The Boy With The Blank Stare: Future

Chapter Seventeen: Savior

TW: Referenced Suicide Attempt

Ouma's POV:

The azure sky had been sewn with stars as I walked around the darkened forest, the tall and looming trees threatening to swallow me whole as they captured me and had stolen the night, the brief breaks of starlight illuminating the ground ahead of me. The woods left me no path to follow, it was truly wild and undisturbed by man, tiny flowers I had forgotten the name of lined the paths and the grass felt plush beneath my feet.

Each step I took felt as if it had been a thousand, exhaustion seeping my bones yet I couldn't find any escape, even if I closed my eyes the ache wouldn't give away into sleep anymore. Arctic chills were sent across the wind, the slightest scent of salt in the air as I continued to walk embracing myself trying to cling onto the little warmth I could. The trees screamed widely in the night, rustling with the harsh winds.

As voices and whispers cried out from among the foggy landscape, the only lights to guard me, the only light to guide me was the moon which hung over the ink-black horizon. The moon was full and seemed to be almost amber, from the glances I caught it, it always disappeared before I could truly see it. Gone in the blink of an eye, and left me with a feeling of longing.

Finally, a gap opened among the trees and I sprinted, ran past the screaming trees as I found my ankle caught under a root, I tried to scream but nothing came out as I reached my hands out to stop my fall and...

...

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...

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...

I woke up to the sight of nothing as I paused sighing, my body ached as I struggled to sit upright. The mattress creaked with every movement, the springs of the bed poked into my back causing immediate pain as I yawned trying to wipe out sleep from my eyes.

My hand hovered over the spot where my wheelchair should have been, before realizing I was only grabbing air... before my brain painfully reminded me of the past days. Of why I was in this creaking bed, and why the air of the room was heavily scented with cinnamon this morning, a scent I had come to despise the longer time had passed. 

Grandmother.

I bit down my bitter resentment as I struggled to reach over to the nightstand and quickly changed as I waited at the bedside. My grandmother had heavily encouraged me to choose my own clothing, yet whatever I wore was never good enough in her eyes. Even if I argued my only real formal clothing or put-together look was my old school uniform. My leg, the one with the remaining feeling throbbed in protest as I squeezed it tight, hissing slightly from the pain. I found myself feeling around the fluffy carpet underneath the bed as I continued to get ready, the texture was almost ticklish. It almost made this room seem homely.

The room once belonged to my mother.

Maybe it was silly, that in a room that hadn't been used in a near two decades I wished it smelled just a little like her. Something close to vanilla, from those few months she worked at a bakery, or the smell of old books from when she worked in storage. I would have been elated if even a brief scent of her had lingered all these years later, waiting for me. As if she was sitting in this room with me, or coming to see me any day now. Instead, the room had the smell of age and decay, a room that had been covered in so much dust it still made me feel sick. Of course, she wasn't here though, and I had a feeling she might have been happy if she knew not a single trace of her existence here had been left behind, past the memories of the occupants of the house. 

I wrapped the thin blanket around me trying to shield out the cold from the rest of the house. The blanket hung down on me as if weighing a hundred pounds, only leading me to try and wrap myself tighter, focusing on the song of sunset reprint from beyond the door. The door was locked again, if I got up at the same time, as usual, it might be two hours before breakfast.