Rage, emptiness.
That’s all I feel. That’s all I’ve ever felt until them. I never believed a person could change so much. How a single soul can be embedded to my own. How a single touch feels like dancing through an everlasting fire. How the void can suddenly be fill with just one look. This was my one weakness just like it was my strength. Never thought it was for me or more like I never believed I deserved it.
For someone who knew it was destruction, I still took a leap, and I would do it a thousand times again. For one more smile, one more rainy day, one warm embrace, one hour, just one second. I just want one more second. Just a moment to see their light and never let it go.
Why? Why did I do this? Why couldn’t it have been me? I would give anything to take their place.
This is unfair. I didn’t deserve to be here. They should’ve never trusted me. I warned them and still they were blind to it. I was blind to it.
They don’t warn you that it rips you apart. That your whole being becomes nothing, but a speck meant to worship the moon. And when the moon is gone, there is despair and pain. So much damn pain in the darkness I once thrived in. That’s all I see now.
Vengeance. Despair. Red.
So much red, I wouldn’t know if I was still on the ground, if it wasn’t for the heavy weight in my arms. If it wasn’t for the lifeless silver eyes staring at me flicking from the living and dead.
“It’s okay. It’ll be okay, Lance.” She coughed as blood drip through her lips. The wound on her abdomen soaking her shirt in crimson.
“Just hold on. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. Please don’t go.”
I continue repeating the same words as I put more pressure to the puncture. Tears spill from me blocking my eyesight and splashing against her cheeks.
Please don’t leave me. Don’t die.
“Just wait, they’re coming. I’m so sorry,” I begged, refusing to believe she was leaving me.
“Who would have thought it would take this for you to beg?” She tried to laugh but it came out as a croak. Her limbs becoming more weighted as her eyes became droopier.
If she could just wait, I knew the others would be getting help soon and be on their way. They had to get here on time. She wasn’t allowed to die not without doing everything we plan.
“If you keep your eyes open, I’ll keep on begging. If you just hold on, I’ll take you to all the places you want to see. I’ll dance with you every day in the backyard even if it’s thundering. I’ll watch your weird cooking shows. I’ll personally bring down the stars you draw every night. I won’t stop begging until my last breath. But please just keep your eyes open. It was never meant to be you.”
“Stop, it’s not your fault. Just hold me one last time.”
Struggling, she raises her hand to touch below my eyes, slowly moving across my cheeks and jaw and then settling on my neck. I grasp onto her tighter, taking her in. Committing to memory every detail of the person who made me feel everything. The only person who saw me. My home.
The person whose last breath I hear before they fall still, staring up at the star-filled night.
“NO.”
I clasp her lifeless body, burying my head on her neck as more tears burn down my cheek. My chest tearing apart. That once filled place, empty again. Gone with her. Wishing I could change her fate. Death did not get to keep her.
Just one more second. Just one more lifetime.