Blue Apple - Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Autumn leaves softly fell down from the trees, spiralling in the wind. Bits of light shone through the gaps in the leaves at the top of the trees and created beautiful sparkles bouncing off the river. The sound of the train on the tracks clattered and was all that was heard until it was interrupted when a baby started to cry but was soon picked up and shushed by her mother. Meg looked over at the baby falling asleep in her mother’s arms and smiled. She has a warm smile on her beautiful face. She had a little bit of make-up on but not too much. Just a bit of blue eye shadow with some mascara and some light lipstick that makes all her good features pop up. She didn't even need any foundation. Her face was naturally soft and spot free. It even looked like she was already wearing foundation and was sometimes asked what one she wears and where she gets it. Meg liked to put a lot of time into making herself look nice. She always has; ever since she was really little. Her mother taught her how to use some certain types of facial scrubs that she had and Meg has been using them for years and years ever since so she has a naturally good complexion. She also took good care of her body apart from times where she goes out with her friends when they all try to be healthy but always end up eating at a fast food restaurant or buying sweets at the shop. She didn't mind though because she had a fast metabolism. She pulled out her sketchbook from her bag and started to doodle in it looking up at the baby being rocked to sleep smiling gently.
“I love babies” she said to her friend opposite and she wiped her long, curly blonde hair behind her ear. Her hair caught the light occasionally and had a bit of gold where the light shone on it. She was thinking of dyeing it red but she liked it when it glows in the sunlight. “They’re so cute… With their little chubby cheeks and little tiny hands and little tiny toes and little faces and little-“
“Yes… They’re little. We get it” Interrupted the friend. She, unlike Meg, didn't really look like the happiest, most cheerful person in the world. Her make-up was quite heavy. She had a lot of eye-liner on and mascara and some dark eye shadow. She was also wearing a bit of foundation but she spends a lot of time on her eyes. She wasn't really a grumpy person, she was a little tired from the long train journey and Meg going on about babies. Also compared to Meg she seems quite miserable as Meg is always so happy. “Meg… You keep going about how much you love babies. Is there something that you and Bradley aren't telling us?” she joked.
“Oh shut up, Ashley. You know I'm only seventeen, I wouldn't plan on starting a family for years… Besides…” She paused for a moment “Bradley’s great but I can’t imagine him being a dad. Especially to my child.”
“Yeah and he goes out drinking every night. Still you guys have been together for what… 4 years now? That’s impressive, man” Ashley smiled as she roughed up her long black hair. She liked it messy.
“Didn’t you used to have a crush on him?” Meg asked. Ashley looked at her, raised an eyebrow, and laughed.
“Uhh… yeah… When I was like eight. Dude, we were in primary school.” Meg laughed and rolled her eyes.
“Whatever. I meant… Ah never mind. I can’t believe we’ve been friends since… well before we could talk.” She smiled at Ashley and a moment went by. “So what do you wanna do when we get home?” She looked back out the window at the beautiful sight.
“Wish I was back in London!” Ashley laughed. “That was such an amazing weekend”. She smiled while flicking through the photos that they recently took of their weekend trip on her phone. She laughed hysterically and showed Meg the photo that she secretly took of her. Meg laughed and jokingly cursed her for taking that horrible photo of her and reached across the table to grab the phone off of Ashley to delete it. Ashley quickly moved away and started laughing at it “This is SO going on Facebook!”
“NO! Delete it!” Meg laughed as she lunged across the table again. They stopped when the baby started to wriggle and was about to cry. The mother looked back to see who was making all that noise so Meg pulled a poker face while Ashley just looked at her phone and then looked around as well to see who that was. The mother, however, didn’t buy it but just chuckled and rocked her baby back to sleep. Meg started laughing and slammed her face on the table.
“What?”
“We’re the only ones back here…” She pointed out.
“Oh.” A few seconds passed and they just laughed at their stupidity. A few seconds later Meg looked up and noticed the mother was looking at them with her finger over her lips to tell them to be quiet. Meg nodded politely at her and they just chuckled quietly. Ashley then looked at the clock on her phone, “our stop should be soon.” She reminded Meg who then looked out the window to see if she knew where they were. She recognised a few of the buildings they passed and started to put her stuff back in her bag.
“I’m starving. Where do you want to go eat?” Meg asked while trying to fit everything back into her small bag and started to wonder how it all fitted in there in the first place. Ashley shrugged.
“Maccy D’s?” she smiled and Meg pulled the ‘not bad’ face that they do on the adverts and smiled.
“Sure. I haven’t had one in ages.”
Their train soon pulled up to the station and they got off and made their way to McDonalds while talking about things that they did on the weekend laughing and reminding each other of everything that happened as if they both forgot.
“Remember when that old lady ran across the road and fell over?” Ashley attempted to say through her laughter.
“Oh my god yes! And remember when someone thought you were that celebrity so you gave them your autograph?” Meg laughed. “I forget which one.”
They both kept laughing until they got to the fast food shops and went into McDonalds and ordered their meals. Ashley got the usual. An extra-large double cheeseburger with large fries and a large chocolate milkshake. She also ordered some chicken nuggets to ‘share’ but she never does. She just claims that she is going to share them so she doesn’t look like a pig… as much. Meg ordered a chicken burger with medium fries and a medium strawberry milkshake.  They waited for their order and sat down on the bench outside and looked at some of the videos that Ashley recorded on her phone of them messing around while they ate. First they watched Meg dancing behind people’s backs and pretending like nothing happened when they turn around, then Ashley try but then she kept laughing so she kept getting caught. They then watched their vlog that they did in the hotel and some of the clips from other things they did in London.
“Remind me to upload that tonight” Ashley said and put her phone back in her pocket and finished off her cheeseburger. Meg nodded. She looked up and waved to a friend from college that said hi as he walked past her and went into KFC.
“Wanna go for a walk in a bit?” she suggested. Ashley shoved the last handful of fries in her mouth.
“Er ve ca ger nah!” She muffled with her mouth full. Meg laughed at her.
“I’m sorry what?” she joked. Ashley muffled the sentence again and Meg just smiled and giggled. “Alright let’s go.” She put her bag on her shoulder and picked up their milkshakes that they didn’t finish and they walked along carrying on their conversation about London and that they should go again and then started to plan a huge trip with everyone they could think of and just have a huge party in the city. They come from a rather small town so there isn’t really much to do in there. They both loved London so much. Ashely got really excited about this and pulled out her phone to start texting.
“Wait, Ash. I was joking.  Well…. Actually now that I think about it that does sound like an awesome idea! We’ll plan it tonight though.” She looked up at where they were going “Oh we went the wrong way” She looked at the forest in front of them and then pointed at the shopping centre in the other direction.
“Meg, I was following you!”
“Well I was following YOU!” Meg giggled “honestly we were only gone for a weekend and forgot our way around town.” She looked at the forest and gave Ashley a look “Might as well go for a walk here. Never really been in here apart from when I was checking out the university on the other side and rode through a little bit on my bike.” Ashley nodded and took a sip of her milkshake as she entered the forest. They both looked at the landscape; the leaves gently falling down, birds singing, bugs flying, squirrels jumping from tree to tree and running around on the floor. Meg started humming a song that fitted the scene. It was really relaxing and peaceful…. Until Ashley ruined it.
“Hey look… tulips!” she giggled.
“Oh yeah they’re pretty… wait, what are you…” Meg looked at her strange friend skipping over to the tulips. “Oh. Please don’t…”
“Tiptooooe through the window, by the window that is where I’ll beee come tiptoe through the tulips with meeeeeeee!” Ashley started singing in the high pitch voice. Meg started awkwardly laughing and dragged her away.
“Please don’t” she laughed “that looks really silly anyway because you dress in black and have cool black hair and then you…. Do that” she teased. Ashley didn’t dress like Meg did. She wore black leggings with a white t-shirt on and a black hoodie over that. She like to wear her black boots that she has but they hurt her feet so when she goes out for a long time she wears her black and white converses. Meg liked to wear a mix of clothing. Today she was wearing light blue jeans with a blue top and her hoodie over that. Ashley childishly shrugged.
“That song’s from horror films anyway so that’s fine!” she grinned. Meg gave her a disapproving look and walked away from her. Ashley frowned and followed.
They walked for a little bit but then Ashley noticed something in the corner of her eye and stopped to get a closer look. It was an apple. It wasn’t a normal apple though…. This apple was blue. It looked just like a normal apple apart from that. It didn’t look like someone had made the apple blue, it looked like it was grown like that. Ashley reached over and picked it up.
“Hey, Meg! Check this out!”
“What now?”
“This apple… It’s….. Blue!” She examined the apple some more and peeled a bit of the skin off with her fingernail to see that it was actually a real apple and it was. Even the inside was like a normal one but with a slight blue tint to it. She passed the strange fruit to Meg and she also looked at it and looked back at Ashley confused. “I dare you to eat it!”
“What? Ashley… No! We don’t even know why it’s blue”
“Come one… Just one bite… If it’s all mankey and gross you can spit it out. Okay? Go on”
“Um… I’m not sure….”
“Alright fine. You take a bite then I’ll take a bite. Deal?” Meg gave Ashley a confused look at why she would even think about doing something like that, but then again if Ashley sees a 10 year old jellybean on her bedroom floor when cleaning it for once she will eat it without even thinking. One second it’s on the floor and not even half a second later it will be in her mouth. It’s one of her quirks. Meg looked at the apple. A very dangerous quirk. She sighed.
“Alright… fine….. Here I go...” She closed her eyes and cautiously put the strange fruit up to her mouth and slowly sunk her teeth into it. It tasted fine. She took a bite and hesitated but then swallowed. “Actually... that’s alright.” She passed it to Ashley “it just tastes like a normal apple don’t wor- oh…” Ashley had already eaten half the apple and dropped it to the floor. They both took a sip of their milkshake and carried on walking.
“So where do you think that came from?” Meg asked. “It’s like…. Not… a… normal…” she coughed a few times “normal thing…. To find….” She coughed a few more times and looked over at Ashley. Her vision started to go blurry. Ashley looked up and gave her a panicked look. They both coughed a few times.
They looked at each other and stumbled around Ashley coughed up blood. Meg started freaking out and was about to start swearing and shouting at her dangerous friend but couldn’t speak. Her words came out slurred and soon all she could see was darkness and all she could hear was the sound of herself and Ashley gasping for air and choking. She fell to the ground followed by Ashley’s limp body.