Remains

To Find You / Sing Street

❝I sat there, curled up in cowardice, for God knows how long.

If I'm honest, I could have possibly sat there for hours, weeping until I had no tears left, bleeding until it dried and cracked on my skin.

Even when I was beyond being able to expend tears, every time I opened my eyes, hoping it was merely a nightmare, I only saw Elijah and let out more dry sobs, straining my tired lungs and further irritating my dry throat.

I quietly wailed to myself, knowing no more noise would easily escape my chapped lips. My entire body throbbed; from my leg to my head, everything seemed to hurt more than it should have.

It's not fair. None of this is fair. Why is this happening to me?

I just want to go home.

I writhed around in my own empty shell, my epidermis stinging as if the air around me was also against me. My nails dug into my palms as I rocked myself, wishing there was something to put me at ease, or even distract me for a while.

I wish I still had my music.

Music was always my escape from everything. Any time I went through a breakup or something upsetting, I blasted some music and I was instantly transported to somewhere that there was nothing left to cry over. It never failed to improve my mood, and I knew that it would be a temporary relief from the situation I was in, no matter how bad it seemed.

Of course, now that my phone was in an unsettling amount of pieces, I couldn't do anything but suffer in silence. I knew I had to get my mind off of my injury and the shock that still hounded me, so I began to count.

"One..."

I only could mouth the first number, my voice still finding its way back up my throat.

"Two..."

My voice was barely audible now, the sound just above a silent breath.

"Three..."

There, a cracked whisper, but at the time, the sound of my own voice was enough to distract me.

"Four... Five..."

I flinched as I heard a gunshot from somewhere in the store, and I shook my head and continued to count, my heartbeat accelerating again.

"Six... Seven... Eight..."

A slapping sound on the tile, only a few meters away. Someone was coming.

Despite the oncoming individual, I couldn't take my mind off the distraction.

"Nine..."

"Someone please help me!" Cried an older woman's voice, and she soon came into view.

The elderly woman was dragging herself across the tile, wincing and sobbing. She locked her frightened gaze with mine, and I knew that she was trying to get away from what was going to come. I tried to look away, I tried to close my eyes, I even tried to utter the next number.

But I couldn't.

I was stuck like a deer in the headlights, staring wide-eyed at her in shock. There was another gunshot, too close for comfort, and her body jolted at the impact.

Her eyes rolled to the back of her head and she collapsed to the floor. She was dead.

Another death in this horror show.

At first, I was too appalled to even breathe. I suddenly felt sick to the stomach, the realness finally hitting me in a wave of looming nausea. I turned to the side and retched, but nothing came up except coughing and another attack of dry sobbing.

This wasn't just a night terror anymore.

This was real.

I broke down again, my insides churning and another splitting headache gnawing at my skull.

I wished that I could just wake up and it would all be over, and my body began to numb.

I couldn't think straight anymore.

It had only been a few hours at most, but I had already felt myself beginning to shut down. How many had died already? There was no way for me to know how many had fallen without endangering myself. I had no idea if I could even walk, let alone hold myself together. I had witnessed two deaths, but I knew there were more.

My brain thought of nothing else but one more word.

"Ten..."

And with that, I somehow succumbed to the sweet release of a dreamless sleep.❞