Torment

TORMENTfive

Blue, nothing but blue. A light blue sky with no wisps of cloud present and a deep blue cavernous ocean. I look down. My feet are lying on wet sand. Just as I thought. I'm at the seaside.

The tide comes rushing in. I gasp as the water is death-cold. Strange. It's cold - too cold. I turn around. No tourists. An empty promenade. No activity at all. Seems suspicious. No, hang on. There is someone. They're running towards me. Damn. Why do I always have to attract attention?

I swear under my breath. Hang on. My tongue's in place. Please say that was just my imagination. Then - Oh damn! Someone's got there arms around me!

I prise off the person's fingers and am ready to kick them where they know it's going to hurt when the person says, "Lou! Overeactive much?" I look up. There she is - the one, the only, my sister Tess. She moved out recently, which must have been why I didn't dream of her...

"So!" She says, interrupting my thoughts. "Aren't you going to hug me?" Of course I was! I run towards her denim jacket and squeeze her really tightly.

"OK," she says, happily. "You can let go now." I don't. I'm never letting her go. Not after that dream with my parents. As I think of that, I hug her even tighter.

"Lou, it's alright, you can stop now!" she says seriously. She's speaking in that tone? I know something's up. But I can't move my hands

"Lou! LOU! Damn God, LOU?" she manages to croak out. I'm trying, I really am. But something is holding my hands in place. Something which must hate me. Then she falls down limp. Wonder how that happened?

I feel her wrist for a pulse - I hope she's only unconscious. I really do. I feel her wrist, wanting to find a pulse.

No pulse.

Red marks start to show around Tess's neck. Red marks shaped like hands. I didn't think I could hug someone that hard. And didn't I hug her waist, not neck. Therefore, I shouldn't have strangled her. Shouldn't. I've been down on luck recently.

I replay the memory in my head. I ran, then hugged her at the waist. No, that's not it. I grasped her by the throat...

I killed my own sister. And I cry. Big feverish sobs wrack my body. I couldn't have, could I?

I wipe my eyes and look at the tears. Tears of blood. I feel around my eyes. There are cuts where the tear ducts should be. I look above my dead sister's body. There, holding two shards of glass is Matt. His voice is distorted as it comes from his mouth.

"You must pay the consequences." Matt shouted. He smirked at me, then ran at me and pinned me to the floor.

I tried shrieking but he had somehow put a prop in my mouth which I couldn't get rid of. And finally after millennia of waiting, he had completed his task. A dissection of my tongue. He had cut it bit by bit. Slowly, painfully. He threw each clump of tongue muscle at my face.

His last words to me? "Go die somewhere else." Then he kicks me away.

I know it's not my imagination now. I know that this can't be some warped nightmare. I would never want to kill my sister. I would never dream about it. I would never dream about the pain Matt has caused me. This has to be real. It has to be.