the keys to the car.
Old knowledge slowly seeped into my head, and finally the pick of junk’s engine started. By then both my grandpa and the servant were beating at the door. I didn’t care I backed up fast, like in an action movie. Going forward was a bit harder, since I hadn’t been at the wheel for two years. A few stop and goes, and I put the petal to the metal. I sped out of the estate. A few minutes on the road I noticed headlights behind me, catching up. I shouldn’t know my grandparents wouldn’t give up so easily, well to bad for them, neither did I.
I sped up. Now the storm was still raging, the road to the plantation is made of dirt, which was now wet, and the road are curvy. Needless to say a high-speed chase on this kind of road in this kind of weather was dangerous. Still I kept on going coming to the end on the road with the car still chasing me. We came to the last turn in the road. I barely made it. The truck edged on its right side but tipped back on all wheels when the turn was cleared. The car wasn’t so lucky. On the last turn the car didn’t tip back on its wheels, it rolled. Yup, the car rolled over till it stopped thanks to a large tree. I hoped the driver would be okay, but I didn’t stop. I kept on going, driving away from my grandparents for a good long time.
The next day I abandoned the truck and huffed it on foot. I hid around town, making sure no one saw me. By nightfall I made out of town and on the next one. Strangely enough a week went passed and no wanted posters were up. It was weird, because I know my grandparents wouldn’t give-up so easily. Later I found out that my grandparent’s town kept very isolated from the other towns, so their business was their business. However, a few times the fat policeman that had denied my freedom before showed up trying to catch me. I figured that my grandparents wanted me back but would bring me back in secret. I admit it struck as weird, but I didn’t really want to find out why they would keep to themselves about my escape. I didn’t matter, because now I had to survive on my own.
I couldn’t go back to my uncle and I surly didn’t want to return to my dear grandparents. So I decided I would live on my own.
Okay people that was the beginning, so make it easier on myself I am going to switch point of view. I will now be writing in the present tense. I guess I will make the story flow better. I don’t know, I am not a professional. Anyway the rest of the story will start three years after my escape, which will make me twenty. Still I am on West Shapp. Avoiding my grandparents that are still looking for me. Now if you are asking how I survived, well I was a handyman. Which to say I do odd jobs for money. Anyway the present tense version starts now.


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Yeah the past tense will change to present tense in the next chapter. The plot will move along now and if you guys are wondering about the sea creature, it will make its appearence again in the next chapter. Okay, if you have any questions go ahead and ask, I will answer. Thanks for the support and i hope the have the next chapter up soon. Thanks ^.^