Amber

(9) Lunatic

Jared's Point of View

I visited Amber the day I heard about the landslide in her area. Out of the very few houses in her neighbourhood, her's was probably the worst affected.

She was crying, terribly. I watched the rescue forces take her to the hospital and whenever she woke up, she whimpered. She wailed and banged her head on any object near her. No matter how hard I tried to console her, it was all in vain. She frantically beat her breast and howled in grief while asleep. Even someone with the strongest heart would have been terror struck on seeing this condition of hers.

Although I hate to accept, for one moment - just once - I was glad that she had no family. No one would be able to see their child in such condition, like a madman shouting and shrieking at random people. The irony was that it was her lost family that made her so vulnerable. Her unstoppable tears themself made my eyes tear-filled.

But she's wasn't wrong though. She had all the right to get angry, and react in this manner. God had been hard on her, and when things were finally getting good around her, she lost her only family left. I remembered how she admired the way her Grandma looked at even the most impious things positively. But this, tore her heart to shreds. I didn't know if I should call her brave for being able to survive the landslide or a coward for refusing to open her eyes to the reality. I thought my presence wouldn't let her feel she had no one.

***

After hours of fiddling with my fingers and nibbling on my nails, she woke up in the hospital room and scrunched her eyes. The white ceiling and surroundings seemed to bother her too much. She looked weak, and yet her waking up made my heart lift for a second. She let out an irritated groan and turned to face me. Giving me a what-the-hell-are-you-doing-here expression which made me doubt if I should have come here at all, she asked me, "Where's Grandma?" in a raspy voice, filled with curiosity. "She said she had written a poem for me." There was hope in her eyes, like that in a child's eyes when he wants something from his parents. "Ah Jared..." She held her spinning head. As if she seemed to slowly gain her memory, her breaths were getting heavier.

"Uhm A-Amber," I stammered, "I think you should-" I awkwardly said but got cut off by her.

"NO! GRANDMA! WHERE IS SHE?"

She sat up and furiously shoved the pale white sheets aside.

Her hazel eyes were moving in a frightening way. I could see her recalling the past incidences as she put two and two together.

"You should have some water," I said, slowly handing her a glass of water. Like a bolt of lightning, she slapped the glass away, spilling water all over my shirt.

"TELL ME, WHERE DID THEY TAKE HER?" she screamed. If eyes could burn, I'd surely be burnt alive, keeping in view the way she was glaring at me.

I gave no response and kept my head low. Perhaps it was my sympathy for her that kept me from revealing the truth. My silence, undoubtedly, seemed to bother her which made her start screaming deafeningly. I tried to calm her, reluctantly though, not wanting a glass to be thrown at my head this time. Her screams brought a  nurse rushing inside the room.

"Miss please-"

"DO YOU HAVE ANY FREAKING IDEA WHERE MY GRANDMA IS?!" she said, her eyes filled with nothing but rage. It was almost unbelievable how she was lying motionless on the bed a few minutes before, and was howling with anger now.

"The government has buried her, miss Amber."

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU'VE BURIED-" she shrieked too loud for anyone's ears in a shrill, disregarding tone. Her tone and glare was enough to get over anyone's nerves, but the nurse was clearly not taken aback by her behaviour. So the nurse spoke rigidly this time, "Miss, please cooperate, you're disturbing the other patients."

"I- I'm disturbing?" she asked. A familiar expression of vulnerability was plastered across her face. She inhaled a long, sharp breath and started moaning again. She didn't shed tears, or I should have said, she couldn't shed tears. Her eyes were swollen and sore and all she could do to let her agony out was just scream and wail.

The nurse tried to comfort her and showed her sympathy by keeping a hand on Amber's shoulder but found herself on the floor, her palm in shades of green and blue the next moment. Amber had wrung her hand like a piece of cloth and pushed her to the floor all with a single shrug of her hand.

I made a mental note to not touch Amber ever again.

The girl who I supposed to be a wrestler abruptly rose to her feet and as if looking for something, ran outside the hospital room. Forgetting my mental note completely, I tried to grab her hand which was shrugged away too. I wasn't surprised to see myself hit the wall behind me, at least it wasn't worse than what she did to the nurse.

Like a madman, she ran in the corridors of the hospital, searching for the exit. The doctors and I ran behind her. A doctor tried to grab her by her dress but was unfortunately knocked down by her. She frantically hit her hand on a tall cupboard inside which were numerous glass tubes and fell it with a great THUD. While the others had a strong feeling that she deliberately did it to block our way, I convinced myself that it was an accident.

Whilst e made our way carefully by dodging the cupboard, I saw a little child hit his head into her body running with great speed. A part of me expected her to violently push the child sideways like all the others she'd been hurting. Instead, she sat on the ground to face the child and gently asked him, "You alright?"

The red-faced boy obviously nodded his head fearfully, but Amber being the Amber she was, guessed his lie without a beat.

As we approached her, we saw she tightly hugged the little 5 year old and mumbled, "Sorry". The boy's mother quickly grabbed his hand and brought him to the side, giving Amber a cold glare from the corner of her eyes. With a gloomy face, Amber rose to her feet and started walking towards the exit; maybe, to avoid hurting someone further. I, with her Grandma's diary clutched tightly to my chest, called out, "Amber! I have the diary! Please, stop."

The girl who had caused a chaos in the hospital came to a halt. With a very nasty smile, she spun around and walked to me. After what felt like a lifetime, she stood right in front of me and looked at me directly in the eye. Pursing her lips, she abruptly seized the diary. And off she ran, sneering like a cannibal, past the exit pushing one of the guards off the railing and leaving us utterly flabbergasted.

This wasn't the Amber I knew. Maybe, her physical wounds had healed but she, as much as I hate to say, she had become a lunatic.

A/N:-
This chapter took too much time to be framed because I'm not very used to writing such content. Please tell me how it was, including Jared's Point Of View.