The Strange Tale Of Ayla Jae

Chapter One - The Pits Of Despair (No Relation)

As you might have guessed, this is the apparent story of one, Ayla Jae. Yup, that's me.

I'm currently sitting on the top step of an abandoned house with a ripped piece of paper in one hand and a sharp metallic pendant in the other. The porch is freezing cool against my hurt legs, and I'm not really sure what to do. I don't know why I stopped here, but it doesn't ultimately matter. It's all I can think to do.

My mind is an empty wake of fear, adrenaline, and exhaustion. I've got cuts everywhere on my knees and legs, clothes barely hanging onto themselves, and I still feel like someone is still chasing me.

The forecast looks fairly bleak to say the least. I just listen to the shallow and desperate nature of my breaths against the silent nature around me and the house in front of me. In a fit of frustration, I relieve the numbness crawling up my legs by spinning around to face the world behind me. In reality, there's not much to see beyond the trees, but it is the only solace that keeps my mind at bay. If I were a person at peace, I might be able to find beauty in this moment.

I don't know where to go, and I have stupid fear that my best friend has abandoned me to some sort of ill fate. There is a faint sound of a siren I begin to hear on the edge of the street.

I think it's coming toward me, but it's too faint to tell. A few moments stain time. The sound doesn't get much closer before it suddenly fades again. I breath a little deeper. I need a few more minutes to collect the remnants of my mind as this tense moment is just too much. I can't believe she would just not show back up. That isn't like her. In this moment, I know I need her.

Her name is Chloe, and she is my favorite person and ally. I've know her since grade school, and unlike most friends, she sticks around. Even when she ebbs and flows from group to group and friend to friend, she has always seemed to make time for her "weirdo". I love her for that, and honestly, I can't imagine what could possibly keep her from keeping her word tonight.

Something must have happened. I can barely stand the thought. Friends are my lifeline, and she has been the core piece since I could first tell a teacher off in second grade.

I hope she's okay. Man, I hope she's okay.

It seems I'm not being immediately pursued anymore, so I try to think of somewhere I can go and not be recognized, somewhere Chloe might have gone. The growing awareness of my injuries make me hesitate.

I need to bandage a few spots, desperately. There are sizable gashes on my legs and my breast that definitely can't go unpatched for too long, among other things.

Anyways, I think Dave's Mart is still open, and he's usually a pretty aloof guy. As long you don't steal from him, he honestly doesn't really care what you do or buy. Chloe and I still go there whenever we get snacking to try some foreign snack he's managed to get a hold of, so if there's any place for me to go, it's his place.

Maybe Chloe went there already. I glance down at my phone. The time reads "10:40pm".

"Damn..." I say aloud to myself. Dave usually closes up around 10 on Tuesday nights, when he goes to his 'meeting'. I hope he decided to skip it tonight. I really need those bandages.

"Ayla!" I hear a voice calmly shout from the left side of the house. I instantly know who it is.

"Oh my crap, Chloe. Where did you go?" I can't help but let my frustration out. When she get close enough, I try and slug her in the arm a little, even though she seems to kind of expect it.

"You were right behind me all of the way from the edge of town. Where did you go?"

Chloe is standing a bit cock eyed, and I quickly find out why. She pulls a shopping bag out from behind her. She thrusts her hand inside of the bag to pull out and reveal a glorious box of wide bandages, gauze, and then a large tube of antibiotic ointment.

"Oh, thank you. Seriously, I thought you got really freaked out this time and just ran. Not that I would have blamed you. I should have known you were just thinking ahead." I reach out to snatch her heavenly gifts, but she pulls them back.

"Hey," she says firmly, "you just sit. Let me help do this."

"Like I don't know how to heal a cut, Chloe. I've been healing bruises and cuts like this for one reason or another since you've known me." I seethe through my teeth as the cut along my breast flares up in pain again. I almost hate that she's right, but honestly, I'm just grateful that she's here.

"Figured you'd go to Dave's anyways. Just speeding it along. Here, sit." She helps me back down to sit. "It's not exactly like I want this night drag out longer either," she continues ," It's sucked horribly, and I think we both know that. But I suppose it's not the worst of the worst, so, all is fair tonight. You could've died, Ayla." She finishes her words and punctuates it with tightening of the first bandage. I groan.

I let a calm silence sit between us for a moment. I know she is right, partially, but I think her sense of danger is always a bit more attuned than my own.

"I know, Chloe. I know. This hasn't exactly been my top ten." I finally tell her.

"Well, when we finish up here, do you want to just go to the backgreen like usual?" Chloe's bright blue eyes looked up at me. I could see her worry for her friend. Usually, her attempts to help me in moments like these are just simple pleasures from our early days in grade school. I almost never turn them down, because they're some of the most pure things in my memory. Any chance to visit those is worth all the hell most days can conjure up, even if I know this time it's not going to happen. This time is fairly...severe.

I try to laugh a little. "Yeah, that sounds dope." Chloe even laughs at my stupid cliche use of dated slang. Anything to help lighten the moment is welcome, even dumb jokes.

Chloe stands up revealing her usual attire, dingy Converse, one-piece overall short, a random band t-shirt, and her hair pulled back. She paces around for a bit, ending in an unsettling sigh.

"You know, Ayla. This can't keep going on."

I keep thinking to myself that she's not going to say what I think she is going to, what everyone else eventually says to me.

"Hey, we've been through this before. We're fine. Things just went especially crappy tonight, but I don't see any reason why things can't stay as is."

I could hear the words coming out of my mouth, and I knew they were some form of my usual white lie. Telling myself everything is going better than expected has become sort of a crutch, a traditional way of life for me. It gives me some semblance of hope when the world so obviously backs down from being even a little merciful.

"Ayla..." Chloe paused.

"I know." I help tighten and pat down a bandage or two. "I know."

Chloe looks at me for a moment before helping the raggedly old me up from the porch. She's always a bit stronger than she seems to be aware of, and I almost lose my balance from getting pulled up too quickly.

"Sorry, A. I'm just...we gotta stop by Dave's again, first, before we do anything else. I forgot something."

I check my body one more time to make sure I'll last until then, with most of me at least patched up.

"Fine. I guess we should go. Just don't get to far ahead, okay?"

Chloe gives me a stern look before smirking a little. I noticed she's already bandaged a few spots on her left leg and right arm.

"Don't worry, Ayla. We've got this. You still got that pendant and the paper?"

I look down, almost forgetting I set them on the porch in the medicinal session. I see the pendent, and I don't see the paper.

"Crap...uh." I fumble around in a circle, my knee almost buckling before I see a small paper start wisping away. "Ah! Yep. Got it."

Chloe briefly smiles, and she grabs my shoulder with a surprisingly gentle but firm grip.

"Then we'll be alright."

We slowly hobble down off the beatdown porch and veer right towards our gloriously cheap small-town shop with newfound confidence.