Red was off school for a week. Not that he needed it, since he spent most of his days at home anyway.
It was autumn, when the trees had just finished their journey of turning yellow and red and all the colours in between, starting to dry and fray in the outer corners, gradually rotting. Snow was on its way, in fact some flakes had fallen just the night before, but melted away on the still slightly warm ground. The grass was in a shade of pale yellow, as if painted by the same colour-palette as for a moth. The sky was dark, but still in a shade of blue. Red liked the coloured leaves and he was sad it had to go away. He hated winter. Hated it. Quite frankly, he hated white overall. He felt nauseous just thinking about it, because it was just wrong. These last few days had been hell for him, knowing he had to go through the same thing as every other year before. His favourite thing being taken away and replaced by disgusting white was like witnessing a friend die and he'd do anything to get it back. It was so bad that just seeing the snow had made him so upset his brain couldn't even function for the whole five hours it lasted. Autumn was his favourite time of the year, and red was such an amazing colour. Hence his nickname. The colour red was just soothing. In fact, it was the only thing that could really calm him, especially when he felt like this.
The world could look so pretty when it was dying.
The air was cold. A thunderstorm had struck the town, lighting up the sky every other second, exposing the coloured trees and bathing Red's bedroom in a pale light. The rain was shattering loudly against the metal roof and against the windows. Red woke up with his knees pulled to his chin, arms wrapped around his legs, staring into the darkness. He was still for a moment, an uneasy feeling starting to build up. Then the thunder struck again and he sat up quickly. The watch on his bedside table showed 3:44 AM. He looked out the window, framed by his perfectly red curtains, and saw his own reflection, morphed and blurry. The lightning and thunder struck at the same time, showing his startled reflection. The loud, rumbling sound slowly died down, faded out until it had vanished completely. He nodded.
"Cool," he said.
He liked bad weather. He liked the dark. Not as much as red, but he still enjoyed it. He liked being not easily seen, for some reason, as if he had something to be ashamed of. Some strange comfort in going by unnoticed. He was this semi-adult, full-on-awkward and way-too-cool-for-this sort of guy, so it really just was in his nature. But for some reason he now felt all but content. Something was not right. Something was wrong. Maybe something out there, but he didn't know what.
Was it the way the heavy rain was washing away all the last hints of autumn? Ripping out the very last remaining red-coloured leaves and turning them into mush on the ground that soon would be covered in god-awful white?
Anxiety was tying itself in a knot in his chest, several knots, building itself out and using up all the small space there was inside his ribcage. He didn't understand why. It was dark; he should still feel safe. Why would something like that just change? Instead of soothing him it felt as if it was damaging him, tearing at his insides. It was a chaos in his head and he started to feel dizzy. He thought for sure he'd die if he didn't fix what was so awfully wrong.
Ridden with worry, he stood up and put on some clothes and went downstairs. He should have been getting on with his routine, like measuring up his cereals and showering with an exact amount of soap, really just his silly everyday rituals that his head told him he needed to do or he'd go nuts. But something was not right. It felt eerie. He knocked on the wall along the staircase, three times like he always did, but it was still wrong. Something was missing. And he felt like eyes were coming out of the walls, judging him. Or as if someone was following him. But when he turned back�which he did several times while trying to just make his way down the creaking stairs�there was nothing. Just obscure silhouettes in the pitch black, but nothing abnormal. The one thing he once loved so much was now betraying him. A stab in the back. Doesn't a true friend stab you in the front, after all?
