Snippet from a day of a boy who survived the APS attack.
The sky rumbles with the sound of thunder, and you look up. A lone raindrop lands on your eyelashes, wetting them, blurring your sight, and you blink it off. It cascades down your cheek, the icy cold water clinging to your jaw, quivering, by your chin and down your neck.
Glancing at your wristwatch again, you look ahead, and your fingers itch inside your pockets for a quick smoke. You fist your hands in your jacket, eyes closed, nerves tangled in a mess of anxiety, and stamp your feet for warmth; you can smell the approaching storm in the air.
Five minutes later you can’t take it anymore. Fishing your jean’s pocket for a lighter, you hold it close to the cancer stick in your mouth and watch as its end burns and settles to a dull red. Your breath floats as white mist in front of your face, and when you look up to blow the smoke, the grey sky welcomes you.
Eleven months, you think. Life in the aftermath isn’t what you’d quite pictured it to be. Your fingers fist themselves when you consider what you’ve become, how low you’ve fallen, barely a reflection of who you used to be. It makes you angry, this taint on your proud bloodline, the crippled state of your honor.
The white lilies you bought are sitting on the hood of your car, getting washed by the occasional raindrops that came down from the heaven above, and you frown in the cold atmosphere. Grey asphalt extends in both directions, with no flickering tail light to indicate the presence of any vehicle for miles. You suddenly think this is a bad idea, waiting out here in the cold where no one can hear you call for help. The gun in its holster feels heavy on your waistband and does little to calm your frayed nerves that seem to be jumping all over the place now.
Quit that, you berate yourself, feeling angry because of the sudden surge of fear that made your heart skip a beat. Pulling at the edge of your woolen cap, you lean against the door of your car again, hands secured in your jacket’s pockets where they will be warm, and look up again.
The air feels charged, as if sky is winding up a dynamo ready for a lightning display. Your wrist watch reads five thirty-seven. You decide to wait another five minutes.
You work the cigarette from one corner of your mouth to the other, like an expert would, and note how the ash sprinkles down every two seconds. Its end is barely lit, now that there’s no place left for the tiny flame to burn. You smoke the last ring in the direction of the sky, and watch as the fumes disperse in the wet atmosphere, disappearing in an instant. Another rogue drop of rain water touches your face as you take the cigarette out of your mouth and stub it under your sneakers, smearing the grey across the road.
The horizon’s getting darker now. Something black flickers by the corner of your existence, and you flinch, hands reaching for your firearm as a reflex, but when you open your eyes again, there’s nothing there; just an empty space resonating with your empty heart.
Your wrist watch reads five fifty-five. You pull the lilies back into your car- frustrated, angry, afraid; you can’t tell the difference between them anymore, not after that horrifying day – and push the keys in ignition. Blue neon fluid glows along the doors and the center console where you cram the heat to the maximum. The car comes to life silently, and you can imagine how the pressure exerted by your foot pushing on the pedals makes this beautiful monstrosity function.
Flickering the indicator (a force of habit, one which is too instinctual to ignore, even in face of the deserted roads), you pull the vehicle off the side of the road and take off. The rain, invisible against the black backdrop, beats down incessantly like a thousand warriors pounding on their prey, racing to see who could last out the longest. You pull the cap off of your head, and relinquish in the sudden heat that curls around your scalp. Your hair are standing erect, pillars of black on alabaster skin, and you find it difficult to look at yourself in your rearview mirror.
You’re a coward, there’s no denying that. You still can’t face their graves without having the incessant urge to kill yourself.
And there’s no hope for you. You’ll go back to that same house and bask in the emptiness that surrounds your heart and makes your days go. Because you’re still afraid, and the guilt too damn strong. There’s no redemption for people like you who hide behind monotony like toddlers clinging to their parents’ legs.
But it hurts, still does, even after all this time. You trace the scar on your hand, feel the ridges of uneven skin and close your eyes as the memories play behind your lids; you remember hiding under the corpse of your best friend, cowering in fear, too scared to make a sound, too weak to move; you remember the echo of gunshots reverberating in hallways and the hiss of crimson blood gushing out of wounds, a never ending symphony of anguish, where battle cries resonated with screams of agony and the words didn’t exist. But most of all, you remember your own selfishness, your immobility, the dread that had frozen your bones and pooled under your tongue.
The colors you see shadowing the corners of your mind make you angry. Your fingers tremble on the gear-stick with bitter rage.
The road is still empty ahead, and maybe if you accidentally push the accelerator to hard, God will take pity on you and spare you the pain when your car smashes into a tree. Closing your eyes, you clutch the steering wheel tightly, fingernails digging into the matte finishing, and you think you’re ready for it. You almost really are.
But when a horn blares at you, your senses snap back to life and the adrenaline saves your neck from shattering into a million pieces. Your lung protests when you draw in hurried, uneven breaths, and your heart takes a while to leave your throat. The ringing in your ears is consistent, the throbbing of your pulse in your neck too strong.
You’re still not ready to leave. It shouldn’t relieve you, but it does.
