Fallen Raine {Completed}

Chapter Four - The Adventures of Jock-Guy, Brood-Boy & I

~Chapter Four - The Adventures of Jock-Guy, Brood-Boy & I~

         ******RIVER’S POV******

            I walked through the midway strip of the second story of Mapleton Mall with Brood-Boy and Jock-Guy, as I had come to call them. I couldn’t remember their names, so I didn’t even bother.

            Plus, it wouldn’t matter in a couple of hours.

            “What’s the point of this again?” I asked Jock-Guy, staring at him dully.

            “To find any people still trapped in here,” Jock-Guy replied, as if it were blatantly obvious.

            “Why? We’re not facing a zombie apocalypse or alien invasion. We’re just trapped in a mall. What’s the point?”

             “I don’t know. In case anyone gets scared and confused about why they’re trapped in a mall with no way out. Maybe they think they’re trapped alone.”

 This guy seemed a little too goody-goody for me, so I lapsed into silence. I walked past butcher’s and newsagent’s and clothes stores and shoe outlets that offered discounts on everything. This was Jess’s scene, not mine.

             Personally I’d rather be doing what I was doing earlier with Jess than be trapped here now looking for people that I didn’t even know, for no truly legitimate reason.

           Just as I was cursing my life at the moment, a shrill squeal echoed around the glass roof around me, and I stiffened at the familiar sound.

            That was Jess’s scream. I’d know it from anywhere. Not for any romantic reason, but because I’d been dragged into too many shoe outlet stores with her, and had learned to recognize her scream when she spotted a particularly good discount on a pair of hot-pink stilettoes that were ‘so this season.’

           I stayed still for a second, listening for any other sounds. For a second there was a silence so deafening it hurt, before another, less hysterical, scream rang out. It was a shriek of shock and horror, and somehow I knew immediately it was Raine.

     I don’t know how, but I just knew.

             Before I even knew what I was doing, I took off in the direction of the scream, my arms and legs pumping as I ran down the aisles so fast every store whipped by in an indistinguishable blur of colors. I wasn’t quarterback of the football team for nothing.

             The noise was soon joined by another pair of sneakers that slapped heavily on the ground, and the boy soon matched pace with me and stayed there.

            It was Jason, and I briefly wondered where Travis was. Wow, turns out I did know their names.

            I ran down the now-stationary escalator and tried carefully not to trip over. I wouldn’t—I had steady feet—but you could never really be too careful when it came to these kinds of things.

           They were all the way on the other side of the mall, so we ran for about two minutes before we reached their area. The first thing I saw was Jess, hunched up against a wooden counter of a fruit produce store, sobs wracking her whole body as mascara made tracks down her face from the tears she was currently shedding. Her chest rose and fell rapidly as she let out hysterical little yells of horror.

            Then I noticed Raine. For a second I couldn’t take in her expression because her mahogany hair was covering her face in soft curlicues. Then she looked up at me and I finally saw her.