3A/N: Please please review! Even if you're not very nice I still like reviews... I will try to upload a chapter at least once a week but if you're nice to me you might get more and if I'm busy you will get less.
This story is dedicated to my brother. Thank you Sam, for being the best twin that I could wish for.
Chapter One- Forgetful Beginnings
Have you ever wondered what it's like to have a completely fresh start? Where nobody knows who you are and you don't either; your head is full of knowledge that you have no recollection of obtaining; where, like a weight you never knew was there being lifted from your shoulders, all your troubles have been left behind? That would be a land of opportunities. In your imagination you might live in the countryside on a little farm with rolling hills everywhere you look and sheep scattered around. You have the freedom to go where ever you want because you have no one to stand in the way of you being yourself. You are able to breathe in the fresh country air and take a stroll through fields with dry stone walls to mark boundaries. You don't have to worry about friends and family because the only thing you know about them is that they are safe. You don't have the pressures of family life - the only family you will ever need to worry about will be when you fall in love, at your own pace, with a neighbouring farmer in ten years time. Nobody is out to get you or hurt you. Well, step out of that daydream because they don't let fifteen year olds live on pretty little farms in the countryside, all by themselves.
"Do you know on computer games, where there is a reset button? Well, I think there is one in my head and I think somebody pressed it." That's what I said to my social worker when she asked me how I was feeling last year. I had been found on the side of the road in London with my head bleeding vigorously because a heavy slate had fallen off a roof and hit me on the head, hard.
I remember walking through the busy streets, lost and alone. The rush of people overwhelmed me and, stupidly ignoring any dangers of dark alleyways, I turned off into a side street. Glancing backwards often to check for those scary men that people always said you might find in places like this, I hurried through. Relief flooded into me as I came to an open street with a much more manageable amount of people in it. I let my paranoia vanish. Despite my fear in the alley it turned out that I was probably safer there because unexpectedly something hit me on the back of my head and I fell to the ground. I felt a sharp pain, a gunshot, in the back of my head before a thumping feeling raked through my brain. I tried to turn around but my legs wouldn't let me. Instead I fell to the ground and just caught sight of a woman with a horrified look on her face; she was lifting a child up to turn their head away, her hands shaking. It was that woman that told me how bad it was – the way she reacted was enough to make me panic. I blacked out as other people rushed up to me, I saw someone whip out their phone. My last thoughts before I dropped into sleep were that I was done for, not because of the injury, but because of something else which for a long time I couldn't remember. The darkness then was refreshing. It was like when you're just about to go to sleep- that wonderful bubbly feeling you get when you're teetering on the edge of consciousness. Then I dropped into a slumber that was over in a flash but lasted forever, although it couldn't have been longer than a few minutes.
I forced my eyes open a woman asked my name. The sunlight glared onto my eyes sending a sting shooting through my foggy head. I tried to remember what happened but it was as if there was nothing there.
"I don't know my name." said a voice woven with pain which I slowly identified as my own. Groggily I opened my eyes but this time more slowly so the sun wouldn't hurt me. I registered the fact that I was laid on my back and that there was a pulsing ache coming from my head. The woman that had asked my name was wearing a fluorescent paramedic's jacket which made me feel dizzy for some reason. My hands were shaking as I realised what I had said. I wanted to know what was going on – I needed to know! "I don't know!" I cried out, releasing some of my emotion with the words. The release was short lived as panic set in- I fought through my mind looking for memories, but found nothing. There were just fuzzy things that were out of reach; they were so close it was as if they were teasing me, telling me 'Ha ha! You can't catch me!'. I shuddered, longing to return to the world of sleep. Then as if someone had flicked a switch I closed my eyes.
"Ok, keep calm and try to stay awake please. Do you know how old you are?" the woman asked, strangely I felt like yelling at her for accusing me of not being calm. A warm liquid, which I guessed was my blood, seeped through my hair. It did not worry me. Nor did the fact I had no idea what my name was. In fact I felt oddly relaxed as if the blood flowing from my head was all my bad memories and worries leaving me – the only other thing I wanted at that moment was to go to sleep, to live in the countryside on a pretty little farm with sheep scattered around amongst the rolling hills.
"I am fifteen," I said with a certainty that surprised even me. How could I know my age when I didn't even know my name? My age changed every year but I had had my name all my life so I don't know why that was the thing I had forgotten. The woman frowned but she was busy with my head.
"I want you to make sure you stay awake but I'm going to give you some pain relief now," she said "Keep talking to me." I sighed with relief as the strong painkiller the paramedic gave me flowed through me. In my head I said 'I don't want to talk' but I am not certain I said it out loud. Instead I allowed myself to relax as the pain evaporated and I drifted off into a fitful slumber.
"Fifteen? Fifteen? You look like you're on a different planet!" Maggie exclaimed, "Jim asked if you still wanted to apply for a visit from your mother." She put on a fake posh accent on the last few words but I was used to being teased about the way I talked, even if I talked a lot more like everyone else since first I went into care. Most kids in care didn't come from a rich family. Maggie became my friend after I first went into care. She, and everyone else for that matter, called me my old nickname even though we met after I found out my real name.
"N-no I don't want to." I stammered to Jim who was standing in the doorframe. My key worker jokingly shook his head at me and gave a fake sigh before going back into the kitchen to make dinner.
"You should make up your mind, you know. I always dreamed Mum would come for me," said Maggie with her famous dreamy look in her eyes. "I mean, I know, Lena visits but she's not flesh and blood." I sighed at Maggie. She was nice and a great friend but she was incredibly dumb sometimes. Lena had found Maggie, miles from home, wondering through the park that her mum had dumped her in and she had instantly connected with her. Lena visited every week and it was obvious to everyone except Maggie that she wanted to adopt her. The woman treated her with more motherly love than most mothers ever treated their own children.
"Lena would have adopted you by now if you stopped your idiotic opposition to adoption. You'd be happy with her and she cares a whole lot more for you than your real mum," I said softly, "You're leaving here in less than a year and she would let you stay with her for as long as you wanted, or would you rather live in a grotty government flat?"
"My Mum loves me! I'm her daughter and she would do anything for me! I can stay there! I don't need Lena to support me, she doesn't want to adopt me and that's why she hasn't asked," shouted Maggie. This angered me. She had the chance to live with someone who cared about her and who wanted the best for her but instead of grabbing it with both hands and never letting go she was ignoring it, in favour of the mother that had left her to find her way home from miles away at the age of three and who hadn't even bother even writing her a letter since the custardy hearing. Maggie would be leaving the care system at seventeen and she might as well live with Lena, away from a children home, whilst she still had the chance. I wasn't sure if Lena could afford to take her in once she left the system. My blood boiled at Maggie's mother for the way she had hurt my best friend, her daughter.
"She does not love you, Maggie. She wouldn't do anything for you but Lena would! You do need her to support you and the reason she hasn't asked you if you wanted to live with her is because you always made it perfectly clear you were going to wait in care for you precious Mum." I argued, slipping even further into the 'proper' accent which I hated so much – it reminded me of my old life. "The only reason she hasn't told you is because she didn't have the heart, but everyone knew it. Even little Freddy knew what was going on while dense old you just sits by the window, totally oblivious to what everyone already knows, waiting for mum. Your mum is rubbish and we all know it." As Maggie sank down to the floor with a tear in her eye, I knew I had gone way too far especially with that last comment. I stormed up to my room, overwhelmed with guilt, anger and a little bit of sadness about my own parents.
A/W: I have written a backstory for Maggie and I will post it when somebody reviews. (Yes that is bribary)
Words - 1774
-Elizabeth Drake