Epilogue: Times Gone By

Who says true love is a fairy tale? Thanks to Disney the story of a handsome prince sweeping in to rescue the fair maiden or damsel in distress has become the ideal romance for many young girls. But me? I never thought it was possible nor did I expect that it would happen to me. I lived my life in a shell, hiding from the outside world, too afraid to open myself up because of past experiences. But six years ago one opportune New Year’s Eve party changed all that.

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10: Eternally Grateful

Warning: The following chapter contains sensitive subject matter. Reader discretion is advised.

“Do you want something to drink?” Zach offered, watching her timidly shifting her weight between each foot and avoiding his gaze.

“No. I’m fine,” she replied softly. “I just want…I wasn’t exactly honest with you,” Abigail frowned as she fell to the bed. “Our first time…that night in the cave. It…wasn’t really…I wasn’t a…,” she sighed while she fumbled with her fingers trying to find the right words to express herself. “What I’m trying to say is it wasn’t my first time,” she finally blurted in one breath.

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09: Ugly Duckling

The phone rang again but this time, Abigail didn’t jump; she was expecting it. For the fifth time in nearly an hour it violently buzzed on top of her bedside table, begging to be picked up. But she didn’t answer. Instead she stared at it. Watching the glowing LED screen mercilessly flashing the caller’s ID and frowned. At last it went quiet. Abigail unclenched her jaw and sighed as she turned away. 

For three days she’d been going over her argument with Zach, trying to sort out her conflicted feelings. And for three nights she’d been lying in bed trying not to think about the way his hands felt on her body. She missed him. It had been too long since she could even get close to a man without completely freaking out. And there had been no one she could trust with her secret…except Zach. He was the first guy that genuinely showed interest in who she was as a person instead of snubbing her on sight.

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08: That Did Not Just Happen

“Today, we will be focusing on social psychology and how individuals relate to one another in social situations including social attitudes, social influence, and other group behavior,” Professor Singleton stood in front of his class, lecturing to a full room. Abigail sat, impatiently tapping her pen on top of her notebook as she waited for the hour to end. Lately, she found that her time in class paled in comparison to being with Zach; a fact that Jemma was all too thrilled to point out.

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07: Flowers and Candlelight

Warning: The following chapter contains sexually explicit material. Reader discretion is advised.

A rose danced around the corner where Abigail stood, inching closer and closer until she ducked her head around the side of the newspaper stand and found Zach attempting to hide. “Hey!” she nearly shouted as he stood up and innocently pecked her cheek.

“Hey yourself,” Zach grinned and handed Abigail the flower. “Where are you off to?”

“My Scholars of Tomorrow meeting. We’re discussing this year’s charity event to raise money for school supplies for students in the Philippines.”

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06: Reading by Moonlight

Morning came and Abigail awoke to find Zach pulling on his dried jeans and shirt near the back of the cave. He smiled at her as she rolled over the blanket still naked and dreamily looked up at him. Zach started towards her and fell to his knees beside the firepit. “Morning, Sleepyhead,” he leaned down and lightly brushed his lips against hers before pulling her completely beneath him and deepening the kiss.

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05: Rainstorm

Warning: The following chapter contains sexually explicit material. Reader discretion is advised.

“Abigail!” Zach shouted as he rounded the fork in the trail in the last place he saw her. Recent prints in the mud indicated someone had passed through here not too long ago. “Abigail!” Zach walked the trail in the direction of the footprints and came to a stop just before a huge drop-off into the canyon. Looking around he noticed more prints and gasped, “No.” From the looks of the tracks, Abigail had gone over the cliff and fallen into the chasm!

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04: It’s Him!

“Now we’re going to break up into groups of five. It’s very important you remain with your group whenever out in the woods. Although the trails are supervised by park rangers, remember this is a nature reserve. Meaning there are still very dangerous elements around: wild animals, toxic shrubbery, jagged boulders and even hanging cliffs. Please avoid being out past the advised curfew and remain on the designated hiking trails at all times.” Professor Jones counted the heads of the number of students on the bus as Professor Chauncey addressed them.

“Alright, I want the left half of the bus to follow Professor Jones, the other half will remain seated and I’ll give you your cabin assignments.” Abigail and Jemma slipped off the bus and lined up with the other students. Abby began taking shots as the supervising professors handed out sleeping arrangements. 

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03: The Not So Popular

“Write 230,000,000,000 in scientific notation,” Abigail read the next problem on Knox’s assigned homework. Since meeting up with him at noon as promised they’d only gotten as far as the fifth problem; five out of twenty-five. Abigail had quickly lost patience with the numerous bad jokes and sexual innuendoes continuously spouting from Knox’s mouth.

It was close to 3:00 p.m. and she was ready to get out of there and find a more constructive use of her time. “Easy, 23 x 100!”

“Actually the proper rule is ‘Ax10ⁿ’. ‘A’ represents the real number, in this case 2.3 and 10ⁿ represents the number of times you move the decimal. You count those and place them after the 10 as an exponent. The answer would be 2.3 x 10¹¹.”

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02: Ditching Practice

“And she just ditched you? Damn, Bro, and I thought I had problems,” Knox laughed, listening to Zach’s story as the two tossed around the pigskin mid-field. “Jemma’s on some tirade about me and Shana Dempsey when all I did was hand her a glass. Man she reamed me! Instead of going back to my dorm like I’d planned, she poured her drink on me and went looking for some friend of hers. Chicks!”

“At least you know her name. I didn’t even get that much. The only thing I really know about her is she’s a damn good kisser.”

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01: Auld Lang Syne

“I knew I’d find you here!” Jemma Crowe’s voice startled her best friend Abigail Carmichael and she nearly jumped down from the windowsill she sat perched upon. It was late afternoon and most students were already out for the night or preparing to tie one on the town and here she sat with her nose in a book. 

“What?” she asked and glanced over the top of her glasses towards the blonde as she made a beeline through the aisles of books. Dawning Hall was unusually quiet and the dimness from the flickering fluorescent bulbs cast eerie shadows up and down the columns of shelves. Jemma did her best to ignore the sudden goosebumps that covered her arms as she finally made it to the cubicle where Abigail hid.

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31. The Masked Man

*Sort of long...*

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I rubbed my head as I lay on the icy, hard ground. A tender ache ran the length of my entire nervous system as if I’d just broken nearly every bone in my body. The chilly night air did little to resolve my pain as the freeze seemed to intensify the throbbing between my ears. Fog had started to roll in creating an even hazier view through my narrowly pierced eyelids. “What the heck was that?” I grumbled and slowly pulled myself from the dirt, feeling the ache in my lower back as I moved. “Hello? Is there anyone there?”

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29. Lonely Dancer

“Evian, come back!” I yelled behind that crazy ass girl. Man she could really move. I had no idea where she was goin’ and I don’t think she did too much either; she just ran. When she finally stopped to catch her breath we were on a familiar trail and I growled when I looked around noticing it. “What the hell woman? Why did you just take off this way?”

“Did you not see that lunatic with the ax back there? Why the hell do you think I ran Ro?”

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26. Stranger at the Door

There were bodies perched in the trees. Arms, legs, blood everywhere…so much blood! “Oh my God! Oh my God! We’re all gonna die,” Jemma yelled and continued screaming as we stood in front of the carnage. “We’re never getting out of here! We’re gonna die here!”

“Jemma calm down alright, panicking is not going to help this situation,” Abby spoke in a calming manner to try and get her friend to stop all that damn yelling. The only thing I could think was oh great, just like in a horror movie the scared bitch is about to bring the monsters towards us with her screaming. God; why the hell did I come out here?

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24. Kidney Thieves

*Contains nudity*

“Did you find him?” I asked a little out of breath as Knox, Jemma, Roland, and Evian reentered the campsite from different directions the same time as me and Abby.

“No, not a trace,” Roland answered and Knox just shook his head no.

“Well where the hell could he have gone? And he didn’t say anything to you at all Ro?”

“Like I said Dude was actin’ funny I shrugged it off as him bein’ high as fuck and went to bed. I had no idea he was gonna pull a Houdini.”

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21. Soul Collector

It was a quiet night, which I think a lot of us appreciated. It was bad enough Chazz believed there was a hell demon roaming the woods but it seemed like Jemma was beginning to believe it too. I sat watching her with Knox and wondering what it was she really saw. The other night I stayed in the tent with her and she only kept repeating the same words over and over again it’s eyes, it’s evil, red eyes.

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17. The Babysitter

 

I kissed her; I smiled as I thought back to last night. I kissed her and she kissed me back; it was nice. She seemed pretty nervous at first but that seems to just be how she is, so sweet and shy even when I say hello. I waved at her from across the camp and she gave me a little smile as she waved in return. She and Jemma were busy collecting small bundles of fruit and water that could be carried and Chazz and I prepared to get our stuff tied down and locked inside the cars. Like that would matter considering the cars had no windows in them thanks to our little visitor our first night here.

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15. Bride-and-Seek

“Did it have horns and a tail?” Chazz asked as he knelt down towards Jemma. She looked up at him and nodded her head no. “Was its eyes glowing? Did it have fangs and hoofed feet?”

“What the hell are you going on about?” Zach asked and Chazz stood to his feet. 

“I told you I saw something but everyone thought I’d gone crazy or something! I just want to know if Jemma saw the same thing, that’s all. Ask her; ask her if this thing had glowing red eyes! Ask her!”

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13. The Boyfriend

God could things get any worse. “There’s enough food for about four more days but I really think we should start making plans to get out of here,” I heard Abby report to Zach as the others hung around the pit doing various things. Roland and Knox had just come back from getting more firewood. Chazz was tying the tarps down on everyone’s tents for the upcoming storm Zach said would hit us soon and Evian was washing out her night clothes and hanging them to dry on a nearby tree.

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11. The Legend of Bloody Mary

What a waste of some good bud.  This trip has not been at all what I’d hoped it would be when I agreed to come. We were attacked, my Jeep was trashed, my clothes were shredded, my bammer got 86’d and Jemma was sleeping with Knox. At least the rain’s let up. I groaned and moved towards my tent as I continued picking the dirt out of my stash. I’d been able to square away a Forty but the rest of the Ounce I brought was lost.

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