The Search For Dakota Thompson

Introduction:

Never was I prepared for the events that occured on such a day, a day of loss and confusion. Nor was I prepared for everything that came after.

5 years was a long time. Long enough to forget normalic events, yet it would never be long enough to forget those etched into your memory, like a scar in your flesh, or an illness in your blood.

It was which you carried with you every day of your life, a constant reminder of said event, you wish nothing more to rid yourself of.

This key and this locket, they were my reminder. One good, one bad. Yet one brutally worse than the other.

The day rolls around every year. That much I know. And its pretty much unavoidable. I'll never run fast enough to outrun my past. No matter how much I want to, or how hard I try.

From taking Aprils hand as she and Mark lead me to the car, to Jake pulling out of the drive way, me in the passenger seat. I couldn't recall the details, not that I would want to.

Everything inbetween and after was a blur. With every right, this was the one and only day a year I let myself shut down, relying on people like April, Mark and Jake, to take the fall for me. Because if I fell for the same reasons again, I'd never get back up.

Out of what I actually could remember, the day was at its worst. Storm clouds filled the sky, not a soul filling the streets. Not one street but that one.

I was fine, for months before, the walls I had built over the last 8 years still standing tall, yet all it takes it a single glimpse of death to change all that.

Something as simple as that, was devastating.

It happened fast. Faster than I could comprehend. Than I could react. My gaze locking with that of blinding lights, illuminating the once vacant road.

Then it halted; the scene was a picture in my mind, scared into my memory, for what I knew would be forever. The car infront showing no signs of slowing,

Jake beside me frozen in time, his hands locked to the wheel, a look of fear drowning in his eyes. Without a doubt, my own reflection submitted the same look too. Growing tight inside my stomach, my emotions acted in overdrive. Nerves, fear, shock. Confusion.

Taking my last glance of both car's final moments of stability, and my own, I exhaled deeply, relaxing, before everything unpreventable, became unprevented.

I don't remember much, but I'll never forget the excruciating pain of metal ripping into flesh and broken glass peircing my entire body. Or the deafening sound of tires pulling at the road, as they tried to escape the stomach-turning lurch towards the other car, metal on metal, grinding and scraping against eachother.

And the screams, the gut wrenching screams, belonging to Jake as we were both slammed into the front of the car, saved by our belts, and catapulted back into our seats. I also remember the almost immediate sound of sirens through the blurred sound of crackling fire and steam escaping from somewhere.

My vision was red, and then it was gray, but I could make out everything I needed to.

The car had no driver, and Jake, no doubt, had no idea where the car came from. But the cold expression on his limp body, still upright in his seat told me nothing. His chest was falling with every shallow breath, as was mine. Both of us covered in blood.

The grey turned to black and I was out light a broken light.

Accidents like this happen all the time, swiftly and without warning, but with brutal conciquences left in its wake.

And it was quick, the car I mean. So quick to appear infront of us and quicker to make contact. No one would have time to save themselves.

Maybe that was the entire reason behind it. My mother had died from the fatal injuries of car crash so if someone wanted me gone, that was the way to go about it.

But the question I had this time was; Who wanted me dead?