Short Stories

It Happened Quiet

"I don't remember much more
But I know it happened quiet"

I couldn't breathe.

I couldn't think.

I couldn't hear.

It was like being underwater, except the muted sound of water in my ears was replaced by a thunderous tsunami of nothing. It filled my head, infiltrated my lungs, bled into my veins in a rush until all the water in my body weighed me down completely, my limbs heavy and still. I couldn't even move.

I could only stare.

Her blue eyes looked steadily back at me.

I found the strength to swallow, though it took effort. I choked on my own voice as it forced its way out. "W- what?"

"It happened last week. I didn't tell you." Her words were dark and deep like the storm lurking behind her gaze.

"But... why?" Hurt swelled up inside. I thought she was safe.

"I didn't want you to know. I was... ashamed."

I shook my head angrily. "No. You promised, Avi. You said that you'd be safe. You- you lied to me!"

Her features became chips of hard stone all aimed at me. "It's not my fault. And it was a stupid promise anyway. No one ever knows if they'll be chosen."

The ocean in my veins roared up and seeped out of my eyes in a hot flood. My voice was giant, black spirals blooming in my mind. "You're a liar! You said. You promised. And now..." I sank to the ground as the darkness subsided and whimpered, fingers covering my eyes. "I don't want to lose my only friend."

She stood for a moment. Softened. Knelt down beside me. Rain began to fall softly from the sky, light and barely there. Nurse said it wasn't meant to rain today. Everything was wrong. She put a hand on my shoulder. "You won't lose me."

"But you'll be different. You won't be you anymore." I sniffed and took my fingers away to see tears shining on the tips. The rain put tiny dewdrops on my hair. "When will you be changed?"

Her grip tightened on my shoulder, tension running stiffly down her arm.

My heart grew still with horror. "Avi... no..."

"I wasn't supposed to come here," she said huskily. "But I had to see you. I slipped out after they- after they did it. I didn't know what else to do."

Slowly, I raised my head to meet her eyes. They were blue, like always, like Avi, nothing special. Just blue. But what I had mistaken for a storm behind them was wrong. Empty. Hollow. Her eyes were blue and hollow. The darkness was spreading through her.

Like them. And she would never be her again.

Sickness coiled within me. I ran. My white dress swished around my feet, mud stains on the hem.

"Wait!" I could already hear the new rasp in her voice, the growl beginning behind her words, and I stumbled faster. "Eille, come back!"

The house rose up ahead, big and fancy and not home. Never home. The front door swung before my fingertips. The soft hallways stifled my panicked feet. I hated running. Everything was wrong.

My bedroom burst open. I burst open into the bedroom, all my distress radiating from me in a twisting grey glow. The white of the room blinded my eyes. I tried to slam the door but she burst open too and suddenly I could see her beautiful bright light being torn apart, devoured, digested by the horrible darkness growing in her like an unstoppable black cloud,