No one moves. No one speaks. Silence consumes us all. Our wide-eyed stares stay glued on the fallen figure in front of us.
I can't find a single word to say. Every thought escapes my mind.
None of this feels real. It has to be a dream. No. A nightmare. Nothing else could explain how I got here. How any of this could happen. This can't be real life. I'm not here. I'm not part of this. I didn't just watch two people get murdered right in front of me. That doesn't happen in real life. Not in my life.
Those people aren't dead. Neither of them are real. They don't exist. My mind made them up to play the villains in this dream. I'm asleep in my bed, having a vivid nightmare before my alarm clock wakes me and takes me away from this place. Soon. Anytime now. I won't have to live through this much longer.
Wake up. Wake up. Please. Wake up!
The body doesn't disappear. None of the scenery changes. No blaring sounds fill the atmosphere. I don't wake up.
I glance around at the others, all of them stare at the body. Blood pours from Wyatt's nose. Jonah holds his arm. Axel rubs his fingers on his jaw that already shows evidence of a bruise beneath the red smears.
Reaching up, my fingers feel at the spot where his thumbs had pressed in on my airways. An ache still lingers. My split lip stings and the side of my ribs holds onto a nagging pain.
I don't need to pinch myself. I have enough pain to tell me that I need to accept this moment as reality.
Axel breaks the stillness, confirming for me that the world hadn't frozen. He walks towards Chris. Wincing. Limping. Kneeling down, he places two fingers on his neck and waits. He shifts them around. Here. There Searching. After several seconds—or minutes, or days—he pulls his hand away and looks back at us. "He's dead," he confirms.
I hear Jonah release a breath. "Now what?"
"We call the police," Wyatt says, wiping blood from his face.
Axel stands up. "And tell them I just murdered someone?"
"It was self-defence," Jonah says.
"Doesn't matter." Axel gestures down to Chris. "I still killed him."
"Technically," I say. "He killed himself."
"I shoved him." Axels voice grows a little louder.
"But he," Wyatt points down at the fallen figure at Axel's feet, "was holding the knife."
Axel shakes his head and frowns. "But the cops won't believe he just stabbed himself willingly."
"So," says Wyatt. "We're supposed to just leave both of them out here?"
"Sounds good to me," I say under my breath, earning a small chuckle from Jonah.
After everything they've done, I couldn't care if the birds and wildlife picked them to pieces until there's nothing left. They deserve it.
"We can't do that," Wyatt says, crushing my dreams. "Someone will find them eventually, and they'll figure out we were here."
"How would they?" Axel asks. He takes a step forward, rubbing his red wrist.
"Our fingerprints will be all over the house," Wyatt explains.
"We could scrub it clean."
"Seriously?" Jonah says with disgust. "I don't even clean my own bedroom."
"Axel, we aren't in the wrong," says Wyatt. "This isn't your fault. The cops will see that as much as we do."
"No, they won't," Axel replies, throwing his arms up. "They'll look for someone to blame, and there's no one else but us."
YOU ARE READING
Her Only Hero
Mystery / ThrillerA teenage bad boy, with a hatred for his family, has to chase a stranger all over town to find and save his little sister who has been kidnapped. *** When Dorian leaves one morning despite his mother's orders, it's just another simple act of rebelli...
