Zoe Parker Ch. 05

Chapter 5-The Countdown

How one could wake up to the last day of their life and feel completely serene perplexed Zoe. She had been laying awake for the past half an hour watching her alarm clock. That alone was an interesting event to her. Each tick of the minute, each change of the digit, was a like a slow countdown to her final moment on Earth. Watching the slow expiration of her life be tallied away was a new experience. Then again, it wasn't quite staring at the wall.

Zoe wanted to see as little of the three other people in her house as possible. It was going to be her last day alive and she didn't have any desires to deal with the cold stare of her step sister, the artificially sweet passive aggressive tone of her step mother or the complete indolence of her own father. She had heard them arrive home from the hospital just an hour after they had left last night. She had heard her step mother's shock and anger with the emergency room nurse who refused to admit her daughter over a superficial laceration. She had also heard her father's adamant refusal to schedule an appointment with a plastic surgeon over an injury not much larger than the average paper cut.

So Zoe had arisen at five thirty that morning and took the quickest, quietest shower in her life. Quickly she had slipped on a plain, worn navy blue hooded sweatshirt and a faded pair of blue jeans that were two inches too long for her. Then she proceeded to do the time watching that took up her entire morning. It was now half past seven o'clock and Zoe, already politely turning down her father's mumbled offer to have some cereal, slung her canvass bag over her shoulder and headed to the front door of the house.

As she slipped out of the front door she made sure to lock it behind her. Everyone had already left for their respective days' agenda. Her father was now at work, Gabrielle was at a morning musical practice and her step mother Victoria was presumably out shopping. Earlier that morning when her father made a flat effect offer of cereal he was also quick to mention that there would be a school bus in

front of the house forty five minutes after seven o'clock. Zoe was lucky to have heard that as she made every attempt to drown each individual word that escaped his mouth.

After travelling down the walkway Zoe found herself standing where it met the sidewalk in front of the house. As Zoe waited for her transportation to school she found her mind swirling around the different ways she could do the dark deed that afternoon after school. Before she could let her imagination go into too much detail she was snapped to attention by the hydraulic brakes of the large yellow metallic beast in front of her. With her head down and attempting to draw the least amount of attention possible she boarded the bus and found an empty seat halfway to the back.

Trying not to make eye contact with anyone Zoe clutched her bag and kept her head lowered. Within her peripheral vision she could see a pair of black canvass high top Converses' with hot pink laces settled on the bus' floor across the aisle. That was enough for Zoe. She didn't dare to let her eyes drift up and draw the attention of whomever those feet belonged to.

The ride to school quickly became a sudden place of suicidal meditation for Zoe. She let her eyes wander to the ground between her feet as her mind did a warp speed review of her life and the options she had to end it that afternoon. Just as she was about to settle on the route in which she would take to no longer exist she found herself feeling lifted up slightly in her seat. Being snapped to attention she realized her sudden change in personal elevation was from the plopping down of someone next to her on the large cushioned bench.

With the sudden intrusion of the private space next to her Zoe found herself almost gawking at the person now sitting next to her. It started with the black shoes and hot pink laces that were once across the aisle but now were on the ground next to her own worn, white tennis shoes. Zoe's eyes travelling up found a pair of legs clad in black leggings, a red plaid knee high skirt, a white long sleeved dress shirt with a black corset vest and a long very loose knotted red neck tie hanging around a pale

neck. Moving her view to the face of the intruder she found a girl who had a huge smile plastered across her face. Her big smile made her already round cheeks puff out even more over her cheek bones. Zoe's eyes then met the glittering, innocent looking eyes of the girl next to her. Zoe found that she was nervous and quickly dodged her eyes away and was now looking at the girl's head. On top of it was a black cadet hat with a big red cross on the front. Under the hat were long auburn curls of hair that fell a couple inches past her shoulders.

"Hi! I'm Riley! What's your name? Sorry if I'm intruding. I don't mean to intrude. You looked kind of sad and I've never seen you before and you looked like you could use a friend. Not that I'm saying you don't have friends. Because how would I know. I know nothing about you. Not even your name. Which is why I just asked it, of course," the girl next to Zoe said to her in such a hyper, frantic tone Zoe almost had to hold her jaw from dropping.

Zoe hesitated her response for a sheer moment and Riley jumped all over it with another energetic, boastful response, "I'm so so sorry if I scared you. I did didn't I? I knew it. I don't always talk like this. Just when I meet new people or when I get nervous. It's kind of like a tic or something. But now I'm sitting here, scaring the poop out of you talking like an over the top Saturday morning cartoon character hopped up on a truck load of pixie sticks or something. So so sooooooooo, what's your name?"

"Uhhhhhh, Zoe. Zoe Parker," Zoe surprised herself by managing to let her name spill out as a response.

"It's blessed to meet you Uhhhh Zoe, Zoe Parker," Riley said in a very joking tone that still made Zoe feel embarrassed. "I'm sorry. I was just joking. It is great to meet you. We're going to be best friends. I already know it."

"Probably not," Zoe muttered while staring at the ground.

"I knew it! I came off as this babbling monster and totally scared you. I don't blame you. I'm not the most normal person. That's probably why I don't have too many friends. I mean, I have some friends in my youth group but at school not really. Most people are nice and all but not friends, you know. No one there who like, really knows me. But if you don't want to be friends I understand," Riley's words implanting into Zoe's mind making her realize this was the most anyone had spoken to her since she could last remember.

"No, it's not you. It's not like that. I just....I'm going to be moving soon. Real soon," Zoe found a way to try and brush her off without letting Riley know the real reason she wouldn't be around to be friends.

"Really? Wow! I've never seen you before so that must mean you're new here. And now you're leaving. That's odd. Well, that means we have one day to become the bestest friends in the entire world. That way, when you leave, you HAVE to keep in touch with me," Riley said in such an optimistic, happy tone that she once again caught Zoe off guard.

Zoe didn't know what to say. While the last thing she wanted to do was make friends with someone on her last day alive she wasn't mean enough to brush Riley off. And not that Riley seemed like the type who could be brushed off. Zoe decided that it probably wouldn't be the worst thing in the world to let someone sit next to her on the ride to school. That was as long as she could get her to stop talking.

"I don't really feel like talking today," Zoe tried to be nice about getting Riley to not talk her ear off.

Riley was very polite in her reply when she said, "That's ok, some of the best things are not even said," she then reached into the side of the backpack between her legs and pulled out a pink iPod. Without asking, Riley place one of the white plastic earbuds into Zoe's right ear. She slipped the other one into her own left ear, pulled her knees up into the back of the seat in front of her and slinked back relaxing.

"I u...." Zoe started to object.

"Shhhhhh! We're not talking," Riley was quick to remind her with a coy 'a matter of fact' tone.

Zoe gave up her half hearted fight and let herself relax back into the seat also. The music playing into Zoe's inner ear canal was an alternative rock band she had never heard before. It was heavy on bass and drums and the little bit of lyrics Zoe did listen to didn't seem to fit the normal rock music mold. Just before leaning her head against the bus window Zoe glanced down at the face of the digital music player. She could make out the name of the band playing as it was listed on the small LCD screen. It read: Skillet

* * *

The school day went by being neither too eventful nor memorable for Zoe. Still planning to go through with her plans after school gave her no reason to take in the details of the school, whether it was the teachers, her locker combination or much of anything else. The things she did notice were few and far between such as, that the high school was average size and that half the boys and girls in her freshman classes resembled her step sister Gabrielle in their expensive brand name clothes, an obvious over prioritization of their looks and a snooty demeanor of self worth.

Zoe did have four classes with Riley, the girl from the bus. Attempting to convince herself not to care, Zoe attempted to nicely ignore her throughout the day. Riley made that hard as she would playfully throw pieces of paper at Zoe just to get her attention so she could make goofy faces at her from across the classroom. She did this in every class they had together. It made it rather difficult for Zoe to concentrate on just how she was going to finish her mortal tenancy after school was out.

As the last bell rang Zoe bolted as quickly as she could to the bus without drawing attention to herself. She planned to find a seat with someone else in order to avoid Riley. Boarding the bus Zoe groaned. She was the first one on. With her plan foiled Zoe found the same seat she occupied that morning. Somehow it didn't surprise her when the second person on the bus was Riley. It surprised her even less when Riley plopped down right next to her.

Riley looked at Zoe, placed her two pinched fingers to the corner of her full lips and pulled them across like a zipper. She then turned an imaginary key which she then pretended to throw out of the open bus window next to them. Bowing her head Zoe tried to hide the smile she couldn't resist having after such a goofy display.

The ride home was much like the ride to school. Riley once again placed the earbud in Zoe's ear and once again they listened to alternative rock music. Zoe could hear the instruments but with her mind slipping away, thinking about this being her last hour on Earth, she didn't focus on any lyrics.

With a release of air the hydraulic bus brakes came to their first stop. With the bus not moving Riley reached into her backpack and pulled out a neon green gel pen and a small notebook. She quickly wrote something inside the notebook and then ripped out the paper that the fresh ink was on. Tosses the notebook back into her bag she then folded the paper in half and wrote something on the top of it.

The bus had started back up again but after only travelling a few hundred feet came to the second stop. Riley quickly scrolled through her iPod, hit the pause button and pulled the earbud from Zoe's ear. Wrapping the tiny white headphones around the electronic device she placed it in Zoe's hand and curled her fingers around it. Then she grabbed Zoe's free hand and placed the note gently into her palm.

"But....," Zoe was cut off by Riley's finger pressed against her lips. Riley shook her head, pointed to the note and with a quick motion grabbed her bag and stood from the seat. Zoe looked at the note in confusion and looked back up at Riley. There was no one there and the bus had started to move again. Zoe examined the top of the note that lay in her hand. Scribbled on it she saw

"DON'T OPEN UNTIL YOU GET HOME!"

Unsure of what to do Zoe slid both the note and the abandoned iPod into the front pocket of her hooded sweatshirt. Before she could think the bus came to its third stop. Looking up Zoe realized this was her exit. She collected her bag and with each step suddenly realized she was walking to her own death march. Soon she would flee the world that had brought her so much pain.

Once off the bus she quickly made her way to the front door, unlocked it and bolted inside the house. Locking the door behind her she went straight to her room. She found her fuzzy purple monkey buddy Roger and gripped him close as she took a seat on the edge of the bed. Not wanting to scare herself out of it, Zoe decided right then she needed to get her dark deed over with. Without giving it much though she came to the conclusion that she needed to silence the suffering now and extinguish her own flame of existence.

She reached down, grabbed the bottom of her hooded sweatshirt and pulled it off revealing her white tank top underneath. Knowing exactly how she would attempt to join her mother in death she arose from her seat on the bed. Then something caught her eye. The shiny pink iPod that had fallen out of her top lay on the ground next to her garment. She reached down and picked it up. Bent over she also noticed the corner of Riley's note sticking out of her pocket. She grabbed that also and returned to her seated position on the bed.

Zoe placed the iPod on her lap as she opened the note. In pretty neon green gel pen was written,

"Just press play and listen. Please listen. Really listen."

Zoe figured she could give the one nice person in her life a last request. She placed the earbuds in her ears and let her thumb circle over the play button. After some hesitation she pressed play. An acoustic guitar's melody came through and entered her head. At first she just listened to the rhythm and then she remembered the note, so she listened. She really listened.

Zoe let the words flow through her ear and into her skull. But they didn't stop there. The more she listened, the more they sunk into her. The more she listened the lower the words entered her. When the chorus came through the tiny speakers it was penetrating her heart, piercing into her soul.

It was then that for the first time since her mother died Zoe Parker began to cry. Her tears poured from within her and she had no idea why. They were tears of sadness, hurt and grief. But as the song played on they became tears shed as release and relief. Zoe curled up on her bed, her knees buried in her chest as she wept. The tear drops flowed like rain as Zoe felt a great, heavy burden lifted from within her. The song came to an end and Zoe quickly pressed play again. She listened to it for a second

time, this time crying harder and heavier. She heard every word that was sung. The chorus of the song seemed to play just for Zoe as it rang right into her very spirit. She felt every word,

And I'll be by your side Wherever you fall In the dead of night Whenever you call And please don't fight These hands that are holding you My hands are holding you

It was then that one thing became clear.

Zoe Parker would live another day.