BADLANDS

colors

"you said you'll never be forgiven till your boys are too."

3 DAYS LATER
9:07 AM

he was like a vision in the morning light; the tips of his dark brown hair curling over empty blue eyes, fluttering in and out of sleep. the veins on his head are translucent, a sickly blur of blue and red. his head was propped against their backpack, their only lifeline. he's just getting worse, color drawn out of his skin, leaving only a flushed white behind. she often hears him screaming in his sleep.

it was almost like they were... okay again, like they weren't stranded and lost in the middle of the badlands. as if he wasn't dying and she wasn't losing it and he didn't hate her. it didn't change the fact that all they did was walk until they were deathly weak and fall asleep.

she woke up every morning, but it was never with him.

the bright colors were all sucked dry out of the earth. the landscape is slanting upwards, the base of the mountain surfacing underneath their feet. her world is falling apart at the seams, visions clouding her present mind. she can't tell what's real anymore.

they were almost there. they either made it or died. she brushes the sleep out of her limp eyes, blinded by the sun on the horizon.

THIS WAS IT.

x

"you're dripping like a saturated sunrise."

4 DAYS LATER

0:00

in her dreams, everything is blue. his hands are smudged with it, his pills a vivid shade, the blood stains on his jeans glowing vibrantly.

blue.

his lips when they touch hers, his skin in the dark. her hair, his eyes. it's everywhere.

it's the same every night, these brushes of life and color, woven through the same hotel room, the number 93 engraved into the doorframe. the badlands were still with her in her dreams, the pulsing flow of the city life.

but tonight, not for long.

"you shouldn't have gotten this far," a warm but steel edged voice bounces through the room. "you should've turned back long ago."

her long, dark hair is longer than she remembers, golden brown eyes filled with surprise.

"mel," she breathes. "i haven't seen you in forever... i'm so close. we're going to escape."

"you don't understand!" her voice is loud and forceful. "ashley, you need to turn back," her voice breaks, eyes wild.

"what?" her breathing is heavy, she's desperately shaking her head no, no, "i don't..."

wake up, ashleys screaming at herself, just wake up already. she can't handle the truth, she won't let these words be anything but lies. she's left everything behind for this.

"you can't wake up because you're not asleep." mel's voice slips away from her grasp, bedroom bathed in blue light. "he's waiting for you."

x

"and you suddenly decided purple just wasn't for you."

1:03 AM

she's awake, but she can't move. something inside of her keeps her frozen, soft cheek pressed against the rough ground, breathing in the rubble. she keeps her eyes shut, trying to control the air she takes in. breathe in. breathe out.