ELBINA 2

Chapter 11

"That bastard." He kicks at the flattened tire, both of them that I can see are flattened.
I feel like I should be crying but I think I'm also still in shock. It hasn't quite hit me yet and I still don't believe it.
He's irritated, it's not going like he planned but he pushes me towards the car Fallen brought and I notice it's Dan and Halley's. I don't even contemplate fighting back, my mind still seeing Fallen falling.
How am I supposed to do anything if he couldn't?
Even if I stumble or I slow up, that gun is pressing harder into the back of my neck, pushing me on and reminding me of the consequences.
I don't have anything more to lose right now, I should fight. I should do something.
Why am I not doing something?
He pushes me against the car, my cheek touching the cold metal of the roof. He's leaning into my body, holding me there when I feel the gun being taken off my neck. I hear a clink of something being placed on the roof of the car behind my head but I don't want to assume it's the gun.
"Give me them." He growls into my ear when I resist his hand gripping my wrist as he tries to bring it behind me. I pull it out of his grip again, the friction making my wrists burn.
This time he's angry, he kicks at my knees and twists me till I land hard on the floor. My chin grazes the pavement but that's when I see someone on the other side of the car, knelt down on their knee. I see them plant a hand on the ground as they start to move slowly towards the front of the car.
It had to be him. They're limping, struggling along the ground.
I start to fight, pulling and kicking, I nearly get a foot planted on the ground but he kicks it out from under me.
"GET DOWN!" His shout is loud and aggressive, he sits on my back and I'm stuck. His weight holding me down too much for me to do anything.
My arms are twisted in an odd and painful direction, I feel one tie around my wrist and then the same on my other. He's pulling them together and I know that I won't be able to get out of these makeshift handcuffs. They're three linked together, I can't let him connect it with the third.
I won't have a chance.
I can't see him under the car anymore, he's too far around to the front and out of my line of sight so I fight with as much of me as possible.
He's cursing at me so it's getting even harder to fight against him.
Finally he's off, rolling into the muddy ground beside the road.
I plant my hands on the ground to get on my knees, the loose tarmac digging harshly into my skin.
Lucas.
I can see his face under the ominous moonlight, landing a punch into the man's face. It's weak though, I can see it and I can see he's wincing at every movement.
He's rolled onto his back, I scramble up quickly, hooking my arms around the man's neck from behind. He tries shaking me off but I drop back, slamming into the ground behind me and bringing him with me.
I wrap my legs around his waist and tighten my grip, desperately trying to keep him down with me.
My eyes trail upwards, Lucas is struggling to get up. He's coughing and wheezing, hands splayed out on the ground in front of him.
"LUCAS! THE GUN!" I flick my head in the direction of the car where I can see it just peeking over from the edge of the roof.
"HURRY!" I don't know what we're going to do once we get it but it's the only thing I can think of.
"LUCAS!" He's shaking his head but he's still getting up slowly. My grip is slipping and when I try to readjust my arms he manages to grab my hand and before I know it, he's brought it up and his teeth sink into the fleshy palm of my thumb.
I try holding on, screaming from the pain.
He jabs his elbow into my gut till I'm winded, so I can't stop him getting up and I can't stop him from heading straight into Lucas.
Lucas drops the gun in the collision, it clatters to the ground noisily.
I scramble up quickly, palm bleeding and grazing along the floor till I can grab the gun before he turns around.
He's stalking towards Lucas. I can see him reach under his jacket, it's a knife.
It's long and serrated and ready.
He takes another step closer to Lucas whose inching backwards along the ground.
Before I can think about it, I lift the gun.
"YOU TAKE ANOTHER STEP AND I'LL SHOOT!"
He pauses, his shoulders raising. They're not just raising, they're jumping up and down.
He's chuckling, quietly and it isn't until he's turned fully around that I can even confirm it.
His eyes looking at the gun in my hands, his head tilting to the side with a shake of his head.
"You don't even know how to use it."
"I know enough." I hissed right back.
"But you won't. You haven't got it in you." He taunts, that smile still there that all I want to do is wipe it right off.
"Try me then, asshole." I say, clenching my jaw to stop the wobble.
I can see his grip on the knife twitch, his eyes narrow when they meet mine.
He suddenly steps back, the knife heading straight down towards Lucas.
BANG
He jolts, nearly falling from the force of the bullet.
I look down, blood seeps from between his fingertips at his stomach.
"Lucas, get away from him!" I shout shakily, the power from the shot ricocheted through to my shoulders so they're aching away.
I can see in the corner of my vision he's dragging himself away from the man and closer to me but I keep my eyes on him. Watching him stumble, I gulped seeing it.
"You really are his sister." He spits blood at me, I almost step back.
"Don't listen to him." Lucas says to me, I have to grit my teeth even harder to try and do as he says.
For a moment, we're all just looking back at each other. My shoulders and arms sore by how hard I'm holding the gun.
I look down for a second to Lucas whose trying to get up, planting a foot on the ground to stand.
Another set of footsteps in the quiet alerts me which is when I see him taking long and quick strides towards us.
I really don't think, I just lift my arms and squeeze with my finger in shock.
It sends him back till he falls to the floor.
My breathing fast in a panic.
I can't move, I still have the gun in a tight grip in front of me.
His gurgling stops but I see his body twitch little by little, rising up and down from the ground but he doesn't say anything. I can see the blood glistening against his fleece, pooling and soaking the material. It isn't gushing, not anymore, it's slowly seeping out. Like the push behind it has dissipated and it's just kind of flowing out of him like nothing, he doesn't need it anymore. My eyes search desperately for some form of life, an ounce of a breath from him but there isn't, I know it.
I know what I've done. It was the right thing to do, It had to have been.
Because he was going to kill us, he was a bad person, there was no other way. If I keep telling myself that then maybe the real fact won't feel like such a gargantuan mistake, that I could have done something else instead of shooting him.
Or did I mean to kill him? He was a murderer after all, he deserved it.
But what does that make me?
Do I deserve to die then? If he believed Dan, Halley and Fallen should have died and ultimately believed Lucas should have too, then does that make me any different from him?
My breaths come out faster and shallower that I start to get light-headed because he's still not moving and this is still real.
Lucas moves in front of me calling my name, but I keep staring at the man on the ground. The blood is virtually at a stop now, it's all gone and the time where his body was twitching is done and it's only silent and still.
And that's it. His life is done and I made that decision for him.
Everything breaks in me, worse than before.
He's dead.
Because of me.
He's dead because I'm a murderer.
He's dead.
I'm not sure when I started sobbing uncontrollably, it's probably once Lucas grabs the gun slowly from my hands, easing it away from me. I'm not even sure what he does with it.
It's so hard to breathe between the sobs, I feel like I'm choking.
But I'm still breathing and he's not.
I'm a monster and he's dead.
And nothing that Lucas is saying to me is working.
He's still dead.
I still killed him.
Lucas wraps his arms around me, pulling me into his chest and holding me there, trying to talk to me. He's crying too which only makes me sob harder.
"You had to." It mumbles against my neck.
"You had to." He keeps saying it and I keep shaking my head.
But what if I didn't?
I wrap my arms around his waist, till a headache develops and stabs me in the temple.
Shit.
"Fallen." I whisper, the blood from his cheeks smear onto mine when he pulls back, a tight grimace on his face. Screwed up into pain and overwhelming sadness. He isn't the same, everything about him is different and I guess it's the same for me. He's brushing a thumb over my cheekbone, glancing back up the hill where we both know he is.
"Fallen." I say harder, trying not to look at him on the floor and removing myself from Lucas. Even if I don't want to, I have to see him.
"Ella. You don't want to see it." I don't believe it. I need to see it. I pull my arm out of his hand, dragging myself up the slight incline to him.
It takes an eternity, sliding up there and I can barely see where I'm going but the closer I get, the more I can see his dark figure on the ground. He isn't moving. I can catch the ominous glow of the moon from above us, reflecting off his nose and his cheekbones.
My knees hit the floor beside him.
He can't be.
"Fallen?" I don't even touch him, I'm too afraid to. He's so quiet laying there.
I grab hold of his arm and I squeeze it hard, nothing.
I lean over and hold the back of my hand beneath his nose, I shake so much I'm not sure if he's breathing. I say his name louder this time, sniffling away some of the tears.
But then I see it.
"LUCAS!" I shout down to him, he's still by the cars, on his knees where I left him.
"LUCAS!" I glance back at Fallen before shouting again. "HE'S ALIVE!"
The utter relief hits me in the chest that I cry all over again, I shake him to wake him up a little more. His eyes continue their fluttering when he tries to get a grasp onto consciousness.
"Hey." I sputter out and he groans in pain. There isn't a gun shot in his head but when I pull the hat off I notice the tear in the material and then I feel the blood stain my fingers when they graze across the side of his head. He only just missed.
"You're going to be okay." I say, he goes to lift his hand up to his head, but I stop him.
It takes him a couple of minutes to wake up, by then, Lucas is behind me. A hand on my shoulder as I help Fallen to sit up from the floor.
"Where is he?" He looks panicked all of a sudden, looking at the both of us when I drop my head away from him. Gulping down the guilt. I shouldn't feel guilty, I had to.
Lucas answers for me and Fallen follows his head down to the bottom of the hill. He widens his eyes in realisation before he turns to me and I can feel the tears brimming at the surface.
He understands better than anyone what I'm feeling, he opens up his arms and pulls me into his chest. His hand holding the back of my head steady.
His words muffle against my shoulder. "I'm sorry." I'm shaking my head against his chest, trying to forget the recoil of the gun in my hands when it went off. Trying to forget everything else that happened after that.
But really. I should be sorry, not Fallen. Sorry because truthfully, I wanted that man to die... I just hoped that it would be up to Fallen to do it for me.
Now that I know what it takes to do it. I realise how selfish that really is.
To expect him to do the dirty work for me, to expect him to be the one with all the guilt.
I circle my arms around his waist and I squeeze him tighter.
****************
"You can't drive." Lucas looks at me stoic, leaning against the doorframe again. He's holding himself so carefully, protecting his abdomen like his life depends on it.
My head shakes when I reply. "And neither can you."
I pushed him into the passenger seat anyway. Shutting the door behind him, pausing to lean against the doorframe. In the corner of my eye, I can see him on the ground, still dead.
I have to take a second to rein in my breathing, they're still vibrating against my voice box that it comes out all jittery. My feet move on their own accord, dragging my body around the front of the car and to the driver's side. I open the door and slide in, hands still shaking when they grab hold of the handle and pull it shut behind me.
"What do I do?" I turn to Lucas beside me, Fallen is still feeling dazed in the back so he stays quiet when Lucas begins explaining. It doesn't take long and I do as he says, the car jumps awfully when I eventually get it moving and I stall once with my shaky foot on the clutch before I actually get anywhere. Thankfully, it's quiet and there's no one else on the road when I veer off to the right of the road as I'm trying to change the gear.
Eventually I managed to arrive back at the house, parking at the side of the verge near the front of the shop. I can see the little path at the side of the building where it carries on down to the bungalow that resides at the back.
I'm afraid to go in, knowing what I know now.
"You stay here." I say to him, shutting off the engine. He shakes his head with a deep frown.
"You're not leaving me here."
I unclip my seatbelt, pleading with him to listen to me. "You can barely walk, please –"
"I don't want to be alone." I pause when he looks at me long and hard, then I see the fear in his eyes, and I get it and so I nod.
We all step out of the car and start making our way down the little path. There's still a pouring of light escaping from the hallway, streaming out from the open front door. My eyes inadvertently survey the surrounding garden, almost expecting there to be someone looking right back at me. When I don't see anyone, I step through the open door and into the hallway and even from here I can see the open kitchen door at the end. Somehow, I already know what's in there.
"They've got some camping equipment in the shed. I'll grab that." Fallen says, my head turns only partly when I see him bypass the open door and walk past out of sight.
"You okay?" I nod to Lucas, but he doesn't do anything in response, he's staring at the open kitchen door. Which only further answers my question.
I open the first door on the right, just before the door to the bathroom, it's the cupboard. It's lined at the bottom by shoe racks, mud coated walking boots lined up next to each other. One or two nice looking boots which I presume belonged to Halley. There's a bunch of coats too, all hung over one another from the sheer volume of different types, hats and scarfs messily thrown on top of some of them. None of what I need except the two large rucksacks of theirs followed by the one we brought along as well. When I picked them all up, ours was still heavy, filled up with all the things Lucas had piled into it back then. Once I had what I needed, I shut the door again. Picking up the bags from the floor and dragging them to the centre of the hallway.
He said others would be coming. I should be hurrying, even if I wasn't sure he was telling the truth.
Yet I hesitated for a long time in the hallway, looking along with Lucas at the open door at the end before I finally built up the courage.
"You clean yourself up in the bathroom." I turn to Lucas. "I'm going to get supplies." I pick up two of the bags from the floor by my feet, helping him move to the next door and trying not to think of how messed up he looks.
When he's in, despite how much I really don't want to go in there. Despite how much I can see it has affected Lucas, I continue down the hallway, stepping through the kitchen doorway before I can backtrack.
When I see them, the breath gets knocked out of me. I have to plant my palm against the wall to keep my knees from crumbling beneath me. Tears immediately build up in my eyes, having to swallow them down just to stop myself from spiralling.
There's a third chair, beside Dan. I can't look at him, I can see enough of the blood. But the third chair has stains of red on it as well, nothing in comparison but it's obvious he was in it. He watched it happen. He tortured him and killed them in front of him. This time, I can't hold back the tears, they flow out of my eyes in torrents. No amount of breathing or forcing them down will work, not when Lucas' fear of being left alone again makes even more sense now, of what he lived through tonight.
He should be at home. He shouldn't be here.
I swipe my sleeves over my eyes again, my heart racing in my chest so it feels like it's not working quite right anymore. The guilt keeps on building and building, it's all I feel now. This horrible agonising guilt that won't go away and that's been there the entire time since Fallen took us.
I try not to think, I move to the counters and grab whatever bottles I can and start filling them with water. My hands shake and I can't help but notice the silence in the house, that cosy nature a distant memory from this afternoon, now replaced by the eerie emptiness.
It takes only fifteen minutes for me to grab some essentials. We'd have to camp; I'm not staying in another house again. I knew this was a terrible idea from the start, I knew nothing good would come of it. The thought just makes me angry because Lucas wouldn't be in this position if it weren't for the decision to stay here.
I'd have never had to kill someone.
Dan and Halley wouldn't be dead.
Lucas would be okay.
I slam shut the pantry door, tying up the bag when the back door opens and Fallen steps through. He doesn't look past me, he can't look at their bodies on the floor. He's holding a couple of bags, two I presume are tents because they're larger than the others which are smaller and rounder. There's a couple other things in his hands and that I see are on the ground behind him outside of the house.
"Are you done?" He gulps when he looks at me, I know I'm glaring at him with so much anger that he doesn't quite understand what happened.
I'm so mad now that I've been thinking too much. I need someone to blame and he's the perfect candidate. The relief of him being alive earlier is obliterated when my eyes remember the battered skin on Lucas' face.
"I am so fucking done." I throw the bag at him, but it falls feebly between the two of us since it's too heavy for me to properly throw. My tone is filled with so much venom when I speak. "With all of this. With you."
He doesn't respond. I wipe at my tears again, the grazes on my palms stinging when I clench my fists hard.
"I told you!" I jab a finger in his direction. "I told you this wasn't a good idea!" He still does nothing, even his expression is stoic. "I knew we shouldn't have come here. WHY DID I LISTEN TO YOU!?" He drops the bags on the floor by his feet, genuine worry on his face.
I don't even know quite what I'm saying at this point, all I know is that I'm angry at everything. I'm fuming and shaking in rage so when I point at him, my hand can't stay still.
"THIS." I point to them behind me, still dead and still bloodied. "IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I LISTEN TO YOU!" It's mixed in with unintentional sobs, my lower lip jittering everywhere until I suck in a breath and hold it down.
He raises his hands in surrender, asking, begging me to stop. "Elbina-"
"If it weren't for you Fallen." I say darkly. "THEY'D STILL BE ALIVE!" I knew I was wrong.
"If it weren't for you Fallen. LUCAS WOULDN'T HAVE WATCHED THEM DIE; HE'D BE SAFE... I'D BE SAFE!"
He walks up to me, trying to hold onto my arms but I don't want him near me. I don't want him touching me, I'm so angry and lost in the emotion that I don't think of anything but how it's all his fault.
I twist a little, pushing him back behind me and he falls. I'm horror stricken when I see him fall against the floor, right into the pool of blood on the ground beside Dan. He smears against the blood when he tries to catch himself, the red coating his hand and jacket. His entire body freezes when he looks down at it.
Yet somehow in my brain it doesn't register, and the words leave my mouth before I can stop them. They're vicious and I can't even describe the expression that lands on his face.
"You killed them. And I know if me and Lucas stay with you, you'll kill us too. Because you're dangerous, Fallen!" I don't mean it; I know it's stupid and a lie, but I still say it. "You destroy everything you touch!" His breaths come out harsh when he looks up at me from the floor, tears building in his eyes, he believes every word I'm saying. He can't look away from me, even as I step closer to him, leaning down at him with so much vengeance that I don't even know who I am anymore. "None of this would have happened, if it weren't for you."
My shoulders heave up and down when I glare down at him, the anger wearing off. The guilt seeping back in and I lower my hand away from him.
Which is when I see what I've done to him, he looks like a child beaten on the floor. Curled into himself away from me, blood soaked into the material of his jeans now as well when he had to inch away from me stepping towards him. Then I hear movement from the doorway and when I look up, I see Lucas' expression too.
His disappointment is too much, it's too strong and directly at me that I have to turn away and grab the bags from the floor. I kicked whatever Fallen had hold of out of the door, slamming it shut behind me when I stepped outside.
I start organising the camping stuff into the bags, attaching the tents to the back of two of them. It gives me something to do, to get my mind off of what I just did.
I'm a monster.
I didn't mean any of it, it just came out. I should have told him that the minute I said it, that I'm sorry and that it wasn't what I thought of him.
But I'm a coward now too.