Insanity

Dreams

The walk up the hill is deathly quiet, and I can sense the fact that Danny wants to talk about what happened with me, but I can't. Not yet, that is. But suddenly Danny grabs my arm and pulls me to a forceful stop. Unfortunately he grabbed right on the bruise of my arm where Lidia hit me and I wince in slight pain. "Sorry," he says.

"It's fine." I awkwardly say. We then stand there quietly for a moment, but only a moment.

"We need to talk." Danny finally spurts out.

Shit.

"Why?" I ask all too innocently.

"Because I'm worried about you, Van, you need to recover from this."

"I'll be fine," I urge.

"I don't mean physically." He states. I look around the trees for a second and then meet his gaze.

"Do you understand how close I was?" I ask. He raises his eyebrows in confusion.

"Close to what?" Danny questions.

"Close to becoming a murderer." I respond. Danny only chuckles at this. "What?" I ask.

"In this world now there are no murderers, you have to kill to survive." He says. That's when I take a few steps closer to him, get so close to the point that I can feel his warm breath on my nose and smell his horribly odiferous scent. I lean in and speak these next words very carefully to him and in the most assertive way I could,

"I was going to kill her, I was going to murder Lidia in cold blood without thinking twice about it or without even blinking or taking a deep breath first. I was just gonna kill her, we both know that. A murderer is a murderer, you can change the circumstances all you like but in the end, the definition stays the same and killing someone is murdering them, and the murderer is the killer, and I was going to be that person. I wouldn't have been able to live with myself, Danny. I-" then I pause before continuing. "I guess it's scary to think of not being able to live with yourself, but in my case at least, it's an even scarier though of being able to live with yourself after something like this. I don't want to be a monster." I finish. Danny stares at me for a long time, then I realize I'm still only inches from him and I take a step or two back.

"Are you finished?" He asks. I silently nod, never breaking our gaze. "Van, we both know that's bull." He says as he pulls me into a hug. "You're a great person, you mean so much to so many, me being one of them. I need you Van, don't leave me now." He finishes. I take steps away from him and pull away from our hug.

"Don't you do that to me, Danny." I warn.

"Do what?" He asks.

"You know what," I say, "make me feel guilty about the way I feel and try to change my feelings by dragging yourself into this. I almost slaughtered someone. I'm not okay, Danny, don't act like I'm overreacting." I state.

"I'm not acting," he confidently says while I give him a mean glare, "you had to show her you wouldn't let her control you anymore. You need to forget this, Van, just pretend it never happened." Then I look down at the gashes and cuts on myself.

"My body begs to differ." I chuckle.

And finally, finally, Danny cracks a smile.

"There he is." I joke.

"Oh shut up Van." He giggles. I playfully punch him in the arm as I trot back up to the jeep with him.

When we arrive Danny immediately grabs one of our water bottles and opens it.

"What are you doing?" I ask. He looks at me as if he's never seen me before.

"I'm going to clean you up." He says.