I've Lost My Way (Sequel to Saved by The Way)

Chapter 5

Bert hadn't spoken a single word since I read him the letter. It was kind of scary. What was happening to the poor fellow?

I sat at a table in the crafting room and wrote a letter to Gerard telling him everything.

My handwriting wasn't the greatest, but it could be read easily with a little effort. The pen in my hand made light strokes across the page forming letters and words.

Bert, as always, sat next to me staring down at his hands folded across his lap. His fingers were twitching and his thumbs appeared to be playing a game of wrestling.

The only sound that could be heard was the scribble of pens and the sound of Quinn strumming upon one of the guitars.

The other patients sat quietly crocheting or painting dark pictures with the available paints.

One painting stood out among the others. A beautiful landscape of a river flowing through a forest could be seen. The painter worked fast and made it look effortless. His afro bobbed up and down as he worked and a smudge of red paint had gotten into his beard.

If you listened closely, you could hear him mutter to himself. "The happy tree lives right there. Now we'll add a few happy clouds."

He finished his painting and looked at it with pride. He then dipped his brush into some electric purple and painted his name on the bottom left hand corner. Ross.

The painter smiled at his work then proudly abandoned it to come sit at the table and pull out a piece of paper and a pen and began to write.

I looked down at my letter for Gerard. Then I thought of him.

I closed my eyes and pictured him. I pictured him huddling over his guitar trying his hardest to play, but to no avail. I imagined him hunched over his basement desk in complete darkness writing songs and drawing awesome comics and his own favorite comic book characters.

Then I imagined him in his car burying his face in his hands sobbing because he let me go. I pictured him sitting against the walls of the mausoleum drinking with a disturbed look upon his face. I could see him dragging a blade across his skin. I pictured him kissing my scars and carressing them gently. I pictured his face pulling me away from my fate in the murky water. I saw his dark hair falling over his pale face casting a shadow over it.

I was interrupted in my memories with figures in white bursting through the doors. I then noticed, my cheeks were wet. Stained with emotion.

A figure in white grabbed my wrist and flung me over their shoulder. I yelped at the sudden contact.

I started to scream because I knew where I was going.

The Box.

I started to punch and hit the figure who was carrying me. I could feel an adrenaline rush flowing through my veins and writhed in the arms of the carrier.

"PUT ME DOWN!" I shrieked.

The carrier didn't respond. "NO LET ME GO!"

Still nothing. Well fuck.

I shut my eyes and tried to keep a stiff upper lip as my body was being dragged to The Box.

The figures pulled open a white door to reveal a dark room lit with a dim, small light bulb. One silhouette could be seen. A metal chair with red straps and gold buckles was visible.

I was thrown down into the cold chair then quickly strapped down. The straps went around my ankles and my wrists.

I shut my eyes tight in waiting for the pain. I screamed as my tunic was ripped off my bones to reveal my pale torso.

I then felt my eyes being pried open to be forced to watch my own body be mutilated.

They turned my head downward to look at my bare forearm.

I saw one of the figures gripping a knife in their hand as they approached my arm.

They then slowly began to carve a pretty pattern into my skin.

I screamed as the deep markings let trails of blood flow from the fresh wounds.

Then the figure holding my face started to yell. "YOU WILL NOT CRY! YOU WILL NOT CRY! YOU WILL NOT CRY! YOU WILL NOT CRY!". The voice was fair and high. The figure holding my face was a woman.

I continued to scream and the woman yelled that phrase over and over.

At last the first marking was done. The word "I".

I could smell my own blood. It terrified me. It felt one way to harm yourself in this way, but for someone else to do it to you, that's brutal.

The other figure began to carve the second phrase. Slow and deep. They sliced through my skin like my skin was nothing but water. It was that easy for them.

I let myself scream above all them and screamed out the only name I wanted to hear. The only thing I wanted to think of as if that would save me from my dreadful situation.

"GERARD! GERARD! GERARD!" I screamed over and over. Maybe this was why Bert said the same things over and over.

I then saw the second word completed into my skin. "Will".

"GERARD I LOVE YOU WITH ALL MY HEART AND I ONLY WANT YOU TO HOLD ME IN YOUR ARMS AND TELL ME IT'S GONNA BE ALRIGHT!". I screamed. "GERARD!" I could hear my voice dying. "What's happened to my Guardian Angel?"

My voice was going out and screaming wasn't an option. The third word was completed. "Not".

"Never let them take the light behind your eyes." I said remembering Gerard's little piece of paper.

"Hand in mine into your icy blues." I choked out in my dying voice. " And then I'd say to you we could take to the highway. With this trunk of ammunition too, I'd end my days with you in a hail of bullets" my voice had broken down to a mere whisper.

The last letter of the final word had been completed. "Cry."

"I will not cry."

The two figures then left me alone in "The Box" until the bleeding would stop.

They'd need to get me a new tunic as well.

I suddenly wanted to cry, but looked only at the deep markings on my arm and thought it better to keep a stiff upper lip.

Be strong. Gerard needs you to be strong. I thought.