She was running, running for her life. It was a dark alley, she could hardly see a metre in front of her, her lungs cried for a reprieve, but she knew she couldn't allow herself one. One moment of rest and she was doomed. 

Something crashed against her skull, and she crashed into the street hard. Her head was bleeding when a hand closed behind her neck, choking her. Suddenly a bloody corpse stood in front of her "I thought of giving you a painless death, but now... I'll make sure you remember this day your whole life. Don't cry baby," it cooed. "You asked for this." It said, choking her and closing in for a kiss...

And suddenly, her eyes flew open and she was staring blankly at her roof. She was in her room, lying on her bed and it was dark outside. 'It had only been a dream silly', she tried reasoning with herself, but her treacherous heart wouldn't calm down. She layed still on her bed, listening for any signs of having woken her parents up. The house was still quite, she concluded after a few minutes. She was glad for not having disturbed them for the night, though she wasn't sure how long it could go on this way.

Her alarm glared three forty at her. Hillary sighed, there was no way she was going back to sleep after that dream. She had to be up in another twenty minutes anyway, so why not now? she decided. 

It was her first day of highschool, she remembered. She had absolutely no idea what to expect. She freshened up, ironed her uniform and packed her books and assignments for the day. After having a glass of milk, she took up her swimming back pack and set out for her daily swimming practice at Japan Swimming Federation's swimming pool.

 It was specifically reserved for professional swimmers. The coaching that was provided there was funded by the federation and didn't start before six. After her impromptu break so close to the national finals, she had been snatching every opportunity that came in her way to practice a bit more as soon as her bandages were removed. 

She boarded the first train of the day at four fifteen. The station and the train were empty except for a guy who was nodding off at a corner. Another victim of overtime working, she sympathetically mused. Being just two stations away from her home, she reached her destination just as the gates opened, that is, at four thirty. She quickly headed for the stalls, changed, showered, and got down to practice. 

The lack of practise combined with her damaging injuries and stress during those days had severely affected her performance. And unlike beyblading, the progress was painstakingly slow. Her shoulder still got sore after too much usage and it had already been two weeks since she had started her rigorous training. After an initial bit of warm up exercises and shoulder related workouts, she mostly stuck to laps, focusing on gaining back her kick strength.

Her speed had increased sure, but it wasn't enough. Her speed hadn't yet reached the level required for benchmark preliminary screening at national championship, which was definitely not flattering to the Tokyo champion, considering their predominance in the field throughout the years. 

The only person she had shared the reason of her sudden absence was her coach, and there too, only about her mother. She had slightly altered the story to explain her shoulder injury to be a consequence of the accident, as though she was with her mother, and had escaped with minor injuries, unlike her mother. She had desperately needed her permission to attend both the coaching slots. 

Suddenly, Hillary's feet were pulled from under her and Hillary slipped into the water. But her reflexes knew better and she twisted the next moment, swimming to the bottom and started tickling the culprit. Aubrey Sanders quickly let go of her to catch her breath. A fruity laugh filled the air around her, and she found herself to be laughing too.

Aubrey Sanders was her only friend in the morning batch, though if she was honest, her only friend in both the batches. She was a tall girl with soft cheekbones and wavy jet black hair, with just two strands of aqua Blue. Freckles sparsely dotted her rather clear face.She was gifted with a warm smile and unbelievably optimistic personality. Her most guarded secret, she was highly ticklish. 

 Aubery knew almost everyone there here as she had been in the field for a really long time, unlike her, a newbie. The professional IDs were given to everyone who won at a competition organised by the JSF. But to keep the IDs, one had to win at least one of either of the three medals in a tournament. Her batchmates had been really thrilled to have had the state champion training with them. But she had disappeared too soon, hardly being able to make some real connections. Then, she became a major let down to all of them. They had been privy to her reasons for such a long absence, but she hadn't given in. 

When they finally realised that she wasn't even the 'Star' player anymore, they slowly turned their attention to much eye-catching topics, silently dismissing her win at the state championship for fluke. Everyone but Aubrey, who never stopped having faith in her, who dragged her along where ever she went, forcing her into circles of talk, whether she or the other person liked it or not. 

"Good morning champ, how was training?" she asked. "Fine, and I told you to stop calling me that, didn't i?" She replied back, a bitter hiss in her voice. Couldn't she hear the soft murmering and chuckles undoubtedly happening behind her, or didn't she just care? "And why should I do that?" Aubery lowered her voice then. "You are the current state champion, and living up to expectations is not your job. So, unless you lose to me in this nationals," she winked, "your my champ. Clear?" Hillary couldn't completely control the smile overcoming her face. Her lips twitched, she rolled her eyes instead, replying with a "whatever." 

Unfortunately, they didn't get much time to talk. The crowd around had thicken and their coach had arrived. She was urshing them all to gather in a line in front of her. They were going to practice different strokes for the day. Not her favourite, Hillary thought. Yet, she gave her complete attention to the class and carefully observed her coach as she demonstrated different techniques and common mistakes. The class was short, and didn't have them doing anything alone, for which she was secretly glad of. She didn't want to endure her batchmates' stares and murmurs for the day. She was one of the first to leave the pool when they were dismissed. She quickly changed into a pair of baggy three-fourth and a tee shirt.

The conversation that struck up in the changing room did catch her attention. The dates for the finals were going to be announced soon it seems, one said. Tentatively, the tournament was supposed to start in December, and end in December, another replied as a lively conversation struck up. Hillary couldn't help but wonder how she was planning to pull it off, with less than two months to prepare. Hillary didn't try to pitch in her thoughts on the matter though. She wasn't exactly sure at what place she stood in the social circle presently, but she understood it wasn't flattering. 

Aubrey called her out, "Leaving so soon?" Hillary immediately noticed the number of voices reduce, everyone's attention on her now. At least Aubery left out the champ for now, Hillary reasoned with herself. Plastering up a fake smile, "Yeah, school starts today and I didn't want to be late, our house is pretty far from it. Bye then." She said her farewell to no one in particular, "See you again for the day then," she heard Aubery yell from behind, though she didn't bother to think what it could mean.

Hillary headed straight to home. Her hair had grown to her shoulders now and didn't fit inside her cap like it normally would. The edges always got damp these days. Not wanting to smell like chlorine for the day, she took a head bath. Quickly getting ready, she blow dried her hair. Other than her lips that had become chafed, she looked pretty smart in her uniform of maroon and blue. On realising it was already eight, she took up a plain lipbalm with her to apply after breakfast.

Hillary's mother, Nathasha Tachinbana, worked as the head event manager and interior designer of a reputed company in Japan and her father, Amar Tachinbana, was a business representative of a commercial company based in Nora. Her mother mostly tried to be home by nine while her father's work schedule was highly chaotic. He disappeared for weeks at a stretch, but then took holidays for weeks too, opening his laptop for urgent needs only. 

All in all, her parents were busy people, and she highly appreciated them taking their time off their busy schedules for her. They wouldn't accept her appreciation though. "This is our most important duty, sweetheart", her dad would assure her, and her mother would gush happily behind him. "We couldn't miss it in the world.", she'd say. 

******

When Natasha heard Hillary's hurried footsteps down the stairs, she could hardly believe that the day had come. She remembered the day she had held the newborn baby in her hands, when both of her parents were happy. When her sister Natalie and Ilyas were alive... she shook her head. Today was not the day to grieve. Hillary was starting high school today!

Natasha embraced her daughter as soon as she entered the kitchen. Though caught off guard by the hug, Hillary was soon hugging her mom back with the same amount of fiercely. After the embrace, she gushed "Oh baby, you have grown up so soon. It still feels like yesterday when I dropped you to your first day of school, and look at you!! Starting your highschool!" unshed tears sparkled in her eyes.

"Oh mom, do you have to be this dramatic? Its just the start of highschool. It's not like I've gotten the valediction or something!!" Hillary exasperated. "In time, you'll get that too, no doubt about it!" she said and smiled, patting her daughter's cheeks affectionately.

"Oh mom, you don't understand, the strength will be more than five times the primary school I attended, which means five times more competition, which-" but Natasha was not having any of her daughter's self-doubt or over-thinking today. "I'm not hearing any of it. You are more than capable of accomplishing anything you put your mind into." she sternly affirmed.

Though Hillary did stop rambling, Natasha wasn't sure if the message sunk in or not, for she had been repeating the same lines for years now. Always pushing herself beyond the limits set, criticizing herself for the smallest of the smallest mistakes, something no one else would even notice, seemed like Hillary's favourite hobby since she hit adolescence, a hobby she had inherited from her father. But Amar's  line of work demanded it of him, unlike Hillary, who had no such compulsions.

Astonishingly, that didn't hurt her self esteem as Natasha feared it would. Her confidence had always been scaling up, never backing down from a challenge. It took some time for Natasha the realise that her daughter shared her doubts only with her and Amar and no one else. She had felt wonderfully proud on realising that. 

But Hillary's confidence had suffered a serious setback last month. Every time she touched the bandage around her head, Natasha felt guilty for putting her daughter through such an ordeal all alone, she felt terribly angry with her husband, who had to disappear due to his work at the very same time, and just thinking of the incident as a whole made her dizzy.

******

Amar entered the dining hall just as Tasha served her pancakes. He literally couldn't resist himself as he took the first bite from Hillary's fork. Hillary laughed,while hiß wife complained about his manners indignantly.

He sat beside her on the dining table, opposite to Tasha. Hillary was sitting in her new high school uniform, a deep maroon knee-length skirt, a white full sleeved shirt, a tie, a red vest coat and a navy blue blazer bearing the school crest. Hillary didn't have much make up on herself. She had simply left her hair down after blow drying it, which gave it a voluminous natural look.

"How was swimming practice, honey?" He gently asked. "They're going on fine." was her curt reply. But he knew that things were far from fine. After a break of an entire month of practice, Hillary's speed had drastically gone down, barely able to keep up with her intra-state competitors.

Her coach, though visibly upset with this change of events, had encouraged her that all hope wasn't lost. She believed that if she worked hard enough, she could still reach her previous state of efficiency and much more for the finals. Two weeks since then, Hillary had been practicing day and night, quite literally. From what Tasha told him, she had been at the swimming pool whenever it was open. 

woke up at four-fourtwo hours of personal training in the morning and three hours in the evening,. On top of it, she had been attending her regular three hour practice sessions with the other regional and state level competitors from Tokyo like Aubrey Sanders, present state-level bronze medalist and Cassandra Jones, the defending national swimming champion, present state-level silver medalist and former state champion until Hillary grabbed the title from her three months ago.

Hillary was about to finish her breakfast. "I'll be home for the next few weeks. When does your practice end. I'm plan on picking you up." he asked. "You could pick me up at eight I guess."  She answered. "Do you want a ride now, I don't want you to be late for your first day." He further asked. Hillary looked relieved at the suggestion. She quickly pecked her mom goodbye and headed for the car, with him following her out. 

The ride was quite and peaceful. Hillary was preoccupied and had somehow decided to forget their previous encounter and give him another chance. She always gave him another chance. She looked so much like her mother as she grew up, it was painful to watch. She pecked him goodbye before getting off the car. 

And just like that, thirteen years had passed since they had first found the toddler on the front steps of their Christmas home. Thirteen years since they fled Russia. Thirteen years since they had been living a quite normal life in Japan. Hillary was finally starting highschool with a relatively normal life. What could go wrong now? 

Perhaps, everything.

******

Words: 2490

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A/N: I know it had been a long overdue. All I can hope for is the next update won't take this long. A few things have changed in the storyline. Hillary's mom is an event manager and not a lawyer. I've unpublished the other chapters, I plan on starting this book anew, though, they will eventually find their way into the updates.

So guys, how's the chap. Vote, comment (+/-), just do anything to show your presence for this story. Nothing offensive though.

See y'all until next time.

PS: Just so you know, editing is almost ninety percent complete.