Asunder

Chapter 8 - The Sister

I sigh, and sit up against the wall of my bunk bed, unable to sleep. Though my muscles ache and my migraine is worse than ever, too many things are trapped in my head. It's like they're all banging against the walls of my skull.

I took the ibuprofen, and it didn't seem to do much. It was impossible to sneak past my mom and steal some more melatonin. I would've been sleeping all the way through to the morning if my mom hadn't woken me for supper. But then again, I got to finish her letter.

When I planned this out, I knew hers was going to be the easiest to write, as wrong as that sounds. I almost feel guilty for it, but I don't have much to fix with her, I don't have much to say. Except thank you.

If anyone could've saved me, it would've been her.

The sky outside my blinds is dark and empty. The city lights a few streets away make sure of that. I used to wonder if one day they'd all disappear, if we'd just wipe them out of the sky, because we thought our stars on Earth were brighter. More useful. I thought it was arrogant. Now my opinion is as blank as the endless black.

My head falls back in a light thump against the wall. Maya and I used to talk about 'what if the world ends'. What if we run out of fuel, of ressources, and have to go back to the old ways, of living in nature and hunting and dying of colds. We wondered how many years of darkness it would take for the stars to come back.

And I let myself wonder where she is. Why she left, why she couldn't stand to stay with us. The answer isn't that difficult to find. This tension, and this life in this house, this family... but I thought maybe I was enough. To get her to stay.

She used to play singers with me, and she'd always want her solo part first. But if I cried or pouted, she'd give the whole song away to me.

I wonder where she is, out there, if she's still thinking those thoughts and singing those songs, the ones that have faded away in me. She's so far away now, from us. She might as well be in the sky.

I slap my hands onto my face, covering my eyes. Especially with these thoughts, midnight isn't a good time to be awake.

It's never a good time to be awake, it hisses, it never is.

That's right. But right now I can't fall asleep. So.

Do it now. Forget the letters, do it now.

The voice is tempting, seductive. It's smart. Smarter than me. It sneaks in without me noticing where I end and where it begins, and I don't know the difference anymore. But... no, I have to resist a little longer. I still have things to do. It'll be over soon.

Do it now, it whispers, and I can't tell if it's me, if it's hiding inside my head, or lurking in the shadows of my room.

I shut my eyes and pinch the bridge of my nose, wishing for silence in my head.

But it's too much too ask for, I realize, as everything gets louder.

I see Maya and her thick, raven hair, curling at the humidity of the summer. I see mom screaming, dad yelling, and seven-year-old Maya. I see her chestnut eyes light up in the sun, like two amber spotlights.

I only ever cry when I think of her. A tear slips past my lid. I see her screaming, thrashing as my dad drags her up the stairs by her shirt, and I hear myself screaming. Screaming so loud the neighbors came over to ask what was happening. More tears slip past my fingers and travel to my wrist at thoughts of our hugs, which were too rare. Of how she said she loved me more than anyone else in the world.

I sniff, and it sounds stupid, immature in the silence. And my sob sounds foolish, as I drop down my bed, and run towards Maya's. It'll always be her bed. I inhale the scent of orange blossom shampoo, the one she loved. The mint sheets, mint like the roof of the house, mint like her hoodie. All in her honor, the last worn by me. In stupid hope that I'll see her again.

She didn't tell me where she'd go. But as I fall onto my knees, in front of her bed as if before an altar, I imagine her, packing her bags and walking on a path. And as I lay my cheek on my arms, crossed on the bed where she used to lay, I see her clearly. When I close my eyes, she's on that path, walking away from dad, from mom. From me. And as she gets further and further, she gets younger, smaller. Her baggage gets too heavy for her to carry. But she does anyway.

Sobs twist my body into a shaking mass of nothing, of wreckage. I see Maya, seven years old, walk out of sight, not looking back once.

I wish she would. I squint my eyes open, to chase away the image of the back of her head. I wish I could see her eyes, her wide, chestnut eyes.

And from the floor, through the blinds, I can see the glass doors of my balcony. I stare at them, wanting to see beyond these four walls. Somehow the outside beckons me. A strange force tell me to get up, to open the door to go see what waits there for me.

But before I can comply to the warmth of that force, a cold one pulls me under into a nightmare filled with hazelnut eyes.