Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
We all hear it.
The gunshot.
Archie and I lock eyes from across the classroom before we're both running out of it as our teacher yells behind us.
We had to get out of there before she locked the doors when the lockdown commences.
"Chiara's not in her classroom," he tells me with wide eyes as we pass Mr. Kornell's class.
"Oh, God," I shake my head, not pulling my gun out of my waistband yet keeping a hand over it. Prepared. Steady.
"We have to find her," he says.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
I locked myself in a storeroom cupboard with Florence.
It's flashing through my mind. His steady hand as he pulled the trigger.
As he shot Florence.
She's got her head in my lap, dizzy and disoriented.
I've taken her jumper out of her bag and I'm holding it against her wound.
"Chiara," she cries.
"You're going to be okay," I tell her, tears streaming down my face in a steady flow.
"I was really scared back there," she says slowly, losing energy.
"I know," I nod furiously, "me too."
"But," she pauses as she winces from the pain, "I'm glad that I was with you."
I want to scream out. I want to cry. I want to have the power to stop the blood from pooling out of her upper abdomen.
It's because she was with me that this happened in the first place.
"Chiara," she whispers.
"Yes, Florence," my tears drip down onto her face, however I make no move to wipe them, instead keeping my hands firmly pressing down on her wound.
It's not enough. I know that.
"I don't want to leave you. You're my best friend," she shakes her head.
YOU ARE READING
Leal
Ficção GeralChiara Daveys is living a good life in England - if you ignore her constant struggle with food, lack of a guardian and how she's constantly working to pay the bills. At 17 years old, she's been unaware of her 6 brothers who have spent the 14 years o...
