Jay Aslan: Journey to the Top

Leah sat on her bed, painting her toenails with a deep dark purple nail polish she had gotten from Macy's. She was very careful not to spill any. Her best friend Emily hated that color, she thought it was too grungy, but Leah had seen one of her sister's college friend wearing it and she had really liked it.     

She chuckled at the thought of Emily's face when she would see her, then she froze for a second and looked up at the numerous pictures hung all over her room before settling on the one that was particularly conspicuous; the only one that was adorned by a frame.     

It was a picture of three children of approximately 10 years old, they were happily grinning at the camera, two girls sandwiching one boy.     

On the left was a blonde little girl with a bob cut, green sparkling eyes and two missing front teeth. That was Em. On the right was Leah, shoulder-length soft brown hair and clear grey eyes. And in the middle... was a boy, with short black raven hair and amber eyes.     

Leah shivered, those eyes haunted her. His two childish dimples and the mole under his left eye, all of those details haunted her.     

It was the last picture they had taken together before the accident. It had been thanksgiving then and all of them had been perfectly happy... for a while.     

Then something had happened and Emily and Leah had started a cold war, while the boy had been caught in the middle. Days had went by without any visible sign of the tension easing between them both, so on that Christmas Day, when everyone had been at his house celebrating, the boy had made a decision.     

He had tricked Em and Leah into coming alone to their old tree house near Winston bridge in order to get them to reconcile. But it hadn't happened the way he had hoped.     

Emily had been furious and Leah had been stubborn, when they'd realized they had been tricked, they'd decided to go back to the boy's house, arguing the whole way.     

They had been so engrossed in their petty little squabble that they hadn't noticed the incoming car swerving through the road.     

It had been winter, and that meant snow and ice everywhere. The car had been unable to stop in time, and had kept gliding forward, uncontrolled. The two girls had stood there completely frozen in the middle of the road, and the boy had chosen that moment to act.     

He'd been a coward, a coward who wouldn't dare to go to the bathroom alone in the middle of the night with no lights on, and a coward who would always plug his ears with both hands whenever he heard a horror story, but at that moment, when they had felt death gripping their hearts and at a hair breadth away from seizing their souls, he had bravely sprinted forward and pushed the two of them out of the way.     

She could still remember the words he had said then, despite the noise coming from the out of control car and the numbing icy wind.     

He had grinned at them both and yelled "You're it!", then the noises had come back and drowned everything. She remembered the screams, the crying and the blood-painted snow.     

Leah closed her eyes and her eyelashes trembled. "Shit, not again, I just... got my makeup done..." she did her best to stop the tears that threatened to spill, fanning her eyes in the process.     

She put away the nail polish and laid back on her bed wriggling her feet in the air as an attempt to dry her toenails faster.     

That's how Em found her when she arrived. The 5"7 picturesque blonde sighed at the sight.     

"Seriously?" she asked as she came in and closed the door.     

"You're late." Leah said, not bothering to stop what she was doing.     

Em took off her coat and kicked out her leather boots, then dropped down on the bean bag couch next to Leah's bed.     

"I was held up by Josh, so annoying. The guy's already a Junior but sticks to me like glue. I'm thinking about dumping him." she grabbed one of Leah's magazine and proceeded to languidly leaf through it.     

Leah chuckled. She raised an eyebrow and smirked at her friend "That's like what? The fourth one since January? And we're not even halfway through the semester. You aiming for cock teaser of the year?"     

Em rolled her eyes. "Whatever, the second one doesn't count. He came in his pants when I bit his earlobe for Christ's sake. Captain of the football team my ass."     

Their eyes met and they burst into a fit of giggles. "You're so bad." Leah shook her head.     

She knew why Em was doing this, she was simply trying to numb the pain.     

"Like you're any better missy, Danny was making goo-goo eyes at you the entire time at lunch, you know he wants to take you to prom, right?" Em taunted.     

"I know."     

"So....?" Em inquired.     

Leah straightened up, her toenails were dry now. "So, not interested and not going."     

Em sighed in annoyance, "Fine, live like the nun you are. You know it's- ew! Black nail polish, seriously?!"     

Leah laughed, "It's dark purple, and I think it's hot." she wriggled her toes in Em's direction.     

"Ew go away! Ugh."     

Leah got up "I gotta go, it's my turn to babysit Lou, are you gonna wait here or...?"     

"Nope, I have a paper to finish, so I better leave too." Em mumbled.     

"Alright, wait up then, I'll get dressed and we can go halfway together."     

Leah was about to reach out for her jeans when her door opened wide and her mother came in.     

"Jeez mom, ever heard of knocking?" Leah looked at her mother in disbelief but froze when she saw the look on her face. She gulped "Wha... what is it?"     

Leah cursed under her breath, had she found out that she had eaten the last two pop tarts? Damn she had been careless.     

Before she could make up some kind of apology, her mom spoke.     

"There's no need for you to go to the Aslans, they're not here."     

Leah was caught off-guard, and to be honest, so was Em.     

"Uh... okay? Aunt Helen didn't let me know, is everything alright?" she half-heartedly inquired, relieved at not being found out.     

She was greeted by silence and looked back at her mom, realizing she was now crying.     

"Mom? What's wrong?!"     

"Aunt Lisa?" Em was also looking at the woman worriedly.     

Mrs. Parson took a deep breath and stepped forward. She grabbed both girls' hands, guided them towards the bed and sat them down.     

"It's about Jay." the middle-aged woman said and felt both girls tense up considerably, Em looked about ready to bolt so she chose to just come out and say it.     

"He has woken up. Yesterday Helen, Lee and Lou left for New York." she squeezed both girls' hands and slowly repeated "Jay... has woken up."     

Leah and Em were frozen in place, looking at the woman in stunned silence.     

Leah broke eye contact with her mother and turned to Em, who happened to do the same thing. They stared at each other for a moment and Leah saw it.     

She saw Em's made up facade cracking, as well as her own, reflected in her friend's green eyes.