10The sun was setting over the ocean, the light was a deep purple, the sea a deep indigo. The sky was clear, apart from one cloud, which glowed a deep red.
The sound of waves crashing against the shore showed a cliff, shining with a pearlescent coral colour. A fence is silhouetted on the top of the cliff. The fence is made of a beech wood tree, bleached white by the sun and salt spray from the sea, two hundred metres below.
A road is near the fence, put there for people who want to drive to this scenic view. There are no cars there. There is, however a person. She has obviously walked. Golden hair is blown back from the wind rising up the cliff, and nail bitten fingers clench the fencing. Grey eyes survey the ocean calmly. Her clothes are well worn, and the pack on her back is heavy.
Jen stood on the cliff, the rails pressing into her hands as she looked out at the sunset. The beauty of the scene allowed her to relax. Five years. It had been five long years. Years of running, of hiding from grief. Now she could let the tears run. Now was the time she could grieve for the lost.
Gently, she allowed her memories to flow around her, lapping around her conscious like the waves lapped the beach as she found the beginning.
It had been a fine day. A day everyone enjoyed being outside for Easter. Jen was with her friends, giggling with them as they hunted the chocolate eggs. They knew that they were really too old for it, but that didn't stop them.
The group spread out, looking under bushes, in tufts of grass, in the branches of trees. Then came the cry: "Found one!" it was Mara, she was the first to find one. She held it up in the air, pale fist clenched around the chocolate, blue eyes triumphant. Jen rushed over, jokingly trying to steal it from her. She looked in the bushes to see if there were other eggs there. There weren't. The hunt continued. Everyone found one, more than one in the cases of most of the children there.
They all sat in a huddle, faces flushed from running, eyes shining at the prospect of chocolate. They talked excitedly, Jen the centre of attention. Jen got up as she remembered something. She ran over to her mother, who was talking to her dad energetically. They stopped as Jen approached. Jen hugged her mother, thanking her for the Easter hunt she had prepared single-handedly. Her mother smiled and kissed Jen's brow. Jen turned and placed puzzled eyes on her father.
"What were you talking about?" she asked. Her father opened his mouth, but her mother put her hand on Jen's shoulder.
"Nothing, dearest," she said, "Go and play with your sister."
Jen tilted her head at this mystery, but did as she was told, starting a game of tag with Mara and their friends.
That night, the night before Jen and Mara's birthday, the family held a private party for the twins. A cake was made for the morrow, and the twins were up to the brim with excitement at the prospect of being eleven.
Still playful, the twins went to bed. They sat up, talking late into night, until excitement was overwhelmed by weariness, and they slept.
Mara woke, regretting how much fizzy drink she had drunk. She tried to make her bladder forget, but the discomfort grew until she had to forsake her lovely, snugly bed to go to the toilet.
Jen was woken by the sound of her twin getting up. In a whispered voice, she asked where Mara was going, and in an equally soft voice, Mara told her. Jen nodded, and went to go back to sleep.
Mara walked, cat-footed, to the bathroom. As she sat on the toilet, she could hear voices. Getting up, she washed her hands in the sink, coming out, she looked toward the kitchen. There was a sliver of light shining under the door. Mara listened intently. There was Mamma's voice. It was talking angrily at Papa's. Papa's voice was equally irritated, and then it started to rise, shouting. Mara's eyes grew round as she heard a scream. Swinging the door open, she looked inside the room.
Jen was woken again by the screams in the kitchen. She sat bolt upright, leaping out of bed. She ran out of the room. At the hallway, she paused. Another scream came. Jen swung to the left, toward the kitchen. Seeing the door wide open, she turned.
And stopped dead as she saw her father, knife in hand standing over her sister. Her mother was lying on the floor, blood pooled around her, eyes staring. Mara was standing, holding her stomach as she cried. Jen's father turned crazed eyes to her. She stood there, the only sound was of the person she loved best in the world sobbing softly as she tried to hold her stomach in.
Her father's eyes narrowed and he stepped towards her, bloody knife raised. Jen looked at him. Turned, and ran.
Jen was on the cliff top, tears tracing tracks down her face. The feel of the beech wood under her hands was her only grip on sanity. She remembered learning to be strong. She remembered hunting down her father. She remembered the smell of his blood and the hope that Mara slept better.
The tears flowed down her face, down towards her neck. Slowly, Jen climbed over the railings. She stood at the brink of the cliff. "I'm coming, Mara." She said as she jumped.
A/N: This is another story I did... last year I think... It was in a class, and I wanted to know what everyone thought of it...