Sunset Valley

Chapter 12.

My hands are bound behind me, and somehow I'm on my knees. Where am I? I look around to find evidence for an answer. I'm in a fairly dark room in the corner. The room is completely empty except for me and Jem, who is in the middle of the room with a huge basket of medicines.

"Jem!" I shouted his name. "Untie me!! Jem!" But he couldn't hear me, it seemed. I was forced to just sit there and watch him. He was in tattered clothes, I realized, and had long cuts all up his arms and legs. I even spotted one on his collarbone. It was weird seeing him this way, he was almost always clean and had no injuries.

He took out of the medicine basket all the sleeping pills he could find and a couple random others I couldn't read. I wondered what he was doing, and more importantly, why. He fished out a bunch of pills, cupped them in his hands, and took a deep breath. Then he swallowed them all without chewing and washed them down with a strange purple colored medicine.

What. Is he doing.

Then he swallowed as many as he could before collapsing and gripping his stomach, as if he knew it was a matter of time before that would happen. I screamed and tried as hard as I could to get free, but with every struggle the restraints got tighter. Jem went a sickly color, a color nobody should ever be.

"Somebody save him!" I yelled.

But as his breathes went rapid, I knew nobody else but me could save him. And even I can't do that right now.

I just sat there, watching as my best friend finally goes motionless. There wasnt much blood. Just a small trickle at the edge of his lips. I wondered why he killed himself. And why he made me watch without being able to do anything about it. I began to sob in my little corner. I was as helpless and weak as he was now.

And then I woke up.

Round, green eyes the color of new leaves were staring into mine. They didn't belong to Freya or to Jem.

"You okay, miss?"

Neither did the voice.

I let out a small, panicked noise and backed up into a tree, afraid it was the police again. But when I looked, I just saw a boy with dusty blonde hair and the green eyes staring at me. A shy girl stood worried behind him.

"Sorry," he chuckled, walking closer to me. "I didn't mean to startle you." He stuck out a hand, and a very bright grin. "The name's Torrance, although I'm sure you've heard of me before."