Fate's Exchange (Twisted Fate, Book 1)

Chapter Eighteen

In the image the voice decided to show me, Tina was alone in her room. She sat cross-legged on her bed, methodically lining up a row of red-and-blue striped pills in front of her, just below a row of orange pills that she had already placed. I watched as she opened her bedside table's drawer and pulled out another package of medication so that she could line up a row of white pills along the bottom. Three rows, at least ten pills per row. She swiped the tears from her cheeks and opened a fresh bottle of water she'd had at the ready on the bedside table.

She didn't even hesitate. She simply grasped one of each pill, shoved them in her mouth, and swallowed with a nod before reaching for more. Orange, red-and-blue, white. Three at a time. She did this over and over for a total of ten times until there were no pills left for her to swallow.

She leaned back against the pillows on her bed, a slow smile of acceptance spreading as she closed her eyes. She wants to die.

My heart cracked, folded in on itself, and then suffocated me with the grief of seeing my best friend do this to herself. She was lost. It was my fault. Where were her parents? Or even Des? Why weren't they comforting her or, at the very least, keeping an eye on her to make sure she didn't do anything stupid like take pills to ease her pain?

After what she'd been through it was only logical.

 "W-What is she doing?" I asked, horrified and nauseous.

"Life, for her, has become overwhelming," the voice explained. "In this moment, everything that she has been feeling, everything that has happened, feels like too much to handle."

"So she's killing herself?" I whispered, not expecting an answer.

I sucked in a deep breath, no longer feeling the freshness of the air around me. I felt trapped in the middle of the openness of the cloud which I now sat. My mouth hung and the crushing weight within my chest was too heavy for me to form the tears I wanted to shed, a concrete dam of suppression.

"She wasn't ready for people to know what she'd suffered. By being there, you helped her deal with it. When you died, that was gone. She had no one else to lean on. Now she feels guilty for your death and alone with her pain."

"But—"

"She's in a dark place, Alyssa Frank, and alone."

"She's not alone!"

The empty bottles of pills Tina had set on her night table fell to the floor of her bedroom, knocked over as she set her half empty bottle of water down. The rest of her home was dark, quiet as everyone slept. Where the hell was everyone? She needed help!

"No! Please don't let this happen to her," I begged without shame for my friend. "They won't find her until morning and it will be too late."

"Yes."

"Call 911. Help her!" I looked around, frantic. I had died for Tina. No way was I going to let her die now.

"There are no such devices as telephones here, Alyssa Frank. We cannot stop this."

"Of course not." I rolled my eyes. "So, you can send me back to life, but not help her? What kind of entity are you?" I pointed back to the image. "Help her!"

"We cannot."

"Then you have to send me back again." I nodded, becoming surer with each breath that that was the right thing to do. Despite the anger that had begun to course through my body knowing that this was how she had repaid me, I had died so she could live. She was wasting her second chance. "I have to go back. She doesn't deserve to feel like this. I know I can change it. I can make it better."