Stay With Me

Chapter 2: Liberty Choi

Demi looks at me like she can't believe what she's hearing, "What- what did you just say?" she asks while stuttering.

I shake my head in quick dismissal, "Never mind, forget I said anything. I think the drugs mixed with the concussion is making me have some weird delusions." I let out a nervous laugh as heat spreads across my face. I reach my hand up to play with the earring on my ear. A habit I developed when I was young, I do it whenever I feel embarrassed.

"Is this real?" I hear Demi mumble. I can feel more heat spreading across my face, well shit, she must think she saved some lunatic. I look up at her trying to come up with something that'll make me seem less insane but my eyes fail to meet hers because her attention is focused on my arm.  "It's gone? How is that possible?" she says to herself, she seems lost in thought at the moment.

"I'm sorry, I don't mean to be nosy but what's gone and how is what possible?" I ask, which causes her to snap back into reality. "What?"

"Is something wrong? You kinda spaced out a bit." I say cautiously. Okay so maybe I'm not the only one who looks like a crazy person right now.

Demi asks for my permission to sit on the edge of the hospital bed and I say yes, "You said that you saw something appear on my arm, can you describe to me what it looks like?" she says. "Okay, well um.." I pause and take another look at the numbers on her arm.

"They're just a bunch of numbers, some of them resemble something like time and the others are just a bunch of digits put together. I don't know what they mean or if what I'm seeing is even real." The fact that I sound crazy registers in my head as I hear myself talk. I cover my face, sink further down on the bed and say, "oh my fuck I sound crazy,"

"Hey," Demi leans over and takes my hands away from my face, "I believe you," I look at her in disbelief. "You believe me?" She nods in response, "You don't think I'm crazy?" This time she shakes her head, "Really?" I ask one more time just to be sure. "Oh my God, yes Liberty I believe you and I don't think you're crazy."

"Okay, just making sure." I say which earns me a giggle from her. "Now Liberty-" I cut her off to say, "It's Liv, people call me Liv."

"Liv, I'm gonna tell you something that sounds absolutely crazy and I would really love it if you believe me like I believed you just now." I nod in response. Demi takes a deep breath and says, "I can see numbers marked on people's arms too and based on personal experience I found out that they represent that specific person's exact date and time of death." she says it all so fast it's almost comical, and I would laugh right now if she didn't look like she wasn't joking at all.

"What?" Is the first thing that comes to my mind. "Look I know it sounds crazy and-"

"Crazy? No, crazy doesn't even begin to cover it. It's so crazy you should go and write a book based on it." Demi's lips form into a pout, "That's not fair, I believed you when you said all those crazy stuff. Why can't you believe what I'm saying now, it's basically the same thing."

That shuts me up for a minute. Is it really possible? If a bunch of numbers suddenly appear on her arm and I'm the only one who can see them then maybe it's not entirely impossible that they represent the exact time and date of someone's demise. "Okay, let's say I believe you. Why do you have this.. ability?"

"Honestly.. I don't know. Ever since I can remember this ability was just there. There wasn't a big accident or a near death experience, I just had them. So I don't have any idea how or why I got this ability." she says. "Okay, well surely you've saved other people in the past, did any of them develop your ability?"

Demi shakes her head and says, "I've tried to save other people in the past but I never succeeded, I learned the hard way that death is unavoidable, or at least I thought it was, until I saved you."

"So I'm the first person you actually succeeded in saving?" Demi nods in response, "I don't know if you remember but I bumped into you this morning, I accidentally saw the mark on your arm and I saw that you were meant to die today. I saw you again later in the afternoon and a big part of me was just aching to save you, or to at least try to."

Woah, I feel like that's a lot information to give someone who just woke up from hitting their head on the street, "Fuck, my head is pounding." Demi stands up from where she was sitting and fixes my blanket telling me that she thinks it's best if we have this conversation later, when my thoughts aren't influenced by pain medication and a concussion. "Maybe you should get some more sleep, it is getting pretty late. Is there anyone you want me to call, someone you'd like to come and watch over you?" she asks and I shake my head, "Okay, I'll come back tomorrow morning then." she says as I close my eyes welcoming sleep to take over.

-end of chapter two-