Julia Jones - The Teenage Years: Boxed Set - Books 2, 3 and 4 Read online

  Julia Jones

  The Teenage Years

  Books 2, 3 and 4

  (Book 1 is Free)

  Katrina Kahler

  Copyright © KC Global Enterprises Pty Ltd

  All rights reserved

  Table of Contents

  Book 2 - Roller Coaster Love

  Book 3 – True Love

  Book 4 – Mayhem

  Julia Jones

  The Teenage Years

  Book 2 - Roller Coaster Love

  Evil…

  Her blue eyes stared into mine. The look of hatred was so intense, it cut through me like a knife.

  I could see her lips moving. She seemed to be yelling at me, spitting the words in my face. For some strange reason though, I could not hear a thing. The eerie silence as I desperately tried to move out of her reach, made the whole scene surreal, as though it wasn’t really happening.

  But even in my dazed state I was sure she was there, only inches away, menacing and threatening; the look of loathing clear in her features! And it was in slow motion that I watched her raised hand drop. I followed its arc, almost graceful in its approach and I knew with certainty, it would reach its mark.

  Then, abruptly and without warning, I saw something glint. What was in her grasp? What was the sharp object she was holding with such fierce intensity and aiming with deadly accuracy at my face?

  With horror, I gaped at the gleaming blade. It had caught a flicker of light from an overhanging bulb, causing it to glow once more. Numb with fear I stood, riveted to my spot against the wall, unable to move.

  What was wrong with me? Why couldn’t I get out of her way? I tried to lift one leg and then the other. It was then I found that I was frozen into place, a motionless form at the mercy of the devil.

  Abruptly, the silence broke; deathly, blood curdling sounds that filled me with dread.

  But who was screaming? Who was making that terrible noise? Flicking my eyes from side to side, I tried to focus on the scene around me. Nothing seemed familiar. What was this place? What was I doing, glued to the wall? And worse still…where had she gone?

  “Julia! Julia! Julia, are you okay?”

  “What happened, Julia? Did you faint? Should I call an ambulance? Julia, answer me!”

  The voices around me were a blur and as I stared at the vaguely familiar faces, I tried to shake my mind back into focus. Then with an abrupt movement, I shoved the hovering figures out of the way and staggered shakily to my feet. I had to reach the bathroom, I could see it within view down the hallway but I knew I only had seconds to spare. My head spun in a dizzy fog as the nausea rose to the back of my throat. Clasping my hand firmly over my mouth, I stumbled towards the closed door and frantically pushed it open.

  “Julia, are you okay?”

  “Julia, can we help you?”

  The voices echoed outside the cubicle and when I finally emerged, drenched with sweat and ghostly white, the look of concern on their faces was genuine.

  Sitting me carefully down in a chair that had been propped in the corner, the girls then proceeded to use some damp toweling to sponge my forehead. I leaned my head back against the wall, all the while taking in deep breaths of air until with huge relief, I gradually began to feel better.

  “We need to get you home, Julia! You’ve obviously come down with some type of terrible stomach bug. You should probably see a doctor!”

  “We found you on the floor; it looked as though you were hallucinating. You were making the weirdest sounds. We could not understand a word of what you were saying!”

  I looked at the two faces staring into my own. I just wanted to go home, get into bed and sleep forever.

  What is going on???...

  Sitting up with a start, I glanced around at my surroundings and abruptly realized that I was in my own bed and it had turned dark outside. Several hours must have passed since I arrived home. I recalled roughly forcing open the front door and feeling intense relief to find the house silent and empty. I hadn’t wanted to face anyone and had climbed the stairs to my room, desperate to close the door behind me and shut out the world.

  As I lay there, groggy with sleep, the day’s events gradually came flooding back and I considered the roller coaster of emotions I’d been overcome with from the moment I opened my locker.

  But had I imagined it all? Had it all simply been a dream of sorts, a figment of my mind? Or a reaction to some terrible stomach bug just as the girls had suggested?

  Then the image of the voodoo doll appeared sharply in my head. NO! I had definitely not imagined that. It had been real. I clearly remembered ripping out the needles and any other random bits that I could tear away and then throwing the entire contents into the nearest trash can. I had wanted it out of my sight, forever dismantled and banished to oblivion.

  That had been right after…right after what? I clawed through my memory banks, desperate to remember.

  Had Sara been there? Had there actually been a knife? That part was foggiest of all and I struggled to recall the details, unsure as to what had really gone on. Perhaps it had been some kind of hallucination, a crazed state of mind that had gone into overdrive, bringing my darkest fears to life.

  The moments afterwards were clear though, and I was so grateful that those girls had been there and offered to give me a lift home. They were seniors who I’d met at one time in the library and who happened to strike up a welcoming conversation. On numerous occasions since, I’d come across them in the school grounds and they were always very friendly.

  It had been a pure stroke of luck that they’d returned to their own lockers before heading home for the weekend. They’d had to retrieve a forgotten textbook, one that was needed for an assignment they were working on together; but that had been the only reason they found me laying lifeless on the hallway floor. By that stage, the area was pretty much deserted, so it was extremely fortunate that they had appeared.

  Acting on impulse then, at a sudden random thought, I jumped out of bed and reached for my laptop. When I turned it on, the start button glowed brightly in the darkened room. If my mom was at home I certainly did not want her knowing I was awake. So I sat in the darkness on my bed, waiting for my computer to start. I was definitely not in the mood for her incessant chatter which I was sure I’d be forced to listen to, and right then, I did not want to discuss the nightmare I had woken up from, not with her anyway.

  “How was your day, Julia?” I quietly mimicked her voice, the tone identical to hers.

  “Well, Mom, if you really want to know…I found a voodoo doll shoved into my locker and then I kind of hallucinated and was later found passed out on the hallway floor. But anyway, how was your day??”

  Her initial look of shock would be followed by a small laugh at the absurdity of my response. She would shake her head with the assumption I was sharing some random joke, one that she had no understanding of. Thinking that she had no idea about what on earth I was referring to, she would just rapidly move on, in order to give me a detailed overview of her day, which I really was not interested in hearing about. I shuddered at the thought of that scenario and besides, she was the last person I would even consider sharing my latest drama with.

  I was also aware that I’d missed dinner, which was another important detail that she would remind of, but food was the last thing on my mind right then.

  As soon as the Google home page appeared, I typed the words, voodoo doll into the search bar. At first all I could find were the lyrics for a song of that name but after some more searching, I found what I was looking for.

  However, it was no
t what I had expected.

  Apparently, the original purpose of such dolls is to manifest positive feelings and intentions only. The belief is that feelings such as love, happiness joy and good karma can be created. But after some further reading, I also found that if the dolls are used for bad intentions or with the purpose of hurting another person, then this will create karmic backlash with the creator becoming the one to receive the negative energy.

  Wild thoughts raced through my mind as I closed down the computer and reflected on what I had just read. Had my physical and mental state actually been a reaction to the doll that was hidden in my locker? Or, had I simply been suffering from some terrible stomach bug or maybe even food poisoning from something I’d bought at the canteen. I knew that food poisoning could definitely create terrible symptoms; maybe that was what had caused me to become so ill. Surely there had to be a logical explanation.

  But regardless of that, the person who had been responsible for the hideous looking object that had been created to resemble me, definitely deserved whatever repercussions came to them! It was all probably just some hocus-pocus but to even consider doing something so vile, was beyond me. It seemed incredible that a person could stoop that low in order to play a stupid prank.

  Visions of Sara’s evil glare appeared in my head once more. I was certain it had to have been her. Who else could have been capable? The more I thought about it, the more convinced I was that she was the culprit. It all reeked of Sara.

  I remembered the time she had once locked me in an isolated cabin in the middle of the night. It had been during our grade seven camp and I was absolutely terrified. Especially after a sliver of thick glass had sliced through my hand as I tried to escape out the only window. So many years later and I could still picture the blood; within seconds it had completely covered my hand. That was just before I’d passed out, the fear of bleeding to death in the middle of the dark bushland, just too much to cope with.

  Yes, I was totally convinced that Sara was capable of anything.

  What worried me most though was the idea of facing her at school the following day. And as well as that, it seemed that her uncanny ability for scaring others seemed limitless. If she could follow through with a scenario as crazy as a voodoo doll, what else did she have in store?

  As I stared out the window towards the night sky, I took no comfort at all in the full moon that was beaming its pool of bright light onto the floor beside my bed. Turning away, I screwed my eyes tightly closed, wanting to shut out any and all sensations that threatened to invade my subconscious. But still, the sinister fear I had been trying to evade, made its way silently down my spine. I could feel it, a sneaking, invasion of my mind and body, creeping right through to my soul.

  Nausea began to form in the pit of my stomach and I knew beyond doubt that right then, it was not a stomach bug that was causing it. Gripping tightly to the sheets, I pulled them firmly to my chin, almost like a shield of protection.

  If only it were that easy, I thought to myself, as a loud and resentful sigh escaped my lips.

  The last thing I remember before finally drifting into a troubled sleep was Blake’s smiling face flashing through my thoughts only to be ripped away a fraction of a second later.

  It was abruptly replaced with menacing eyes and an evil stare.

  The eyes were a vivid blue, piercing and familiar.

  Long blonde hair framed the face, but I was sure it was the face of the devil.

  Distraught…

  The days that followed, passed by in a cloudy haze. Sara had not been seen at school all week and although I was thankful for her absence, I felt an uneasy reprieve, convinced that it would not last.

  No one appeared to be aware of the incident that had occurred in the hallway by the lockers. Well, no one spoke of it at all so I figured that it had gone unnoticed; except by the two senior girls who had helped me that was.

  “Are you feeling better now, Julia?” one had asked the following day when I’d bumped into her in the canteen during lunch break, the concern still evident on her face.

  “I’m so much better now, thanks Maxine!” I replied with a smile. “And thanks heaps again for the lift home! I don’t know what I would have done if you girls hadn’t found me!”

  We chatted some more and that had been the end of the conversation. Incident over and done with and never to be heard of or spoken of again. Or so it seemed. And I was extremely grateful to put it all behind me. It certainly wasn’t something that I wanted to become public knowledge that was for sure. I was just glad that the area had been deserted at the time. I also figured that I must have imagined the image of Sara with a knife. Perhaps it actually had been some kind of hallucination. After all, I’d been pretty sick with a terrible fever so who knows what tricks my mind had played on me.

  The week flew by quickly and true to my word, I had done my best to avoid Blake. I’d convinced myself that for his sake and my own, we needed to move on. Although I had sensed him staring in my direction several times in class, any time I felt him nearby I put my head down or tuned my back, making sure that the message was clear.

  I wanted him to stay away!

  So why was I feeling so miserable? The sense of loss that I’d been overcome with had completely overwhelmed me and I could barely concentrate on my schoolwork or anything else for that matter.

  “We’re destined to be together!” Blake had once said, back when we were in middle school.

  But we were just kids then. What did we know! And besides that, too much had changed. Regardless of how miserable I felt, I could not come to terms with the fact that in my absence, Blake had fallen for Sara. After all we had been through in the past, how could that have even been possible? I was sure that was what hurt the most and I was at a loss for how to overcome it. As well as that, Sara’s menacing stare was too fresh in my mind and I knew that while she was around, it could never work.

  Forcing myself to clear away all thoughts of Blake and Sara and the recent locker scene that continued to creep to the forefront of my mind, I focused on the weekend ahead. Images of my dad came to mind and I felt the corners of my mouth automatically curve into a small smile. He was due to arrive home that night and I was convinced that everything would be fine once he returned, even if it was only for the weekend.

  Fleetingly I then thought of Barry, the tradesman who my mother seemed to be so fascinated with but who was way too friendly for my liking. The very idea of him caused my skin to crawl. Having Dad back would solve that problem though! I was adamant that his visit was the key and I pictured his smiling face as he walked into the house that evening. I’d planned to cook his favorite meal and had given my mom a shopping list with the ingredients I needed. I just hoped that she would remember to get everything as I really wanted our family dinner to be special.

  When I entered the house later that afternoon, it was the best I had felt all week and I was keen to get started. I knew that I’d need quite a bit of time for preparation but I only had a couple of hours to spare before Dad arrived home. As I entered the kitchen however, I was struck with a vision that was completely and utterly unexpected. What on earth was Barry doing in our house? It was the night that Dad was due back and there was the tradesman, the one who I despised, sitting comfortably at our kitchen table chatting easily with my mother.

  I eyed the bags of groceries still sitting unpacked on the benchtop and then looked questioningly in her direction.

  “Julia!” she exclaimed. “You’re home! I have some bad news, darling and I know that you’ll be terribly disappointed.”

  Instantly my stomach filled with dread. “What is it? Has something happened to Dad?”

  “No, no, nothing like that,” she said in a soothing voice that I found frustratingly irritating. “Your father rang about an hour ago to say that there’s been an emergency in the office and he’s the only one who can deal with it, so he has been asked to stay behind.”

  “What?? You mean he’s not coming
home tonight?” I already knew the answer to my question, but I had to ask it anyway.

  All she could do was look at me, something akin to sympathy showing in her face. But she was unable to respond. Not that she needed to. It was clear that I wouldn’t be seeing my dad that weekend.

  Then I glanced at Barry, who I hadn’t even acknowledged until that moment.

  “So what’s he doing here?”

  The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them and I’d been unable to control the rude tone that betrayed my disgust at seeing him sitting so comfortably in our kitchen.

  “Julia, I know you’re disappointed about your dad not being able to come home but that is no excuse for rudeness. Show some respect, young lady!”

  I glared at her then, the contempt clear on my face. I hated her and I hated him! The two of them sickened me. How could she sit there in such a contented manner while that creepy jerk sat in my father’s favorite chair? And all the while, my dad was working his butt off in some miserable place all on his own!

  Feeling the tears form in the corners of my eyes, I blinked several times, furiously trying to fight them off. I did not want to give them the satisfaction of seeing me upset. Abruptly and without another word, I turned away and raced up the stairs to my room, desperate to escape their presence. Slamming the door shut behind me, I threw myself down onto the quilted cover of my bed and buried my face in the pillow. The sobs wracked my body and I was unable to stop.

  I felt so distraught, I thought I would die. Why was my life such a mess? How had I come to this point where everything seemed to be going so wrong? The pounding inside my head worsened, until it threatened to explode and I tried to choke back the endless stream of tears that were drenching my pillow.

  I hate her! I hate her! I hate her!

  The words raced around and around in my thoughts until, in total frustration, I voiced what I was no longer able to contain.