My eyes snapped open.
I was in our apartment, with something in my hands. My vision blurred around the edges, it almost felt like I was looking through a fishbowl.
"Alright Markus, he's here!" I heard a female voice. Was that Jessica?
I tried to move, to call out her name or to turn to face her, but my body wouldn't budge.
Involuntarily, my head glanced down and I saw that I was holding a cake with bright vibrant icing that read "Happy 9th Birthday Aaron!" There were eight tiny candles scattered around the cake, all lit.
I heard someone open the door to the apartment and step in.
"Hi Aaron, how was your day?" that same female voice asked.
"Great! At recess me and Daniel made this huge pile of leaves that we kept jumping in, it was really fun!" Aaron's voice called from where I couldn't see. His voice sounded much younger.
"There's a surprise for you here!" the female voice echoed through my head. There was no doubt, it was Jessica.
Suddenly, my head turned and Jessica and I started to sing happy birthday. When Aaron saw me, his face lit up into a wide smile; an expression that I hadn't seen in a long time and one that I would probably never see again.
"Go blow out your candles and make a wish!" Jessica said.
"Alright, I know exactly what I'm going to wish for!" Aaron said as he sat down at the end of the table and took a deep breath.
When he blew out the candles, the room went pitch black.
I felt a cold chill run through the room, and realized that the window was shattered open. A storm was raging outside. Nobody was in the room except for me. What had just happened?
Suddenly, the screams rang out from down below, and I heard rapid footsteps smashing their way up the stairs. I wanted to run, I wanted to get the hell out of there but I couldn't move a muscle. All I could do was keep staring at the direction of the doorway. The footsteps made it to the door, and then something started smashing on it.
I would have jumped if I could have moved, because a bright light flashed in front of me, revealing a feminine figure. It was Jessica, but she looked just like I had seen her last; missing her arm, covered in cuts, mangled legs. And her eyes... there was not an inch of life in them.
The banging on the door stopped, and all I heard was the howling of the wind and the steady sound of blood dripping from Jessica onto the floor.
Then she spoke, and the banging started again as she did, "You never should have come into the storm, Markus. You shouldn't have come," although it was Jessica's voice, there was no way that was Jessica talking. There was a hidden malice underneath it, like she was ready to start screaming at any second. Never had I ever heard her speak with venom in her voice. The banging grew louder.
"You shouldn't have come," she repeated, this time nearly shouting it, "Why would you bring Aaron? Because of you, he's suffering!" The banging was almost constant now, and in the dim light I could see that the door was starting to crack. The wind blowing in through the window violently knocked things over and threw them around the room.
"Jessica" started to scream, "All your fault! It's all your fault Markus!" She screamed over and over. A face peeked in through the window. It was the man I had shot. The door finally burst open, and as it did, Jessica disappeared and the thing I had seen in the building stood in her place. A violent blast of wind threw me down onto the ground.
The last thing I saw was the creature's face pressing against my own, its smile widening.
I woke up screaming. I threw the blankets off of myself and immediately turned to check on Aaron. He was fine, still sleeping soundly.
I glanced out the window; it was still dark outside so at first I thought it must still be night time but with the dark clouds blanketing the sky, I couldn't be sure until I checked the time. The rain hadn't let up at all.
Everything was where we had left it. After the events of yesterday, I almost expected to not wake up at all. This calm situation was the exact opposite of that nightmare we had lived through not even a few hours ago.
I sat there for what must have been an hour, thinking about nothing, trying to keep the nightmarish thoughts aside, until Jared woke up.
We both muttered a good morning to each other. Both of us were still fazed from the day before.
We immediately started looking through the boxes in the room, which were full of canned food preserves. There was actually enough to last a few weeks, maybe even a month or two if we were careful with it.
As we were sorting through them, I decided to ask Jared a question, "So, uh, why did you decide to become a police officer?"
He froze for a second, took a deep breath, then responded, "Well, it's mostly cause of my dad. He was always telling my brother and I how messed up this country was, how nobody was on the side of justice anymore. He said that this world needed the new generation to take charge and to fight for what was right, or it wouldn't be long before things would get so bad that there wouldn't be any chance of recovery... he always said that a good job for us would be to join the police force or the army. So when he passed away, me and my brother decided to become cops in order to honor him. My brother didn't really want to, I told him he didn't have to do it, that dad would have been proud of him no matter what he did, but... Our parents death hit him a lot harder than me. He really didn't want to let the old man down. I wish he would have listened to me..." he lowered his head, tears started to well up in his eyes, "...then, maybe now he'd still be alive..."
If only I had not come back into the city after the storm started, then I wouldn't have put Aaron in danger. If only I had stayed in the city, maybe I could have saved Jessica... I shook my head.
"There's no point in worrying about what ifs," I put my hand on his shoulder, "We can't change the past. Your brother would have wanted you to stay strong now. I know that Jessica would want me to stay strong, too. You saved us in the city, and for that I'm eternally grateful. I'm sure your father would be proud, your brother too."
The tears cleared from his eyes, he nodded, "You're right. I can't let them down! I'm going to do what I can, I'll save you two, and anyone else who's innocent that we come across," he extended his hand to me, "Let's survive, and live on. For the sake of those we've lost."
We firmly shook hands.
