D R O P D E A D {Completed} (UNDER RECONSTRUCTION -- 2018)

(iii) - 'Look at you, and your Catholic sensibilities!'

What an absolute bloody nightmare.

I rolled over the next morning, feeling completely zombified, but as luck would have it the phantom-boy from the hospital was gone. What a weird dream!

It left me wondering how much had been real, how much I'd fabricated. The pain of my Mam had definitely felt real, so that must have happened... and I had been sick, at Sabrina's silly thing. People totally had hallucinations due to like, illness, or emotional pain and stuff, right? And...

Oh, God.

I hated that feeling, the painful emptiness inside of my stomach, rolling over itself and getting ready to throw everything out onto the scabby carpet. It was my mam. My mam.

I could feel myself spiralling until the screech of my alarm alerted me that I was terribly late for school. Stumbling out of bed, I didn't even bother with the bathroom first thing – feet dragging down the carpeted steps, exhausted hand feeling along the wall until I reached the kitchen.

Breakfast was already laid out on the table, neat and precise – very unlike August, who was sitting at the back door and chain-smoking like he wanted to give himself lung cancer. I coughed, pre-emptively, and he tripped off the step with a curse.

"For god's sake, Andi."

"Sorry for interrupting you and your unhealthy coping mechanisms," I muttered, pulling out a seat at the table and flopping down. There was a hasty stubbing out of the cigarette, and he dragged himself back inside, up towards me. "You haven't smoked since I was like, twelve."

"Yeah." Cereal was poured, and the pair of us sat in silence.

"God, you look fierce. Big black eyes, messed up hair."

"Ah – what?" I stopped dozing over my cheerios and hauled my arse up straight.

"You're wrecked, kid." August leaned forward, over his toast, and tweaked my hair so that it'd lie a little more flat on my head. "Is it Julie?"

"Hmm." I pressed my lips together, line of sight flickering down to my crinkled lap. A trippy dream brought on by trauma. That explained it. "I just don't... I can't. August, I can't."

"I know. I know, petal. It all seems a bit grim right now, but I... God." He stopped, running his hands back through his own thick, dishevelled hair. "We've got to think about what'll happen... after. Make arrangements. Think about finances. Me working nights at Ritchie's isn't going to send you to college."

"August, don't. Don't do that, don't talk about that stuff right now." I shook my head. My head was completely screwed, and I was hardly in a place to start making arrangements.

"Alright. Okay. Go finish your breakfast, get ready for school –"

"I have to go to school?"

"Of course."

"August."

"Andi." He mimicked my distressed tone, before smiling sadly at me. "It's best if we just carry on as – hang on, pet."

August was interrupted by a loud, shrill ringing; he shambled up from his seat and out, towards the hallway, while I toyed with the food that was left in front of me. I'd hardly had an appetite for any of it, and I was exhausted anyway. Wasn't like a bowl of sawdust was going to magic all of my problems away.

"You're not – but yesterday – I saw her, we saw her, she was like, dying. She was dying."

I felt my blood run cold.

"Of course. Yeah, no, we'll get there right now. Holy – okay. Right away. Thanks so much for the call."

"August." I could barely wait for him to part from his mysterious phone conversation, instead pushing myself away from the table, legs catching over tiles. There was a sensation of sickening, heavy doom sweeping over me, grasping at the pit of my stomach; why, I wasn't sure yet, but something was making me shuffle towards the hall and come around the side of the door. "August, what is it, who is it, what're they saying?"

"It's your ma, she's... sitting up. And talking. Apparently." He looked completely mystified, still staring at the phone in his hand. I could hear it ringing out quietly from my position. "The doctors are going crazy. They've never seen anything like it."

"Oh my –" God. While the smile was growing over his face, encompassing every facet of his pale skin, I was beginning to think about what this would mean for my mortal soul.

Nothing good, surely.

"I know. I know, no one knows, but we've gotta get out there right away. No school today, come on." Already his hands were wrapping around my forearms, nudging me gently towards the stairs, encouraging me to climb them; but I didn't want to, I really, really didn't want to, because whatever had come to visit me last night was surely lurking in my bedroom and waiting for me to face it.

What the fuck have I done?

Each creak of the step was like another tick of the clock, closer and closer until I couldn't avoid letting myself into my bedroom and shutting the door behind me, trying very hard not to allow my eyes to drift to the corner of the room; where it was lurking. There, that asshole was, in all of his glory, looking a little crinkled and dark-eyed but otherwise, hideously present.

"You're doing pretty well. No screaming, no trying to run –"

"I've gone insane," I gave a little shrug, crossing the bedroom and beginning to dig in my closet for something suitable to wear, "Is all. Temporary insanity. Exhaustion and grief, is what it is. Yep. Figment of my imagination, you are. Where's my black hoodie?"

"If I'm a figment of your imagination," and said hallucination sounded mildly irritated, "Then I'm sure you won't mind if I park my ass on the bed and watch you getting dressed."

"You're a Figment," I said, my voice growing louder, and more insistent, "And you're going to go away."

"Andrea, shut up," the Figment spat out venomously, and I could feel all of the hair over my skin prickle in fear at the tone. "Your idiot of an uncle is going to hear you."

"You can't fucking be real."

"And why not?"

"Because the Devil doesn't exist, that's why."

"I'm sure he'd be very hurt to hear you saying that. Look at you, and your Catholic sensibilities!"

"That's exactly something my brain would say, if it was lying to me. Which it is." Just to be entirely on the safe side, I cracked the wardrobe door a little wider, so that it would partially obscure my pale, pimply body. The Figment had no sense of boundaries, it seemed.

"Oh, Hell, it's not like I want to see you naked." With poorly masked disgust, the Figment rose from the mattress – and almost immediately made use of the open window, because it sounded like something was swinging its leg over. I continued to get dressed, ignoring the black knot of anxiety that was still sticking in the pit of my stomach like tar. August would get a kick out of this, when I got the nerve up to tell him. Sell your soul, indeed. Like that sort of stuff happened in real life.

The iTunes Terms and Conditions of your soul. That had been a good one, though; I'd have to write it down someplace.

As I began to convince myself of the obvious explanation to the issue – that a long, emotional night, coupled with a terrible migraine, had induced some kind of mild psychosis – I could feel a calm washing over me, strange and still. That was entirely it. In fact, I now had time to revel in the good news that my mother, oddly enough, had defied all the medical odds in just a few short hours.

Yeah. Right.