A Tome of Death

Death II

     I stared, petrified, as Jesse jogged across the street towards the fighting pair of men. Suddenly, I heard a loud horn sound off down the road.

     "Jesse-", she called, but her exclamation was cut short by the agonizing, hollow crack of Jesse's ribs, and the sound of his body being pushed back twenty feet from the collision. I stared, motionless.

     I stood there, unable to move, or speak, or do anything. I took no notice to the panicked people retrieving phones from their pockets to call medical services, or of the two no longer fighting men running down the street away from the event unfolding on the street.

     Calmly, I walked slowly towards the broken corpse of my boyfriend. I fell to my knees next to him. "Jesse?" I said quietly, my fingers prodding at his hand. I leaned in closer. "Jesse." Still no response.

     Frightened, I bent down and rested my head against his chest to check for a heartbeat. I felt my heart quicken upon finding he had none of his own.

     I felt my lip quiver and tears start to well in my eyes. "Je...Jesse..." I felt my throat choke up. It was hard to breathe. A feeling of overwelming sadness overcame me like... like...

     I broke out into tears, violently. I felt empty, defeated. With a disgruntled moan of agony, I collapsed onto his cold, lifeless corpse. Tears poured down my face, wetting his jacket.

     I stuffed my hands into his jacket, trying to preserve the last bit of warmth in his body, as if it would do something. Or anything, for that matter.

     "Jesse!" I cried. He was gone, dead, not here, lost, away forever. He wasn't coming back. I couldn't accept it to be true.

     'He was fine only just a couple minutes ago...' I thought. 'He can't be gone, he can't be gone. I refuse to let him leave. He can't be gone!'

     I convulsed again in a shivering mess of tears. They matted both of their jackets and it had soaked into Jesse's shirt.

     In the rush of emotion, I must not've heard the sirens that blasted through the streets. I felt two pairs of arms wrap around my shoulders and started to separate us.

     "No! No, please! Don't take him away from me!" But it was no use.

     I lunged forward with all of the strength that I had left in me, but the medics were stronger. With a nod from one of them, the other ran to Jesse and carried him over to the ambulance. The sirens still roared in my head. I felt a blanket being wrapped around me.

     With that, the second medic left me and grabbed a stretcher from the back of the medical vehicle. Skillfully, both doctors hoisted the corpse onto the stretcher, and then onto the ambulance.

     In my traumatized state, I heard a sort of dinging sound. One like that of glass shattering, or cold metal colliding. I turned to where the sound was to find something had been dropped on the ground by Jesse. Quickly, I ran over to pick it up, the blanket being thrown to the street.

     I found a small steel band lying on the ground in the path of the corpse. Tentatively, I bent down and picked up the band, tears still pouring down my face. I read the band carefully.

                                Angelus