Trauma - Skephalo

Chapter 3: Panic

It has been a few weeks now, and like always, everything has been fine. Right now, it's the weekend, which means that I get to sleep late. That's exactly what I did. Once I did wake up, it was around 12. Gosh, I guess I've had a lot of late night work. I immediately went to the kitchen to see if Zak was up and if he had already made food. Once I arrived, I saw Zak on the table eating cereal. Guess he was too lazy to make anything today. Zak notices me walk in and immediately smiles when he sees me. He says, "Morning, Darryl! Come sit down with me to eat breakfast."

I guess it wouldn't hurt to eat some cereal for once in a while. I greet him and sit down and pour myself some cereal with milk. We eat our cereal in comfortable silence. Once we're done eating, I take our dishes and wash them in the sink. As I do this, Zak is scrolling through his phone, sitting down at the table. Once I finish, I start walking back to my room. After I take a couple of steps, I abruptly hear a chair moving, which startled me from the unexpected sound. I then hear Zak say, "Wait, Darryl! I want to ask you something!"

I turn around to see Zak tucking in his chair and then looking up at me. I raise my eyebrow at him in question. He takes a few steps my way and says, "I was wondering if today you wanted to go out of the campus and hang out."

"Oh, are the others tagging along?"

"Actually- I haven't told them anything... I was actually hoping that it could just be you and me this time. It's been a while since we have gone out of campus, especially just the two of us. The last few times we've gone out of campus was with our friends. But if you want to invite the others, that's fine with me as well!"

Despite Zak's words, I can tell that he will get quite annoyed if the others tag along when he was planning for just us two to go out. That's just how he is. If something doesn't go the way he planned it to, he ends up getting annoyed about it. I let out a small chuckle and say, "Sure. We can hang out today, just us."

Zak's eyes light up with joy. He honestly looks a bit like a child with that look. But what he did next took me completely by surprise. Zak, out of nowhere, ran up to me and wrapped his arms around me as he yelled out, "Thank you, Darryl!"

Since I was so caught off guard, the impact of the embrace made me fall backward, dragging Zak down with me. I fall on my back with Zak on top of me. I fell with my eyes closed, bracing the impact. But it didn't hurt much since Zak put his hands behind my head to cover it. I didn't really comprehend the situation until I opened my eyes and really registered that Zak was on top of me. As soon as I did, I tensed up the weight on top of me, memories rushing back in the top of my mind that I hoped would never come back. To this day, the memory still haunts me. Nobody has been on top of me like this- since- that time with him. I have given it my all to make sure that nobody was ever given the opportunity to be in this situation with me, and yet, here we are. The memory keeps haunting me as I feel myself start to panic. Zak groans and lifts himself up a bit, lessening his weight on top of me, but even then, it doesn't calm me down in the slightest. I feel like I can't breathe until he is completely off of me. I shakily put my hands on his shoulders, slightly trying to push him away from me. I stutter out in a small voice, "Z-Zak- g-get off me- p-please..."

"Sorry, what did you say-"

He stops himself once he sees my face, his eyes widening a bit. Fudge- I must have fear written completely over my face right now. Zak seems to be frozen in place, but then I see a hint of worry come across his face. I start panicking more and say, "Z-Zak-! G-get off me please...!"

Zak lifts off all his weight that was on me, but he is still on top of me. Zak looks at me worried and says, "D-Darryl-? Are you oka-"

Feeling even more haunted by the memories in a state of panic and running out of patience, without clearly thinking of what I was doing, I cut off Zak by screaming, "I SAID GET OFF!"