Lavender Linens (Short Story)

Annabelle Williams was just minding her own business. She had been reading on her Kindle in the rental car as her parents drove her to a random hiking trail. She didn’t enjoy hiking much. She wasn’t very happy to be in who-knows-where, Maine. He parents flew her and her older brother out here when her grandfather had collapsed and was put in a nursing home. She had cried about it a lot, but she didn’t want to have to come here. She didn’t want any more change. But alas, no one can change it as an almost-thirteen-year-old. Her parents were in charge. Yet as her parents parked at the trail, she caught sight of a weird boy, staring at her, a boy she could see through.

Annabelle felt he was familiar, but she was too shocked to try and fish through her memories to remember. Her parents start yelling for her and her brother to hide their devices and get out of the car, and so she does. She sighs and pushes her small Kindle in between the seats till it disappears. She looked back out the window, and the boy was gone. She wonders if she was just making this up or something. 

She adjusts her pastel yellow San Francisco hoodie as she waits for her parents to get the water out of the trunk. It was windy, but she didn’t care much because the hoodie was good enough. Though she was never really one to get cold. Her dad was always freezing, though.

She grabs her water silently when it’s handed to her, and she follows them down the trail. She looks around at the grass and trees around, a nice change from the desert landscape back at home. She lived in Southern California, near Joshua Tree National Park, so there wasn’t a lot of grass. At least not healthy grass.

She hears movement and rustling occasionally, but she tunes everything out when her parents start bickering about her and her brother not liking to hike. She just hated the feeling of getting sweaty and felt like hiking was literally torture to do for hours on end when she could be in a comfy blanket, reading something, or watching something.

After about 5 minutes in, she catches sight of the boy again, and her eyes widen. Annabelle pauses for a moment in shock, and she glances at her family, but they can’t seem to see him. She looks back at him and takes in his features more now. He has messy, dirty blond hair, and he’s wearing a white toga thing that seems to be covered in… is that blood!?!

She’s officially concerned now, and the boy seems to realize she’s looking straight at him. His eyes seem to widen, and suddenly, he’s right in front of her. Annabelle's eyes turn huge with shock at his ability to do that, and she takes a step back. Her family is walking away to see an attraction on the trail nearby. 

“Who are you?” The blond boy asks.

“Who am I? Who are you? Or what are you?” Annabelle asks back, confused and trying to stay quiet.

“I’m dead.”

Annabelle doesn’t know what to say at first, but she pauses. Her face softens a bit, and she looks at the blood soaking his toga thing to his chest. She doesn’t know what happened, but she shouldn’t make him remember bad memories.

“I’m Annabelle,” she says quietly.

The boy smiles widely, like a ray of sunshine on her cloudy day. Because it was dark and cloudy, musty from the rainy weather. But her mind was always feeling like this type of day. “I’m Dean,” He answers back.

~Written by Ashlynn Blue, do not try to copy.~

P.S.- Just something small I started, I'm working on something big, but it's just in planning faze!