Bridge Jumper Comes Back To Life For Help: The Century Curse

001

The concrete pillar the boy leaned against kept his back cold as the warm night air brushed against his cheeks. With the sun setting, the sky gleamed hues of pink and yellow. Propping the notebook on his knees, he looked over the scribbles and doodles on the pages. Among the chicken scratch lay no discernible sentences, only a title he was erasing. He flung his pen above his head several times before dropping it at the sound of approaching footsteps. Ian readied the stopwatch in hand as he locked onto his sister's feet as they approached her self-imposed finish line.

"Time," he said, pressing the stop button as she crossed in front of him.

She heaved and hoed for a second, before propping herself upright to commence pacing. "What was it, Ian?" she struggled to get the words out between her deep exhales.

"Twelve thirty-six."

"So, six eighteen per mile on average... though, the one back felt a lot faster."

What is this girl, a freaking calculator? I know it's simple math, but with how fast she spit that out, she has to be a machine.

Citrus brought two fingers to her neck, making sure her heart rate slowed enough before relaxing. She walked up to Ian and bonked her head against his, looking down at his notebook. His sister reeked of sweat, but her warm breath balanced it with fresh mint.

"Still nothing?" she remarked, giving a face that Ian could only feel was her usual supportive one. It was that kind of lip gesture that a mother would give a child as she watched them eat ice cream after losing their soccer game. "I'd ask if you wanted my advice, but I have your answer locked inside my noggin."

Ian sighed, feeling bad for repeatedly shooting her down. She always had good intentions. "I just don't want my writing to mimic yours, sis."

"Oh! But see, That's the beautiful thing about writing, little bro." She sat down next to him, throwing her arm over his shoulder. "You could read every single one of my books, and no matter how close your style got to mine, you'd still have your own little voice swimming around in those words."

He leaned his head against hers, the black hairs of her ponytail tickling his neck as their strains intermingled. This was her go-to method for getting him to calm down as a child, but it brought back that comfort even now, the two of them adults.

"Plus," she stood up next to him, stretching and cracking whichever bones she could flex enough to do so. "You're only twenty-three. You have your whooole life ahead of you! Unless of course, you drew the short end of the stick. But who knows, right?"

Nice recovery sis. Your sense of humor never seems to surprise me. Plus, that's simple advice for you to give; accomplishing so much and you're only twenty-six.

Continuing her stretches, Citrus got ready for another go. Her continued vigor surprised Ian. She never ran this late, and it wasn't like he'd get any benefit from staying out. There weren't any lights lining the asphalt bike trail they were on, and the bridge they were under is so high up, no lamps lit the lines of his pages.

"You're not going again, are you? It's pretty late already."

"Well, the charity race is right around the corner. You know me, gotta get that first place!" Citrus stuck her tongue out at him.

Ian wasn't sure if she knew the discomfort she was going to be causing him as he sat there and waited for her return. He brushed his head against the concrete pillar and picked the water bottle up, tossing it at her. She raised it, draining it of its contents, at first hydrating, but then drenching herself in the rest. Throwing the water bottle back at him, he picked up the stopwatch, reset it, then waited.

"You ready? You set?" She pranced back and forth as a fighter would do to stay loose, but he thought this was more of a way to hype herself up. "Go."

She took off from him, stride perfected, pace overexuberant, but that's just how the clock in her head ticked. He watched as her image faded behind the bend of trees down the way before turning back to his spiral pad.

Why can't I think of anything?

This thought seemed to return and stay the entire duration Citrus would leave him alone, and it was nagging. He ran his hands up through his hair and scratched his skull, just trying to shake some ideas out. The night wind suddenly picked up, breezing past his ears. But as it carried on, the whistling sounded more akin to screaming. Pushing himself off the wall, he scanned the area. There was no one, not a single soul, but the screaming grew louder.

Ian stood on the path looking as far down as he could, seeing if there was any sign of his sister. The screaming made his ears ring. His head hurt. He tried to deafen the sound with his hands while continuing to watch. But then, a body... a body spawned in front of him, as fast as a bolt of lightning striking. One moment, he observed this blink in shock and horror. The next moment, blood and meat shot up from below him, his vision blinded by the color red.

There was a sickly feeling growing within. He was hesitant to even move, but the burning sensation resonating from his eyes burned too much. Blinking several times, he wiped away every wet sensation he could feel running down his face. Pure viscera was all he could see sprawled all over the pavement. Head, body, arms, legs, chunks of them all were discernible, but in fragments. Ian fell to the ground, the back of his pants now soaking up the spreading human liquid.

The pits of his stomach twisted, and partially digested food passed through his throat. Vomit spewed out onto the grass behind him, his stance now seeming that of a dog on all fours. He smeared the blood from the backs and fronts of his hands in the grass, then cleared the remaining mucus lingering from his lips. Ian had to do something, anything to make this right. He didn't have his phone. The boy never did when he focused on writing. But he could wave down someone, anyone passing by a nearby street. Turning over onto his butt once more, he knew he'd have to lay witness to the corpse again. But instead of his vision meeting the lifeless body, a pair of pearl-white legs stood before him.

Ian slowly panned his vision up. A bloodied tank top and jean shorts accompanied emerald green eyes and short snow-white hair. The processing power of his brain couldn't comprehend what was happening. He was speechless, breathless even. Though he found himself using those words in a more literal sense as the woman crouched down on top of him, wrapping her fingers around his neck.

"Wait..." he struggled to get even that one word out as he latched onto the girl's fingers, attempting to pry them off. He reached up for her arms, chest, face, anything he could, but he was nowhere near as athletic as Citrus was. The memories of him sitting on the couch watching television as his sister worked out behind him filled his slowly fading mind. His arms fell loose, hitting the ground as if the mysterious woman siphoned all the strength from them. But a cold, sharp sensation under his arm awoke him.

Ian latched onto a large rock and connected it to the temple of her head. The girl fell beside him motionless, as blood ran from the gash. The oxygen of life filled his lungs repeatedly as he contemplated the near-death experience he just faced. But he knew he needed to remain attentive. So he sat up, looking down at the girl, the hole he made now visible to him. Or at least for a moment. Before his very eyes, he watched as the wound healed without a trace.

Ian sat and looked over the unmoving girl until Citrus's footsteps approached. Her pace slowed as she stumbled up to the large pool of blood left behind from the impact. She took a glance over at the girl, then up to Ian, but the look in his eyes told an obvious message. He didn't know what the hell was going on.