Stagnant

Excitement

Feelings were foreign to me and recently I had no idea if I was feeling something until Jackson pointed out the emotion I was expressing.

It was strange, not knowing what was happening with my own mind and body, having to have someone point them out to me. But then I hadn't felt anything in so long, I had been in a constant state of emptiness and numbness. Feelings were a concept I didn't understand anymore.

There was no judgement with Jackson though. He accepted my depression and my numbness, only trying to help in reawakening some part of me that had gone dormant like a volcano that hadn't erupted in hundreds of years.

But when I pointed that fact out he said a dormant volcano has the capability to erupt and will, at some point, erupt. It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. It was at that point I made the comment of being an extinct volcano, one that has the inability to erupt.

So after a discussion -a very long and agonisingly painful discussion- we both came to a compromise that I was a dormant volcano instead of an extinct one. My feelings were waiting for my emotions to 'heat up enough' so my magma could erupt.

Yes... he used that analogy.

Gloucester was our fourth stop out of the twelve cities we were visiting. A blur of ages rolled in to one: Romanesque and Victorian buildings; large and beautiful cathederals that looked like they adapted the style from the gothic middle ages; round arches; thick walls; giant towers; ornate gables; masonry walls.

"What we doing today then, oh great saviour?" I said sarcastically, rolling my eyes as we stood outside the plain building that looked more like a place where people are kidnapped and cut open for their organs.

At least I might die...

"I like that name." He smirked, throwing his arm over my shoulder while I scowled at the contact. "We are Go-Karting and axe throwing."

"Can we do axe throwing first?" The shot of excitement hits me, shocking me to my core at the emotion that passes through me.

I'm excited about axe throwing... I want to do this.

For the first time in a long time, I actually wanted to do something. I found the motivation to do something, a small part of me was clawing to be released. The motivation shocked me, my limbs weren't as tired or achy and the excitement wasn't faked.

Was I dying?

"Whatever you want." He continued walking, pulling me along with him. "Are you... excited?"  He wiggles his eyebrows teasingly.

"No." I shrugged. Lie. "I just want an excuse to throw an axe at your head."

"Lying is a sin, you know?" He wiggled his eyebrows.

"So is trying to commit suicide." I shrugged as best I could with his arm over me. "I'm already going to hell, might as well be welcomed and praised when I go down there."

He chuckled. "You're one of a kind, you know that Elizabeth?"

I was a depressed nineteen -nearly twenty year old- who has ran away from her home to join a rugby enthusiast in road tripping around the country. Yes I would say I was one of a kind.

"You're just saying that so I don't throw an axe at your head. Or beat you at Go Karting." I resist the urge to smile up at him, instead keeping my gaze straight ahead as we enter the building.

The outside of the building doesn't match the inside. Instead of it being dark and eerie, with torturing screams echoing off every wall, it's light with the sounds of laughter and engines ricocheting.