Broken Till Dawn

4: It's Him

I sucked in air, and held my breath, whilst the tears ALMOST fell down my face. Somehow, even without the tears falling, I felt blinded by something.

"W-why are you upset?" I contemplated whether to expose my identity or not. It's so difficult to admit it's me. I had panic attacks, and I couldn't cry. I haven't cried since the day they left. I was mad, anger abruptly surged through me, I breathed in, took a nice breath to calm myself, and stared out into the lake, the beautiful view.

"Because," I paused, but I didn't feel the urge to cry, in fact, I wanted to scream, so loud, wake up everything around me.

"AERGHHHHH" The scream rang throughout the woods, echoing, ripped from deep in my gut.

"Um, are you okay?" And it hit me, I AM NOT OKAY.

"No no no. Okay and me? I haven't been since you left. Because Noah, it's me. Your best friend." I can't cry, people just think I do, but I don't. I scream, not cry. It's a scream, it's my anger, boiling inside me. "YOU... you did this, to me, you don't deserve anything." I was violently shaking, it was so important to me, HE was important. All I had was him, just a stupid little kid, but he was right. "But you were right" I spoke, my voice slightly wavering. "I needed you. Yet you left. You fucking LEFT. And I can't think. You left me. No, you BETRAYED me."

"Ok lana, calm down please."

"CALM DOWN??" I screeched. Everything, 2 years of saving everything up, that ANGER, SADNESS, EMOTION running inside me, flowing through me like blood in veins. "DON'T TELL ME TO CALM DOWN! YOU MADE ME THIS WAY." It suddenly occurred to me, it's my birthday, the day I killed them. The day my brothers left. 1 year since he left. "2 whole years, today." I spoke, dangerously calm. "You never even looked back, and I'm done. I am officially done with you, with my family." The word family felt like poison rolling off my tongue. "And I can say what I said 2 years ago, today. 1 year ago. What I remind myself everyday. I'm a murderer." With that, I ran. I knew where I was going, and I refused to stop.

About a half hour after running, I reached my place. I hadn't been here since the day they died. In fact, I never DID come here. I also didn't mention, since it hurt so much, I had a brother, now 5 almost 6, who ran away the day our parents died. He was the sweetest thing, I don't even know if he's alive. Little Alex. I love him so much. It was his sixth birthday tomorrow. I know my brother doesn't like talking about him, even though me and Alex were closest, and I hope he's okay. He escaped the car crash, that's what they said. I might've killed him too. I couldn't go in, it was too hard, so I sat by the gate, the thoughts running in my head. "Did my 'brothers' find them? Is he being taken care of? Is he even ALIVE?" Eventually, I got up, shaken from my horrible thoughts on my 5 year old brother, who was like my son, and stepped in. I walked around for a bit, until I found my parents, well their tombstones.

'Here lies Mr. and Mrs. Dallas, 1958-2017'

My dad's section read: 'I love you, my 7 amazing children. Pursue your dreams, even if they beat you with a stick, don't let them have the satisfaction of seeing your blood. You get the satisfaction from when their's boils.'

My mom's read: 'My 7 children, support each other. None of you are to blame. Continue fighting over the little things, making up, and hugging it out. You get very few people in life who care about you, don't mess up with you seven. Take the bullet for your siblings, because you know they would for you."

I scoffed, "Nice speech mom, but I can't. They wouldn't do it for me." But I then noticed a piece of paper taped to her side, it said, "ONLY FOR ALANA. DO NOT OPEN." So I took it and opened it. I gasped, it was my mom's handwriting. "