Fading Out

Chapter 14

Nick’s POV

All that anger. All that shouting. All those words.  What now? My mind asks despite knowing that there would be no answer. The moment the door shut behind me was the moment I knew what a huge mistake I had made. All the anger instantly vanished as regret took over. She was being fair in her own way. Would you have chosen a different punishment than hers?

I shake my head in response to my own mind's accusations.  There is no way that I would have done anything other than what she did. But the moment things changed to being the matters of the heart, she should have stopped. Games of the heart rarely end well. A cool breeze passes by me and I finally acknowledge that this isn't a lie or a dream or an illusion. I take a few steps to get away from the door as an irrational fear of suddenly being pulled in takes over. And when nothing like that happens, I can't help the chuckle that comes out. "I'm free. I'm not stuck." I say out loud to the open world around me.

But then why do you feel like a stranger now? Like you don't really belong in here anymore? My hurting heart asks me. I don't answer it, knowing that what it seeks cannot be fulfilled. She doesn't belong out here. I never belonged in there. We cannot be together. Then why does it feel like you had to force them out even in your mind?

Stupid heart, why can't it listen to reason once? I'll just ignore it and… The thought trails off as I realize that there is nowhere I really want to be other than the place I just left. "I could go home." I muse out loud but then realize that it would be foolish. Mom and Dad would already be asleep and little Jonny would probably be sneaking off to party with his friends. Just then, a silhouette steps forward from the dark and I freeze in terror until I recognize the slightly hopeful idiot blabbermouth. "You could have given me a heart attack, you dumbo. What are you doing here hiding in the shadows?" I hit him on the shoulder to emphasize how ominous his entry was. "Next time I will probably do get a heart attack when you shine light on your face while walking out of shadows like a bad movie villain."

There was more coming but I am suddenly out of breath as Shane attacks me for a hug and squeezes so tight that my ribcage feels like creaking. It is only as I am about to open my mouth to make a poor attempt of a joke when I finally hear what he has been chanting while hugging me to death, "You're alive! Thank god you're alive!"

If I was willing to be insensitive, I would have added how hard he was trying to make that sentence false but I don't dare make a mockery out of his fears. "Can't breathe! Need air." I gasp out before he realizes how hard his grip is and releases me with an "Oh, sorry!"

Stepping back, he asks now with relief clear in his voice. "You have no idea how worried I was!" Then he takes a pause and asks me with a strangely bracing tone, "That scream… that was a girl's voice. What exactly did happen inside?" It is as if his question bring forward all the things that I had slowly began to take my mind away from and I nearly fall under the weight of guilt and despair and disappointment.

"Not now. Not here." I manage to speak and he nods understandingly. Oh boy, you have absolutely no idea. "How about the crypt?" I suggest. It would feel strangely comfortable for this discussion. He simply nods again and we walk away from the house where my entire life changed in a few short hours without looking back even once. And the thing that disturbs me the most is the absence of any sort of eyes staring at my back from the house and how uncomfortable I feel about this loss. "Goodbye, Daisy." I murmur into the air in a low voice.

"Did you say something?" Shane asks in response. I simply shake my head in no. There's nothing left to be said now.

The crypt takes us less than ten minutes to reach from the McCain mansion and once we settle inside it, I tell him everything that happened. What we said, what I felt, how it all was… everything finally finds a release from me. And when I am done an hour later, Shane is dumbstruck with his mouth hanging open. "Is this a joke?" Shane asks before continuing. "Holy… God that sounds like a movie script. If it weren't you, I would have suspected the person to be pulling my leg. You aren't, are you though?" There's barely a pause for me to open my mouth, let alone speak, before he continues. "Nah, you can't be lying. I could read the emotions off your face." Then with a pause he asks again. "Really? Wow, that's a lot to take in."