Shoot Me Down

Part 10

This chapter is dedicated to Kity124 for the awesome fan art/cover. It can be seen over on my tumblr (link on my profile).

Caleb is unbelievable. Two days after my murder, and it’s business as usual. I watch him sitting on the couch in nothing but sweat pants. He’s got a TV tray in front of him covered in plastic baggies, methodically dolling out clumps of green into each one and marking them with a black sharpie. Larry must have come by while I was at the river with Sam.

            It’s some kind of sick fascination that keeps me coming back here. Like a bad car wreck. You don’t want to watch, but you just can’t seem to tear your eyes away. I need to know the next part of the story, I tell myself, I need to know my enemy. What he’s doing. What he’s thinking.

He’s watching TV now, laughing loudly from time to time, a ring of cigarette smoke circling him. When I get closer I get a facefull of the pungent smoke, and the anger flares up inside me so fast that it makes my breath catch in my throat. I wave my hand in front of my face and I’m shocked to see my fingers drag through it, breaking it apart.

My jaw drops open, and I wave my hands again, parting the smoke, dispersing it. I must look like an idiot flailing my hands around like this with a big grin on my face, but it’s not like Caleb can see me.

“What the hell?” Caleb’s eyes are half shut. He leans forward and squints into the smoke, and I realize he must be seeing it stirring of its own accord, moving in unnatural ways. “Trippy,” he mutters, and sits back. “This is good stuff.”

“Good stuff,” I mimic him, even though I know it’s childish, even though he can’t hear me. “Good stuff. God, you’re an idiot.” It feels good to insult him, so I continue. Telling him he’s an idiot, and a loser and he’ll never go anywhere in life. Telling him he’s disgusting. Telling him he’ll go to jail for what he did and some other drugged up loser would shank him in the shower and I’d be happy they did. I lean into his face, closer and closer. I’m yelling now. My hair slips off my shoulder and brushes against the bare skin of his arm, and he reaches up absently to scratch it.

I stop mid-rant and stare at him. Did he feel that? My anger drains away, replaced by excitement. Could he possibly have felt my hair brush his skin? I reach out cautiously and try to poke him in the chest. Instead, my finger slips straight through his right pec, and I jerk back quickly and nearly fall over. “Ew!” I flap my hand, wishing I could wash it. It had been inside him. Gross.

Caleb shivers and takes another big drag of the joint in his mouth, muttering about someone walking over his grave. I glare at him. I won’t walk over your grave. But I’d sure as hell like to dig it for you.

I drift into the kitchen and look out the window into the forest behind the house. The sun is halfway down the sky, and it makes me think about the last two nights, which were sleepless and terrible. There’s no need for sleep, I know that, but it feels wrong. I ended up just drifting from room to room feeling scared and alone. The image of my limp body tumbling down the bank surfaces in my mind again and again. It’s burned into my retinas. I can’t escape it. How is it that I can haunt myself?

The idea of spending another night like that is unbearable. I can’t do it again.

Sam probably won’t mind if I visit him tonight