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    "Winowna! Up right now darling or I'll let Pete drive your car." The slowly fainting English accent of her mother ruffled the teen from her sleep.


One eye opened, the surface of deep blue expanding as her pupil receeded. "You better not."


"It's a quarter to seven. Will you get out of bed before I have to drag you out." Crossing her arms, Winnie's stunning mother gave her a very parental look.


Winnie groaned, covering her head with the duvet of her bed that was growing more comfortable by the second.


"I'm well aware." Elizabeth only lightly smiled, Winnie, with brown locks everywhere, surfaced again. "It's open art day, isn't it?"


This clearly peaked her attention.


Elizabeth knew she'd done her job, leaving her room with a light laugh.


Winnie grumbled once more, rolling out from her duvet and letting her feet touch the wood flooring of her home. Cold, she scrunched her nose but persisted and rose to her full 5'5 height. "Gross," she said, looking out the door to the snow tumbling down in heavy whirls.


Reluctant to even move two more inches, she crossed her room and went to the closet. She removed a maroon cable knit sweater that was comfy and oversized. She inwardly groaned about having to put on a bra but did the deed anyways. She wiggled into skinny jeans and laced up brown combat boots after putting on fuzzy Winnie the Pooh socks.


"Five or you're walking," Winnie called to Pete as she easily winged liquid eyeliner and dabbed concealer under her eyes.


Pete, hair pushed up and dark brown just like hers, only stopped in the hall outside of his sister's doorframe. "Kay."


Winnie nearly ruined her liner, her eye twitching. "Are you a fourteen year old white girl or potassium, Peter?"


Pete only rolled his eyes, the green of them like emeralds.


Winnie adjusted her hair, putting it half up half down with a french braid. With her brother gone, she hummed to herself and jogged down the staircase with her car keys in hand.


Elizabeth slid a over plate with a piece of bread lathered in nutella as Winnie came in while pulling on her big, army green coat.


"Thanks." Winnie quickly took it, putting it in her mouth as she pulled the caught hair from under her coat. She looked to Pete, decked with a neff beanie and half a bagel in his mouth. Motioning with her head as she zipped up her coat, she started to leave. She got her hands free, taking her bag off of the hook in the hall and fishing for her keys.


Pete followed her, grabbing his jacket and slipping it on. He grabbed his backpack, "Bye, Mom."


"Bye, Sweetheart. Have a good day you two." Elizabeth smiled, waving her twins off.


"Love you." Winnie put her bag over her shoulder and took the toast from her mouth. She unlocked the black 2010 Ford Focus, getting in and sticking her bag in the back. "Tests today?"


"Chemistry," Pete replied, climbing in shotgun and putting his backpack between his legs. "You?"


"Precalc, but that's it. I've got a block period of open art so it should be a good day."


"Painting or drawing today?" Pete, not always awful and a typical teenage boy, genuinely cared as they backed out of the driveway.


"Painting, I think." Winnie seemed to have come to a choice. "Yeah, painting. No clue what I'm going to paint, but I'll get there."


"You'll figure it out." Peter fiddled with the radio, finding the alternative station. "You always do."


"True. Unless it's tuesday. I can't really do tuesdays much."


"Well, thank god for fridays." Pete toyed at the sleeve of his coat, the car taking a few turns and reaching the school parking lot. "Man I hate this place."


Mallory High School.


In other words, Hell.


High school in itself, all across the nation, was a corrupt system where kids were taught how social heirarchies meant everything and that you had to get into a good college to be anything in life.


MHS in Arvada, Colorado was no exception.


It held its own; social cliques and all. It was a vicious place, but if you survived, it wasn't so bad.


Pete had it fairly well. He was a varsity lacrosse player currently in season with practice nearly everyday. He held good grades, got invited to parties and even acknowledged his sister in the halls.


Winnie didn't have it so bad either. She was smart and pretty and had a talent for anything art related. She even played water polo in the spring. She had friends, but not many she trusted. She didn't really mind, though.


Of course, there was the pack that ran the school. The prettiest people you could find in the city an hour outside of Denver. Some of them were nice, but it wasn't many. That was expected and it was survivable.


Pete and Winnie got out of their car, heading for the school. It was "their" car but really it was Winnie's. She would let Pete drive it if he needed it, but she was the one who paid for it with her money from her internship at the art studio downtown.


"What time am I getting you from practice?" Winnie asked, at Pete's side and a few inches shorter than him.


"Four. Good?"


"Good." Winnie nodded, parting ways with him at the front of the towering school. As her brother went to his friends handing around at the benches inside, she went to the West Wing to get to her locker.


"Hey Winnie." Coming up to her side, Jake and Libby found her.


"Morning, guys." She smiled, stopping at her locker with the pair.


Libby, dark skinned with the best hair in school, enjoyed Fridays more than anyone. "Ready for math?"


"Nobody's ready for math, Libs," Jake said with a light laugh, six foot with a perfect complexion. He, on the opposite of the girls, was the captain of the lacrosse team but also played for the other team.


Libby rolled her eyes but it didn't change her spirits. "Well, what I'm really ready for is open art."


"How about you, Win? Little sophomore ready for junior art?" Jake asked, grinning as Winnie grabbed her precalc book and shut her locker.


"Oh, please. She's better than all of us in that class." Libby said, the three moving past the stream of people coming into school. "And everyone knows it."


"You're too flattering, really," Winnie replied, going up a floor with them.


"It's not flattery, it's fact," Jake admitingly said, running a hand through his dark blond hair.


"Movies tonight?" Winnie spoke once they reached their precalc room with Mr. Tarnutzer.


"Yep, my house." Libby fist bumped the pair of them, "Good luck."


"You too." Winnie went to the back, taking her seat in the right corner of the class. She undid her calculator and left it on her desk with a pencil and put her book and binder in the basket under it.


She squinted at nothing in particular, her left hand beginning to shake. Winnie put her hand over the other, pushing it away as she inhaled deeply.


She knew it was coming, but instead she took her math test.


¥ ¥ ¥


"There is a god," Libby said, breathing out as they reached the art room that expanded into multiple sections. She set her things on the counter and made a b-line for the paint eisles.


Both Jake and Winnie followed suit.


Winnie tied back her hair in a low ponytail, taking an eisle inbetween her junior friends.


"Smocks for all." Jake handed ones to the girls before tying on his own over his Star Wars 'Expression of a Stormtrooper' tee. "Everyone feeling inspired?" he asked all of those who'd chosen painting over drawing and sculpting. He smiled when he got responses, rolling up the sleeves of his plaid shirt. "Good."


Libby looked to Winnie with slight concern, "I saw you in class. Are you okay?"


"I'm fine," Winnie assured, trying to smile the best she could.


"Okay." Libby nodded, almost not believing her. She took her palette and filled it at the paint station, taking water and a container of brushes. Coming back, she couldn't help but notice just how out of it she seemed. "Winnie?"


"I'm fine," Winnie softly said, leaving with her paint palette when Jake got back.


Libby and Jake exchanged looks, aware of what was going on as they returned their attention to their eisles.


Winnie came over with her palette adorned with greens and blues, black and white with it in dollops. She took in a soft breath, putting a cup of water on the bar.


Holding her paint brush like a pencil, Winnie's concious was overtaken by a shine.


A shine that brought both a beautiful and horrifying painting.


As the two hours came to a close, both Jake and Libby looked to Winnie for the hundredth time. They gave each other a nod and each put a hand on her shoulders.


Winnie lurched, her blue eyes regaining their life. She swallowed, breathing heavier than before. Immediately, she saw the painting she had done, her brush slipping from her fingers and clattering to the floor.


"Jones?" Don, so called by his students, was wandering around and moved his attention to Winnie. "Everything okay?"


"It's fine." Winnie quickly picked up her brush, but Don came over anyways.


Don stood behind Winnie, Libby and Jake leaning in for a look at the newest masterpiece via Winnie Jones. He wasn't quite sure what to think. "What, uh, what do you call it?"


Across the woods, a full moon was giving light on a lizard like creature on a rock with bloody claws.


"Uh," Winnie blinked a few times, at a loss for words.


But there was two that seemed to stick in the back of her mind. So she said them, and they made no recollection with her.


"Beacon Hills."


- Ah yes, I'm so ready for this and to be able to share it with all of you - Mel xx

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