Authors: Anna Bloom
Gone
Gone
Anna Bloom
Copyright 2014 Anna Bloom
All Rights Reserved.
Thank you for purchasing this eBook. Please keep this book in its complete original form with the exception of quotes used in reviews. No alteration of content is allowed. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded or distributed via the internet without the author’s permission.
This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to any person, living or dead, any place, events or occurrences, is purely coincidental. The characters and storylines are created from the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
New Adult Contemporary Romance: This book is not recommended to anyone under the age of sixteen due to strong language and scenes of a sexual nature.
Cover Design by Laura Beege
DEDICATION
For my sister and best friend.
CONTENTS
This book started out as what should have been an easy write. A tale about two weeks on the beach. It turned into something so much more. I ended covering many sensitive subjects that mean a lot to me. I rewrote the manuscript three times in a bid to get it right.
We live in such a small world these days you would think something as vile as bullying could no longer take place. But it does. Worse perhaps because of the technology we all use in our daily lives. Whether it be by Social Media, email or in the classroom and playground like in days past, bullying is wrong.
My hope is that books like this will inspire young people to take control of their lives and come out from under the shadow that being bullied creates.
This book is for all who have been affected by bullying.
Thank you to all the amazing people who helped this book become what it is. You know who you are.
London
1st August 2013
Dear E,
Remember how you always said that one day I would push Dad too far. Remember how you said that I would always need you about to make sure it didn’t happen, to keep me on the straight and narrow.
It finally happened. I’m in two minds about whether you should have been there. You would have gone mental. I would even have shocked you. But in a way I’m glad you weren’t around to see my lowest moment. I’ve got another new name. Facebook went crazy. Dad shut it down in the end. I didn’t even know he knew how to do that. He said he didn’t want me seeing it, but what I think he meant was that he didn’t want Emily to see it. I don’t either.
Mum’s been crying non-stop. It’s killing me to hear it. Death by a million teardrops. I wish I could cry. I haven’t shed a tear since the night you left. I haven’t really done anything since you left. I’ve barely even left my room. Well you know that. I’ve written you every day. Yesterday I decided to venture out and it ended in disaster. Bad. Bad disaster.
Now we’re moving. I don’t have the address yet. I don’t even know where we are going. No one is really telling me anything but as soon as I know, I will write you and let you know. It’s probably going to be the Outer Hebrides or something. Oh God, Mum and Dad are going to make me live in the Highlands to try and keep me out of trouble.
I’ve promised them I’m going to do it. For two weeks I am going to prove to them that I’m not always going to justify the names people call me. Dad says if I manage it he will pay my Uni fees. I need that money, E. I need to escape.
It’s just two weeks. I can do that can’t I? What do you think?
Miss you.
B.
xx
Rebecca
“Josh, come on! Don’t be such a girl.”
I grind an elbow into warm sand as I lean up to find out who Josh is, and why he is a girl.
Instantly I feel on edge. There are six guys running down the beach, surf boards under their arms.
I don’t want to talk to anyone, or even be seen by anyone. I was just looking for some peace and quiet.
I should have stayed in my room. That way I can’t hurt anyone and no one can hurt me.
I breathe a sigh of relief as five of the guys dive straight into the sea, completely ignoring my exposed spot on the sand. Then I offer myself a rueful laugh as I realise that these people are used to seeing strangers on a beach. I won’t hold any interest for them, yet. Not until they realise who I am and the rumour mill starts up again. I will be long gone by then.
It’s the bastard thing about Social Media. It’s impossible for people not to find out who you are. No matter how much you might want them not to.
Facebook is the bane of my life. I know I’ve made mistakes. I don’t need status updates about it.
I wonder which label will attach itself to me first?
I’m a girl with lots of labels and I’m not talking about current fashion trends.
Allowing myself a slow exhalation of air I repeat the words that are currently keeping me going.
I will be gone soon.
Soon enough.
I watch as the six guys
splash through the waves. They keep their wetsuits rolled down and give me what would be an arresting eyeful of toned abs, if my eyes weren’t distracted by something else. The sixth one.
Josh, the girl.
He doesn’t look that girly to me. He looks broad-shouldered and golden. More than that, he has long thick dreadlocks loosely tied in a band at the base of his neck. There is something totally mesmerising about them.
I don’t want to be interested, because I don’t do the whole drooling over guys thing, but I can’t prevent myself from shifting onto both my elbows, to get a closer look. While his friends all circle the water like sharks on their boards, his focus is
only on the sand. He snatches up a stick and starts to doodle.
I watch him for an age.
He never takes his eyes off the sand, which he scores with purposeful and graceful strokes. I completely forget that I am even sitting on a beach, surrounded by strange men. I slide my glasses up onto the top of my head so I can see him clearly without an orange tint.
What is he drawing?
For the first time in two weeks I find myself interested in something, anything, other than the bad stuff I have in my head. I edge up off the sand, ready to move down the beach to try and find out what he is creating. Before I can come up with a reason to walk down by the water’s edge, he jumps up and throws down the stick, sliding one foot across the drawing. As he turns to pick up his wetsuit, his eyes flick over in my direction. He gazes at me for a long moment, his face motionless, before slowly lifting one half of his mouth at me.
Damn it.
My glasses are still on my head and he can clearly see me, open mouthed and fixated. I wouldn’t exactly say I am drooling over him. More intrigued by the doodling, and maybe the dreadlocks.
I can’t help it. Even though I know he knows I am watching him, my eyes stay focused on him as he slides his feet into his wetsuit and stretches it up his thighs. He is just about to start zipping his suit when I see a flash of a tattoo on his hip, just under the waist band of his board shorts.
I want to know what that tattoo is, almost as much as I want to know what he was drawing in the sand. But I know I’m not going to find out.
What would I say to him?
“Hi. My name is Rebecca. My parents brought me here because I’m a very bad girl and need to be kept from temptation. . .”
Yeah, that’s just never going to happen.
I hang about for another couple of minutes and watch him run out into the sea, he quickly paddles past his friends, which makes them jeer as he starts looking for a wave to ride.
With a sigh I start to put my boots on and gather my stuff. I brush the sand from my skin, watching it fly into the air like miniscule beads of glass catching the light. I keep my eyes firmly away from the sea and its occupants as I turn and head back up the path to the beach car park. It’s time to head back to the cottage for my daily bollocking. I may as well get it over with.
In two weeks I will be leaving this town, just as quickly as I arrived. I’m going to go somewhere where no one knows me, where no one will ever know me, and I’m going to leave my family to live their lives in peace without me. My only hope is that I manage to make it through the two weeks without anyone asking me why I am here, and just why it is that I have to leave again so soon.
Joshua
Doodling in the Sand
It’s one of my favourite past times. Doodling in the sand. You can draw anything, and then a few minutes later it will be completely erased. No record of it to be found anywhere. I sometimes wonder what life would be like if we had that ability with our memories. Wash and erase.
Today I have drawn butterflies. Ironic really; beautiful sweeping butterflies with their freedom to fly and me unable to deal with my broken heart and set myself free.
Dan and others are larging it about in the sea. There is a girl on the beach by herself, so they have gone into a masculine over drive of flexing to try and impress her. I didn’t bother looking at her that closely as we walked to our rock, the rock we have sat by for five years as we all learnt to surf and drink sea water. I could see a bikini clad body flat against the sand but that is all I registered. I really dislike holiday makers and try to avoid them at all costs.
Dan declared that she was an easy 7.5 with the possibility of an eight, if she stood up and they could confirm her body was as hot as they assumed it would be.
My friends are such charmers. It is a complete miracle that they don’t have girlfriends. Out of the six of us I’m the only one that really ever has, but she is gone now and I am still dealing with losing her. Dan along with the others, and even Andrew to a degree make use of the holiday makers. That’s not really my style. They have a six week shag fest, where they hike it out to Newquay every night to mingle with the wasted teenagers all enjoying a ‘surfing’ holiday. A surfing holiday that normally only involves one type of exercise on the sand. Sex.
I did one summer, and I’m still trying to forget about it. Now, I sit back and laugh waiting for one of the gang to panic because he may have caught an STD, or worse, got a girl pregnant because the sandy condom ripped. Or because they were too drunk to even use one.
This morning I had to do a shift at Aunt May’s shop. So let’s just rephrase that to, ‘this morning I had to spend three hours counting pencils.’ It never used to be like that. I started working there two years ago to earn some money, but really I spent all my time using up Aunt May’s stock, as I painted my way through a wall full of canvasses. She stopped paying me in the end. I can’t really blame her. Oil paints are really expensive.
I don
’t paint anymore though, so I guess I should ask for some form of financial reimbursement for my pencil counting.
I’m supposed to be going to Art College in a few weeks, but I can’t see the point of it. Does an artist who can’t draw anymore, unless it is doodles in the sand, deserve a place at an Art College? I don’t think so. I’m never going to be a huge success. I’m gonna have to come up with something else to do.
Even thinking about it is enough to make a guy depressed. I throw my stick in the sand and jump up, brushing the sand from my legs as I turn to get my wet suit.
The holiday maker is leaning up on her elbows staring at me. Her gaze is steady and intent like she may be contemplating something, and it makes me hesitate. The moment of hesitation allows me to inspect her closer. Her colour is like none I have ever seen. All gold like the sun.
For a split-second I get caught off guard and my brain goes into some crazy free-fall where I find myself thinking of what oil colours I would need to blend to get that depth of gold. But then I remember that it really doesn’t matter because I don’t paint anymore. Even if I did, holiday makers just come and go, leaving a carnage of destruction in their wake. I won’t need to worry about not being able to blend the perfect oils to make that iridescent gold, because I won’t see her again. And if I had to be honest I don’t want to see her again. Anyone or anything that makes me think about painting is not welcome on my beach, or my village for that matter. Technically I know it’s not mine, it’s probably the opposite. The village owns me, and that’s why I will never leave. I can’t leave the ghosts that haunt me behind. I know I have to stay here and live my life with them.