Prey.

04

Neela awoke with the sensation of falling. It was nighttime when she became conscious. Her whole body was numb, but still in pain. Neela looked like a mess. Her hair was messy, cuts and bruises littered her face and body, the image was almost beautiful. She looked so small, so hurt; so vulnerable.

Neela looked around the small room as much as her injured neck would let her. A little boy stood in the doorway of the small hospital room. When she first saw the little boy, she was startled, to say the most. Until she saw that he was only a boy. He looked to be six or seven years old. His body was frail, his skin had a few bruises also. His skin held a certain fairness to it. He was almost otherworldly. Not ghost-like, but the boy possessed a strange, transcendent quality He wore a white hospital gown, like the one Neela was wearing.

He just stood there in the doorway, not moving even an inch. His face wore a transfixed smile of happiness when he looked at Neela. "Are you awake? I didn't mean to wake you..." The small boy spoke softly and sounded weak. They gazed at each other for a moment or two, they were hypnotized by each other. "Hi, there," Neela offers a tiny smile. Neela then notices his eyes, a bright blue that captured the pale moon almost perfectly.

"My name is Austin."

"Shouldn't you be in your room, Austin?" Comes Neela's hoarse question. "It's lonely in there, in my room." Neela then felt bad. She tried her best to sit up but was failed once again. "My name is-" Neela was cut off.

"I'm sorry your friends got killed." The way Austin spoke shook Neela's core. He bright eyes showed innocence. The way the words and syllables danced off his tongue was frightening. "How did you know about the crash, Austin?" Neela asked softly, could she have said it so soft from fear or sadness? I don't know. "I could tell you were sad. I just wanted to see if you were all right." He then looked at the tiny bedside pillow to the right of Neela's right hand. "I left Ryder for you...I used to hug him when I was sad or scared...I want you to do the same." Neela looked to her right and saw a very squishy, soft, orange-yellow teddy bear.

Neela looked at Austin and he gave Neela a shy smile, kinda like he was nervous or embarrassed. He then turned to leave on his left heel. "Wait, Austin, don't go," Neela calls out, but Austin has already disappeared down the dark corridor.

That night almost felt like a dream.

Neela woke up the next morning, not from a nightmare, but from her own will. When 9 a.m rolled around, a nurse came to check Neela's vitals and to give her more medicine through her IV tube. "Have you seen the little boy on this floor? The one who looks kinda sad, Austin." Neela asks. The nurse looks at her perplexed, "there are no little boys on this floor?" The nurse informed Neela in an asking temper. Neela lets out a small hum, "he must've wandered up from the children's ward then. I was just wondering why he was here." The nurse halts, "there hasn't been a children's ward here since 1988."

Neela laid back down after the nurse left. She looked over at the bedside table, there it was. Ryder.

~~

After a few hours, Neela's dad came back to the hospital. "I'm so glad you're okay." Neela's dad gave her a gentle hug, "how was it, sleeping in a hospital by yourself?" He sits on the chair he's brought over, "I've tried convincing the nurses to let me stay with you, you're underage, they should've let me, the dumb cun-"

"Dad!" Neela interrupted. "Sorry," he sighs, "I just missed you." Andrew held his daughter's dainty hand. "I basically slept the whole night," Neela lied, she didn't want her father to look at her like how the nurse did.

"No nightmares?" Neela shook her head, "wow, sleeping in this place must be good for you." Andrew joked. "I'll be back, I'm gonna go ask the nurse if you can have real food, instead of these ice chips."

"Are you feeling okay?" A voice spoke in Neela's head, she shrugged it off. Her head just probably isn't used to a good night's sleep, she thought. "Keep telling yourself that, angel."

Andrew came back in after a few more minutes, "okay, no real food. Only ice chips. I swear to god, they are a bunch of cun-"

"Dad!" Neela interrupted again. "Sorry!" He put his hands up in surrender. "Changing the subject, I told them about your nightmares." Neela made a hand motion, urging him on. "They said they brought you to the sleep ward at about 3 a.m last night because the people watching over you said it was obvious you were having nightmares. You were like, convulsing, they took you here to monitor your brain waves. They also gave you a medicine to suppress dreams."

They make medicine for that now? "Where do we get that?" Neela chuckled, "that stuff can only be administered by a doctor, they're using this medicine for a test run."

"Well, it worked," Neela commented, "I don't even remember having any nightmares at all."

"That's even better." They sat in a calm for a few seconds, "are you okay?"

Neela shook her head, "no," she pursed her lips together. Andrew leaned forward, "do you want to talk about it?"

She shook her head again, "no." She paused for a few more seconds, "I know they're dead mostly. I just want to get back to a pseudo happy life."

"Now!" Andrew raised his voice in a warning temper, "they weren't even your friends."

Neela crunched her eyebrows, "I still knew them, I went to grade school with them. That was probably the worse thing you could've said to me at this moment in time."

"Whatever." His attitude completely changed, "you have to stay here for a few more days, you're missing the funerals, school starts back for you in three weeks. I gotta go back to work. Bye."