The Freaks | Sally Face

Chapter 64: The Other Side

Sal's POV:-

"Hey Sal?" his voice kept going on at me which was continuing to infuriate me. 

"What?!" I raised my voice slightly as I continued to rock my body back and forth whilst rubbing my aching head. 

"You know... you haven't really spoken to me..." his voice dropped and I felt the sadness in his voice. 

"It's because you're not real. You're a figment of my imagination because my mind has decided to go fucking weird..." 

"That's not true, I've always been in here! I'm you for god sake..." 

I rolled my eyes, rubbing my hands over my face and dragging down my sore and fragile skin. As I squinted my eyes, making sense of the scene around me... I was shocked to see I was at my favourite tree near my old house in Jersey. I frowned my brow, unsure of why my subconscious wanted to bring me here. I knew full well I was either knocked the fuck out or I was dead. I brought my shaky legs up to stand, admiring the orange skies around me. The clouds were a dark shade of purple, gracing the bright and vibrant skies much like they did when I was younger. Nockfell always felt it had a dark cloud over it, almost thick with pollution but New Jersey was always a bit different. It had its shithole areas, but it had its perks. I always remember coming to the fields with my Mom and Dad before we lost her. We used to come for hours of fun, running around and then finishing the day with a picnic that my mom had slaved in the kitchens for hours over. It was our family's little time to spend together. I was only three years old, but I remember everything so vividly. I remember falling down this small hill so many times that my Dad ended up rolling down with me as a fun game to hide my clumsiness. My Mom would wait at the bottom, laughing away as we would almost always clatter into each other at the end, nearly knocking my Mom over in the process. 

"Why am I here?" I turned and faced my reflection in confusion. 

"Not sure, maybe your mind needed you to come here for some reason?" he raised his perfectly formed eyebrow and smiled at me. 

"What I don't understand is, why did I go complete nuts? I couldn't see straight and now all of a sudden, I'm back in Jersey with another version of me? How the hell does my brain work?" I scoffed and rolled my eyes again. 

"Well Sal, the mind works in mysterious ways when it's been handed trauma after trauma..." 

"You're telling me.." I sigh and sit back down beside him, the gentle breeze caressing the under neath of my long, shaggy blue hair. I took in a deep breathe and for the first time, I felt my body relaxing. "I'd love to bring Riv here, she'd adore the beauty of this place. She's always been so at one with nature, finding the best even in the worst looking things... I mean hell, she fell for me..." 

"River, your girlfriend?" My persona nudged into me. 

"Well if you're technically me... River is our girlfriend..." I felt myself chuckling for some bizarre reason. "This whole situation feels so strange"

"I suppose seeing yourself in this way is weird. It's weird for me to see me this way too to be honest..." his voice dropped as he turned to face me. 

I looked back at myself, intrigued with how my face would have looked if the accident never happened. My face was smaller, more sculpted with carved cheekbones and a perfectly straight jawline. As the accident caused half my face to be essentially blown off, my cheek bones were slight more sunken, my jawline was messy as it was patched back together and my nose missing a large chunk, causing my nostril to be slightly larger on that side. His hair was long, mimicking mine but much more tidy and wavy. I know that had nothing to do with the accident but it's almost as if I completely gave on my appearance altogether and that my hair was never a second thought. The biggest thing I noticed was that I had small freckles, dotted all over my nose and my eyes shone so brightly I was mesmerised by my own reflection. I had never looked at myself for so long but seeing me in this parallel universe made me realise how ugly I was. I closed my eyes tightly, avoiding his gaze as the realisation hit me. I was a monster.