Snow's Secret

• Frea Norman, Grade 7, Kings Meadows High School
• Short Story
• 2015

Excellence Award in the 'Read Write Repeat 2015' competition

A shiver runs up my spine as I step outside into the icy cold winter morning.
“Have a good day at school Amity” a familiar voice yells from the kitchen,
“Bye dad,” I call back. That was our usual conversation. I can tell that whenever he talks to me he thinks about mum and how she left us when I was five years old. I don’t really mind avoiding awkward conversations about how our days went and my favourite subject at school.
I crunch across the frozen grass and onto the footpath to school, the snow gets caught on my clothes, staying icy on my frozen skin. I love the cold and snow, dad hates everything about winter. We are completely different people.
My heart skips a beat as a snow ball hits me hard on the back of the head. I jump around ready to jump kick whoever threw it but, nobody is there. I wipe the snow out of my already white hair and step into the trees searching for anything but no one is around. I cautiously double back on the path every five minutes, I know I will be late to school but if anyone is following me I want to find them.
After fifteen minutes of double backing I decide it is probably just Alice or Theo playing a prank on me again. I hear the ice crunch behind me and this time when I turn my head someone is standing there. It’s a guy, mid-twenties, tall, brown hair and blue eyes, wearing all black. He seems like a person everybody is afraid of but, for some reason I’m not. I recognise him from somewhere, I know him, or I knew him.
“Hello Snow I never thought I would see you again,” Snow? Is that what he called me?
“Who are you? Do I know you?” I ask confidently.
“You know that answer Snow, but I will tell you anyway, they obviously messed up your brain. I am Ian, you worked for our group. We were trying to overrun the government. Then when we were attacking them, they caught you, decided you might be helpful, and put you under a strong truth serum. Even after all the training we did, you told them everything, all our attack plans and half of us were captured and the rest of us are in hiding.”
“That can’t be true, if it was I would remember everything, I must know you from somewhere else. I would never be able to forget something like that.”
“He mind wiped you, and made you think that he was your dad. Why else would you have no mum and no photos of her around the house, or of you when you were little? Come with us, we can bring your memories back.”
I stand waiting for it all to sink in, should I go? I have always felt like I didn’t belong.
“So, are you coming?”