⚠️Talk of school shooting. Drug usage.⚠️️
~•~•~
Case Name: Stargazing..
Erratic breathing, cold stabs of fear and sorrow. That's all I could feel. When I glance up I see Mia. Crying and shaking, a hand over her mouth to keep her sobs from slipping out. We were standing on the rim of the toilet in the bathroom.
The quick pops, one after the other, reminded me why we were here in the first place. I look down and see the toilet water rippling. Mia's heels sat at the bottom, one of her ear rings fell not long after.
Everything stopped when the bathroom door opened. Mia looked at me, I looked at Mia and we both silently told the other 'Don't say a word.' That's when the stall door rattled violently. Mia let out a sob and then the door stopped rattling. It was only a split second but felt like eternity.
The door rips open and I press my body against the stall as if to blend in with it as the shooter is revealed. I watch him shoot Mia first, five times.
POP
POP
POP
POP
POP
Blood oozes out of her body as she slumps down into the corner between the toilet and stall wall. Her eyes, blue and void of life, look up at me and she groans before she stops moving altogether.
And then, with a fear I didn't know even existed within me, blossomed. I looked up, my hands pressed to the wall surface, and I was met with the end of the gun barrel.
The flash of the gunshot was the last thing I saw before...
~
Vada shot up in bed, gasping for breath. Soft whimpers fell from her lips as she started to hyperventilate. Her hair, pulled in a messy bun, had little strands hanging out. A few stuck to her face from the cold sweat her body accumulated during the nightmare.
She had lost count to how many she's had since the shooting. Vada seems to realize that they just get worse with each passing night.
After the shock wears off, Vada quickly pats her face then her chest before a new wave of tears begin. Her body falls backwards as her hands press into her face and she sobs.
That's how Vada has been waking up for the past two weeks. It's also why she refuses to let herself sleep until her body shuts itself down. When that happens she usually sleeps for hours and the nightmares get worse. So, she found comfort in something that took away the pain.
Vada began to slowly numb herself. Completely writing off any emotion that coexisted with that day. She'd force a smile for her family, just so they don't start to worry about her. Eventually the fake smiles and broken promises started. And that's when Vada started to care less how it affected her mother or little sister. Or even her father. As long as she didn't have to feel it she'd continue to do it.
And then, came the drug abuse. After she and Mia were trapped in the stall, Mia reached out to Vada a few days later and they began to talk. The talking eventually led into hanging out. And hanging out led to alcohol consumption and smoking weed. Vada neglected her family and Nick; her best friend. Again, she didn't care.
And then came the night she and Mia slept together. It was drug inducing. Vada was high as shit but she could tell Mia had something on her mind. So she tried to coax it out of her. It started with a kiss. And then one thing led to another and they ended up having sex together.
