Chapter 2- Hear me
“What are you doing here?”
“Heard you passed. Wanted to congratulate you.” Cora’s big hazel eyes were red and bloodshot; she’d been taking weed again from what I could see.
“Oh, well thank you. I was really scared I thought I’d… what’s that?” something shiny glinted behind her mid-built frame.
“This? Ah, just a present. Congratulation present.” She smiled.
“Cora… are you ok? You seem…”
“Different? Yeah. I am different. You wanna know why I’m different Emma? Because my friend deserted me” the grin turned sour and her eyebrows furrowed.
“Cora that was two years ago... we haven’t spoken since, and I didn’t mean to, I told you where we were. By the time we got there you were...”
“Oh shut up Emma! Do you understand what I’ve been through? Taking care of Dave’s little sister and then finding out I was pregnant? And you weren’t there, you never were.”
“Of course I wasn’t Cora, I said sorry a thousand times and all you did was make death threats at me. I left you for half an hour, it wasn’t as if you were alone, you were surrounded by friends.”
“You know what? I’m sick of you acting like your better than everyone else. You complain about how crap your life is, making up all this shit about your family and your past, well I’m not going to take it anymore, you got it? I’m sick of it, all of it.”
“What are you doing? Cora… no… Cora put that away… Cora this isn’t funny we could get hurt…”
“No, you could get hurt, that’s the general idea. Time to get rid of this spoilt brat trying to play innocent. Have fun in hell, Emma.” A sharp movement and soon all I felt was a quick fire cutting through my centre and upwards to my lungs, and then it spread. The fire ran backwards, and then poured through my entire being. The taste of salt and metal ran up my throat and filled my mouth, drooling down the side of my face like oil spilling from its container, I choked and more blood came up, my hands went to the wound and pressed inwards, I could feel the empty space, feel the place where my flesh once was, but now was separated and filling with gore. I stared at the blade she clutched in her victorious hand; her eyes were wild, her dark ruby hair strewn across her face in glorious magnificence.
She had finally won. The fire stopped. Everything stopped. A door opened, screaming and pushing were muted. I stammered backwards, until my back hit the wall. My foot slid on the pool at my feet and I slowly slithered down the wall until the ceiling was all in my view. The numbness intensified, until it hurt, and then I felt water roll down my cheek, just one small drop. It stopped at my mouth and merged with the blood, until you would not have known it had ever existed. I blinked and felt tired. My head felt too heavy, my body too lame, my eyelids like concrete descending over my eyes until there was only the garden.
I felt stiff as I rose from the floor. What the hell just happened? I rubbed my back; I must have passed out and landed in an awkward position. I looked at my feet, blood, everywhere. Was someone hurt? I quickly left the room at the sound of shouting from outside.
“You murderer! You SICK murderer. How could you, how could you DO this? I hate you!” Henry fell to his knees and his hoarse voice called out something in audible. He cried screaming. “I HATE you, you bitch! You evil bitch! You’re the devil, the devil, she did nothing, and you murdered her! You killed her…” I ran to his side and put my arms around him.
“Henry. Henry come on let’s sit down. What happened? Who was killed?”
“No… no…”
“Henry come on you can’t stay here, the police have her now…”
“Emma…”
“Come on Henry…”
“Oh Emma… I’m so sorry… I’m so sorry I didn’t get there. I love you.”
“What? Get where? Henry, come on stop this we have to go. Why don’t I make you some tea?”
Suddenly he caught his breath and rose from the grassy banks where he had kneeled.
“Can I see her?” Two men pushing a wheeled bed covered in a thin white sheet stopped.
“I don’t think that is a good idea, son. You will be able to see her in the mortuary, once you have… settled down.”
“I want to see her.” He drew back the sheet and looked upon the girls face.
She was pale, cold. Her body barely had heat in it now, simply because she had so little blood left in her body. Her face was serene, not happy, not sad, peaceful wouldn’t be quite right either, just calm. Her body looked fragile, like all it would take to break it would be to lift it, and her hair was strewn wildly across the surface like tall grass when the wind blows. I recognized the face, but couldn’t see well, so I followed Henry and put my arm on his shoulder. Then I gazed down at the corpse that lay before us. A sudden high noise got louder and louder in my head, it got so high I had to cover my ears. It was like screaming, screaming so loud and high and long I simply couldn’t stand it. I staggered back, I couldn’t believe it.
“Henry!” I called out with my hands over my ears and my eyes squinting as a salty tear dripped from them. “HENRY!” I screamed. “HENRY! Oh god henry… oh…. AH!” I couldn’t breathe. I panicked I screamed. I screamed so loudly then I started to run up the bank and to the first person I saw. “Oh god, help me… please help me. Why can’t you see me? Why can’t you hear me? I’m here.” I bawled. “Please I’m here, I’m right here. Hear me, please. HENRY. Please, please hear me. Oh god.” I squatted on the ground and started lifting stones and throwing them, crying until I had no more tears to cry. I screamed and screamed. But no one heard. “HENRY!” I called and then choked on my breath. “Hear me.”
I awoke. It didn’t happen every night. But it would be fair to say at least 4 out of a week. If I was lucky then it may only be 3. My body was shaking, and drenched in sweat. I figured this out a while ago, that as I still subconsciously think of myself as a person, it follows the same patterns. Such as sweating, crying, laughing, and breathing even. But I don’t have to do any of these things. It’s just, how shall we say, force of habit? I rose from the medical room bed slowly, cautiously, and let my bare feel touch the ground. I took off my clothes and wandered down to the library. That was where I kept all my clothes now. It was a nice place to sleep there, cosy, warm, and the bean bags made some pretty ok beds. It was especially good during the day, because it was the one place where it was quiet at that time. I pulled on a pair of light-wash skinny flares and a plain white shirt and numbly wandered up towards English in deep thought.
