To Be

Chapter Fifteen

Tendrils of smoke encircle me like a snake wrapping its slimy body around mine, choking me---suffocating me. I can't breathe.

"Grandma" I yell, my voice hoarse.

There's no answer.

I fall down onto my hands and knees, the smoke becoming my tomb. Warm tears begin to roll down my cheeks and my body trembles with my sobs.

"Shelby?"

I look through the hazy smoke to see a tall figure advancing toward me.

"Adrian," I choke, struggling to get to my feet.

"I'm coming for you," his voice echoes across the room. "Stay put."

I do, watching him make his way for me, pushing the smoke aside as if it was just cobwebs hanging from the light fixtures. He's just a few feet away when a beam from the ceiling crashes to the floor right where he is standing.

"Adrian, Adrian." I'm screaming and running and screaming some more.

I fall onto my knees before the beam, a sob getting caught in my throat. "Adrian," I whimper.

He's not moving, his eyes showing no form of life and I'm screaming once again...

Then the house and smoke are disappearing and I am crouched in some muddy patch in the woods. Everything is cold, except my 2 hands that I notice are covered in warm blood. Warm, warm, warm blood.

Frantic I look around, my eyes landing on the bloody body resting at the base of a tree. The worn-out, pink slippers on the feet of the corpse I will never forget.

"Grandma," I cry, struggling to stand up.

Someone stops me, strong hands that are not covered in blood holding me down by my shoulders. Metallic grey eyes gaze into mine. "You killed her," Levi says, his words piercing my heart.

"It-it-it was an accident," I stutter, bile rising in my throat.

"Was it?" he asks, his eyes on my blood-stained hands.

Adrian appears beside him, his beautiful evergreen eyes accusing me too. "Yes, Shelby, was it?"

I open my mouth to reply, but can't. Instead of words, blood is pouring out of my parted lips.

"You get what you deserve." Their icy cold voices wrap around me, carving those 5 words into my skin as I fall face-first into the mud. Going still.

***

I awake, my body encased in a cold sweat. So, so, so--- cold, cold, cold. I look down checking to see if those words are etched into my skin, 'you get what you deserve' --- my skin is clear as always. The breath I was holding escapes my lips with a soft puff of air, it was only a dream. A bad nightmare.