Chapter Text
BBBBBBOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
A great flame raced up from the basement, so hot it made everything around it char and blacken. The windows shattered from the heat as everything went up in flames.
A flame licked up your back, scorching your clothes and hair. You flew through the air from the force of the explosion. It roared in your ears, making you deaf to anything else. You hit the ground suddenly and roughly, rolling over a few times before finally stopping. The gravel cut at your abused body, cutting into your skin and leaving scrapes in its wake.
You lay on the ground for a moment, nauseous due to being flung in the air like a rag doll. Small fires still burn on your clothes and you panic. You begin to pat yourself down, and roll around on the ground a few times. The fires still, and your head slumps onto the rocks. Tears burn in your eyes. Hank’s jacket was thankfully unharmed, save for your bloody hand prints.
Rain pelts the ground hard. The raindrops feel like ice as they hit, chilling you to the bone. You’d take it after standing that close to the heater.
You lay there for what felt like hours. Eventually, you push yourself up to stare at the destruction in front of you.
A laugh bubbles out of your throat. You sound like a lunatic, laughing so hard that tears fall then you’re cupping your face in your hands, sobbing uncontrollably. Your throat was hoarse and dry as you cried your heart out.
Lightning rips across the sky, breaking clouds and illuminating the sky. Thunder follows, echoing in your ears.
In the distance, police sirens and ambulances wail. You don’t hear them, and only realize they’re there when blue and red lights flash on the fire. A firetruck screams, and another red light is added to the countless blue and red. You keep crying, huddled over in the parking lot. Doors slam and heavy footsteps hurry over to you.
A hand is placed on your shoulder.
Soft murmurs fill the air.
“[Ma’am/Sir/Mx], are you okay?” A female voice almost yells at you.
“No,” you reply quickly, still bawling.
Someone carefully takes your hands from your face and wipes your tears with a kleenex. Their actions are futile, as more tears replace them immediately. Gentle hands grab your arms and an arm wraps around your torso. They drag you over to the back of an ambulance and lay you on the stretcher. They take your phone and keys, but you refuse to let go of Hank’s jacket, and they let you keep it, closing the doors on the ambulance. A few EMTs sit in the back and tend to your smaller wounds, checking your vitals and making sure you’re stable. The blood loss finally shines through, now that you’re no longer running on adrenaline and an instinct to survive.
Your eyelids droop and you close your eyes, faintly hearing the sounds of panicked EMTs rushing about, trying to keep you conscious.
You close your eyes and allow your body to rest.
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
You hesitantly open your eyes.
The blinding light of fluorescent hospital lighting floods your vision. You blink away the discomfort. Your head throbs painfully. You groan, raising a hand to your head, where you feel rough bandages wrapped around it. Multiple needles stick into your veins, pumping fluids back into your body.
“[Name]!” A female’s voice shrieks. A chair is scraped across the floor and arms are wrapped tightly around your torso, a face nuzzles into your neck affectionately. You hug back, confused, before you smell the familiar perfume. It’s lavender and vanilla.
“Mama,” you breathe out, and hug as tight as your broken body will let you.
Tears wet your neck, and you find yourself crying as well.
“Let me look at you,” your mother says, pulling away but still holding you in her embrace. Her thumbs rub comforting circles into your biceps as her eyes rake over every single cut and bruise on your face. You stare into her warm [e/c] eyes, the crows feet that lay beside her eyes, every single hard-earned wrinkle and imperfection that laid on her skin.
“How’s my babies?” You ask.
She smiles. “Just fine, but they’re mad you haven’t come home yet.”
A knock on the door interrupts you, and you whirl to the door. Your vision swims, and nausea rises in your throat. You moan and snap your eyes shut.
“Lay down, you got a concussion,” your mother says, gently laying you back down on the hospital bed.
A female doctor steps in, wearing dark blue scrubs and a stethoscope.
“Ah, [Name], you’re awake. You had quite the day yesterday. I’m Doctor Lana Greene, pleasure to meet you,” she announces, walking over to your bed and shaking your mother’s hand.
You see her lips moving but can’t hear what she’s saying.
“What?” You ask loudly, barely being able to hear yourself.
“I said that I’ll be taking care of you until you’re fully healed. So, to start, I’ll be going over your condition,” she spoke louder, and spoke with an air of intelligence and you could tell she knew what she was talking about.
“You have a grade three concussion from being hit so hard and taking multiple hits. You may experience speech difficulty, amnesia, vomiting, seeing spots. Brain damage is a potential risk in your situation, so tests will be run soon. Your right ankle is broken, along with your left hand and nose. We expect your ankle to heal fully with time, but your hand and nose, we aren’t sure about. The bones in your nose were shattered and moved underneath your skin, and surgery will most likely be needed to re-correct those bones.”
“The same with your hand, your phalanxes are shattered and scattered underneath the skin. Surgery will also be needed. If those bones don’t regrow after surgery, you may need to get artificial bones to replace them,” she continues.
“You have first and second degree burns on your back. Not too bad, they should go down with the right treatment. You were hit on the left side of your upper body by an ax. The hit cracked your clavicle in half, and ripped through supraspinatus and subscapularis muscle. You’re extremely lucky the hit didn’t cut any lower, it would’ve severed your pulmonary artery in half, and you would’ve died.”
You feel your mother physically stiffen beside you on the bed. With your non-broken hand, you lace your fingers together and squeeze. She squeezes anxiously back.
“You will need surgery to recorrect your bones. They were pushed to opposite sides, and it is doubtful they’ll regrow naturally. Now, for the worst of it,” she sighs solemnly and looks straight into your eyes.
“You have severe hearing loss in both ears, it’s worse on the left.”
Your eyes widen and your jaw hangs open.
“W-what?” You stutter in absolute disbelief.
“You have severe hearing loss. This is due to your close proximity to the explosion. Hearing aids will be needed….” her voice trails off as your mind wanders. You prided yourself on your decent hearing, what will you be without it? Tears build up in your eyes and before you know it, you’re hunched over sobbing, holding your face in your hands as your mother rubs your back.
“You also have a number of less major injuries. There’s bruises and cuts all over your body, and those will heal with time. Your right cheek and cheekbone is swollen and bruised, but the swelling will go down if you ice it and the bruise will fade,” she finishes.
“I am very sorry this happened to you, [Name]. Truly, I am. I will give you as much time as you need,” Dr Lana says, saying something to your mother that you can’t hear. Your mother replies and Lana nods, walking out of the room.
Your mother comforts you, murmuring words that you can’t hear yet can feel her breath on your cheeks. A few minutes later, a nurse in soft blue scrubs walks in carrying a tray of food.
“Good afternoon, [Name],” she says politely, moving the table beside your bed over your body and setting down the tray. You look at your meal, your stomach growling. You hadn’t realized you were hungry until food was in front of you.
There was a small bowl of broth with a few pieces of roast and chunks of potatoes floating in it. A sad excuse for a roll sat in one of the miniscule compartments in the tray. A small cup of water sat beside the soup.
It wasn’t the best meal you’ve ever seen, but escaping death does that to a person. You grab the plastic spoon and begin to shovel food in your mouth, not coming up for air. Your mother gives you an annoyed look, but lets it go. The nurse exits the room, and you take a big gulp of water. You dive back in and within two minutes, your entire plate is cleaned. You look up at your mother.
“No more?”
She giggles at your expression.
“Your portions are bein’ controlled. You gotta start slow to not upset your stomach. You went a long time without eating and lost a ton of blood,” she explains. You huff and lean back.
“That’s bullshit.”
She laughs and moves your table away so she can sit closer. You lean forwards and she wraps an arm around your shoulder, squeezing you tightly against her. It’s silent for a few minutes, save for the beeping of the heart monitor and all the other machinery you’re hooked up to, before you break it.
“Mama, why do people die?”
She sighs. “It’s just life. Don’t know why, just is.”
“Do you miss Dad?”
She smiles sadly at you. “All the time. There’s not a moment where I don’t.”
“I miss him. And Hank. And everyone else,” you mutter miserably. Your mother presses her lips into your cheek.
“I tell you what, soon as you’re out of here, I’m buying you some liquor,” she laughs. You give her a shocked look. She never approved of you drinking, and now she wants to buy you some?
“Van Winkle, moonshine, whatever you want,” she continues. Your shock turns into a smile.
“Moonshine. Haven’t had it since I was young,” you reply, giggling. You sit in silence as you think back to childhood when you’d have a fever or other illness. Your mother’s cure was always a small cup of moonshine with honey and lemon.
“I found somethin’ I think you’ll want,” she says as she walks over to the small chair a few feet away from your bed. On the plush chair sits a black tarp bag. She reaches into it, blocking your view of what she’s grabbing with her body. You crane your neck as far as you can, mindful of the bandages restricting movement.
She walks back over, her arms filled with an assortment of things. A jean jacket and a photo album are the things you can pick out. She lays everything on the bed and you look down at it.
A weathered, bloody pocket Bible, a half used bottle of men’s cologne, and an old photo album. Other small things lay on the bed, including a Catholic rosary, a few other necklaces, your father’s broken watch, and small rings.
“Look at this,” she said, passing you the photo album. You take it with your good hand and struggle to open it. Her warm palms press against the tops of your hands and help you open it. Inside sits a picture of you and your father by a campfire. He’s holding you as you roast a marshmallow. You grin and stare up at your mother.
“Where’d you find this?” You ask.
“Attic. They,” she motioned her arm around, talking about the medical staff, “let me grab some things to stay overnight. I knew I made one but couldn't find it. So, I looked where I kept everything else.”
You brush your fingers over the picture, almost too scared to touch it for fear it would crumble to dust. Your mother turns the page and there’s a picture of you and your sister, June, swimming in the creek behind your childhood home. You continue to flip the pages, smiling as memories come flooding back. There’s a picture of your mother on her wedding day, looking beautiful as ever in her white dress as she walked down the aisle. Decorating the empty space around the picture were more pictures of you, June, and your father. The next few pages were more wedding pictures. Your mother flipped the page and there sat your childhood dog, Timber, asleep with you and June on either side of him, also asleep. She continues flipping the pages and you make small comments, reminiscing when times were simpler.
Your mother turns the page and a picture of your father decked out in his Marine blues is glued to it. You both fall silent. Wordlessly, your mother shuts it and sets it on your bedside table. She reaches for the bottle of cologne and hands it to you.
You lift it to your nose and sniff.
It’s Hank’s cologne.
You turn to your mother, shocked. “How’d you get this?”
She bashfully smiles. “Hank left his truck unlocked. When all the bodies and reporters were gone, I snuck in and grabbed it.”
Hank leaving his truck unlocked felt like a stab to the heart. He thought he’d get in and drive home. A single teardrop falls from your eye. You brush it away quickly.
“Where’s his jacket?” You ask.
“The hospital’s washin’ it,” she answers without missing a beat. “Got you that so you can replace the smell.”
It’s stupid, but your eyes tear up again. “Thank you, Mama.”
She smiles softly at you. “You’re welcome.”
She grabs the small Bible and hands it to you. “Found this too.”
The cover was bloodstained. The edges of the pages were thick with blood. You look at it confused, then back at your mother.
“Hank’s pocket. EMTs found it and gave it to me ‘cause bodies can’t have a personal belonging or whatever.”
You nod then skim through the verses. You set down the Bible and she hands you the jewelry. You recognize the dog tags as your father’s and are shocked at the lack of blood on them.
“I cleaned ‘em,” your mother says, holding a ring up in the lighting.
You set the tags on your bedside table beside everything else. The necklaces were your grandmother’s. You run your fingers over one, yet you don’t recognize it. It was a turquoise bird on wire and had a screw-on clasp. It looked handmade, but not like the ones your grandmother made.
“Was this Granny’s?” You ask, confused.
“No. Ennis’. Found it in his truck as well. The rosary was Jack’s. Hung off his rearview mirror.”
“Oh,” you say, your voice dropping. You grab your father’s watch and slide it over your wrist. All specks of blood are gone, and you run your fingers over the broken face. Underneath it sits the hands, forever pointing at 2:33.
A knock interrupts you. Dr Lana steps in your hospital room.
“[Name], we want to run your brain-scan tests. Doctor Jenner is ready to see you,” she says. Your mother picks the stuff up from your lap and sits it with everything else on the table. A few nurses file in the room and grab the handles on the sides of your bed.
“I’m gonna run down to the cafeteria real quick,” your mother says, rising from your bed and standing off to the side.
You nod as they wheel you through the door and to wherever it is they run brain tests.
-
A little while later, you’re brought back to your room where your mother sits in the chair watching the television and eating chips. A bag you don’t recognize sits beside the chair.
“Who’s bag?” You ask as you’re placed where you sat before and the nurses walk out. A knock makes you turn your head slowly to the door.
The door clicks and in walks June.
“Holy shit!” You cry as she runs over to you, hugging you tightly. You rest your forehead on her collarbone and breathe in her familiar scent. She smelled like your shared childhood. Nostalgic and comforting, her honeysuckle perfume wafts into your nose.
You’re reminded of childhood, where the biggest issue was the sun going down at nine and you couldn’t play outside anymore. You remember sucking the honey from the flowers, loving the sweet taste of it with the slightly bitter bite underneath. You remember chasing fireflies and squealing in delight when you grabbed one; you remember sitting cross-legged on the floor, elbow-to-elbow with June, watching Saturday morning cartoons on the box TV your father had set up, the cereal in the bowls that sat on your laps slowly becoming soggy.
You blink as tears fall.
“I got you somethin’,” she mutters directly in your ear. She reaches into her jean jacket pocket and brings out a small, blue velvet covered jewelry box. She grabs a red velvet one and hands it to your mother, seeing that she had made her way over to your side.
“Open it,” she chides. Your mother pries hers open in no time, gasping at whatever sat inside.
You hold your box in the palm of your broken hand and pry it open with your opposite hand. Inside sits an oval-shaped golden locket. The designs on the outside are intricate and beautiful, floral arrangements fading into swirls and dips of shiny gold.
“Oh, June, this is gorgeous,” your mother says, smiling brightly at June.
“Thank ya, Mama,” she grins back. June’s warm fingers slide over your own and she undoes the small clasp on the side, opening it up.
A picture of your mother and father on their wedding day stares back at you on one side. On the other sits a picture of you and June hugging each other tightly, faces shoved close to the other, a cheek pressed against the other’s. June still had braces at the time, so it had to be close to the summer after your senior year of highschool. The soft smile you already wore grew. You look over at your mother as she slaps a hand over her mouth, instantly tearing up at whatever her locket held.
“What’s wrong, Mama?” You ask. Wordlessly, she hands you her locket and you pass her yours. In hers sits a picture of your father dipping her in some smoke filled honky-tonk, large smiles stretched across their faces. Just from looking, you can tell they were both laughing. The other side holds a picture of you and June as young teenagers, both sitting on the wooden steps, you with a makeup brush and a blush container, dabbing a small amount onto her cheeks.
You both look at June before enveloping her in a massive hug. She’s squished in between you as you hold her tighter. This brings another round of tears, and you comfort each other as you cry.
-
About a month had passed since the incident and your hospital stay. Every night was spent waking up, screaming, drenched in a cold sweat. Screams run rampant throughout your ears and there is nothing you can do to silence them. Blood soaked corpses lay in your vision and dead hands reach out to you, threatening to make you suffer the same fate they did.
Ignoring that, your ankle had been healing up nicely, you could now put weight on it without falling. Your nose and hand had to have surgery, and you were finally regaining movement in your left hand. Your nose had the slightest crook in it, but you took it in pride as a reminder that you’d walked through hell and made it out.
You had gotten hearing aids, paid for by your insurance that was covered by the coal mine and you hated them. They felt uncomfortable in your ears, but you could hear. You’d tough it out for that reason only. Your collar bones had to be placed back together and binded. Scars littered your body, the biggest stretching across your left collar bone. Stitches were stapled into the small wounds on your face and arms from the gravel. All in all, you’d healed up almost perfectly, save for your nose, limp from your right ankle, and limited movement of your right hand and left shoulder.
On the day you were discharged from the hospital, you wore the jewelry of the fallen. You had sprayed Hank’s jacket in his signature cologne, and you were delighted to find that his cologne covered the stench of the hospital perfectly. The necklaces bounced softly against your sternum with every step you took.
You hold two bags, one for your mother and June, as you walk out the sliding doors of the hospital. You were advised to take it easy, your body was still healing. Your mother walks a few steps in front of you, leading you to her car.
You slowly look around the parking lot, searching for her car, yet you don’t find it.
“Mama, where’s yer car?” You ask, confused. She doesn’t reply and keeps walking to the back of the lot. You’re even more confused, but it soon melts away into shock.
In the corner in the back of the light, there stands your truck in all her glory. You gasp.
The sun glints off of her blue coat, making her look shiny and clean. It’s clear she’d been washed recently, small rivets of water dripped down and onto the asphalt. You turn to June.
“So this is what you did this mornin’?” You ask, laughing in delight. June nods.
“She was dirty, so I gave her a wash. She looks brand new, don’t she?”
You raise your arms carefully and wrap them around June, squeezing as tight as you could. She slips the keys into your palm and you smile brighter.
“Thank you,” you mutter into her ear.
“Yer welcome,” she replies, pulling away and squeezing your hands gently.
You walk over to her, smoothing your hand across the doors, brushing away stray water droplets. You slip your key into the lock and are hit by the welcoming smell of the air fresheners that hang from the rearview mirror. You unlock the other doors and shove the bags in the backseat. You slip into the driver’s side and shove the key into the ignition, turning it and reveling in the roar of the engine. Your mother slips into the passenger side and June sits in the back.
You put your hand on the gearshift, prepared to reverse out of the parking spot, but you pause. Both women turn to look at you. Wordlessly, you grab Jack’s rosary and slip it over your head then slide it over your rearview mirror. The cross dangles in front of the radio, bouncing against it slightly.
You mess with the radio, turning it to a local station, then reverse. You pull out of the parking lot, turn onto the highway, and turn down the radio to hear the engine roar as you speed up. You turn the radio back up as you drive back up into the mountains.
Silver Stallion by The Highwaymen comes on and you hum along. You roll your windows down and let the warm summer in, wind ruffling up your hair and sending small whisps flying.
You pull into your small drive and make your way to your house. Everyone rolls up their windows and you stop a few yards away from your door. You turn your truck off and shut you door, then grab the bags from the back. June will be staying with you for a while, just until you’re healed enough that you can do things on your own. You were still weak and hurting, the hurt had just quieted down.
The others grab the last few and you stride over to the door, taking long steps, excited to see your dogs. Howls and brays are muffled by the door. You shove the key in the lock and turn it then shove the door open. Claire and Colter rush out, immediately jumping on you.
“Oh, my babies!” You cry as you fall to your knees, kissing and hugging all over them.
The Hell you endured finally caught up with you. You’ll never see Hank smile, or watch Ennis do something stupid then hear Jack’s laughter ring in your ears. Never will you see Hank give Lainey small, shy grins when he believed no one was watching. Or watch Jill flirt with random men in small, run-down honky-tonks for free drinks. No more early morning coffee and snack cakes with Jack, no more lunches spent in a small diner, the sounds of old country drifting through the air and dissolving in the background of your conversations.
And that breaks you.
You wail into your pillow, trying to wish away the hole in your heart that was once filled with your friends. That was how you spent every night before sleeping. Sleep still did nothing to silence your loud mind, screams and cries echoing around in your ears, images of your friends being brutally murdered in front of you bouncing around your head. You woke up, drenched in a cold sweat, with tears running down your face and snot slipping into your open mouth, gasping pathetically for air. You took everything you could get your hands on to sleep at night, yet nothing worked. Melatonin, prescriptions from the pharmacy, even liquor did jack shit to shield you from the horrors you relive every single night.
Your nightmares had many stars: Hank, Jack, Ennis, Rogers and his murder posse, and many others. The creature in the suit made an appearance every single night; as soon as he appeared, you woke up screaming. You saw a strange symbol in your nightmares, it looked like a circle with an X mark through it.
Your days were spent laying in bed, staring at the ceiling, your eyes deceiving you and twisting devilish faces into the wood above you. When your mind got bored of that, you’d roll over and stare at your father’s picture on your dresser until you cried.
You couldn’t even go on your phone, due to your lockscreen being a picture of Hank. Anytime you saw his jacket, you were drowned in memories. Despite that, you slept cuddled in his jean jacket every night. It’d have to be washed almost everyday-courtesy of your sweaty body when you awoke-but you’d spray it with his cologne and wish it was Hank’s arms wrapped around you instead of your own. You wished you could hear Ennis bitch about the price of gas, or not getting enough “beauty sleep” (his words not yours), or whatever he wanted to complain about. Jack would laugh in the middle of Ennis’ rants, making Ennis flustered at the attention.
You’d give your life if it meant they still had theirs.
One night, June somehow convinces you to go out for dinner with her and some of her friends. You didn’t know them, they were a few years younger and had just passed the legal age to drink.
Trying to drink with them was like trying to ride a young bronc.
You tapped out after what you guessed was your fiftieth shot of whiskey. It was stupid, you know, but you grab your truck keys and struggle to find June in the crowd. You were exhausted and your hearing aids were picking up the background noise which annoyed you to no end.
“June?” You call, peering over heads and looking for the familiar mane of [h/c] hair. A few people turn to look at you then return to their drinks and conversations.
“June-bug?” You try again. Cigarette smoke fills the air, making it harder to see anything beside the people in front of you. You hear her laughter to your right, and your head snaps to the side. You try to make your way peacefully through the crowd, to no avail, eventually deciding on shoving around drunk people.
“Watch it! I’ll take ya outside ‘n beat the holy hell outta ya, ya bitch!” One drunk, middle-aged man slurs.
“Not interested, bald-ass,” you snap back, not turning around to give him the time of day.
You finally reach June by a pool table, where she hangs off of a man’s arm who’s just as drunk as she is. She giggles as he whispers slurred mutters into her ear, only stopping to take a sip from his glass of whiskey on the edge of the pool table and shoot, missing almost every play in his intoxicated state. When he finally makes a ball in a pocket, his arm slips from her waist to her ass, giving it a firm squeeze.
Your protective older-sibling instincts take over for a minute, and your fists clench at your sides, ready to storm in and swing. When she gives a delighted squeal and slaps his chest playfully, you cool off and walk over to her. She turns to you, her eyes glassy and her cheeks flushed from the alcohol and male attention.
“[Name!] You should join, it’s super fun,” she says, her words running together. Her breath smells like beer, and it’s clear she won’t be riding home with you tonight.
“‘M leavin’,” you say.
Her smile drops from her face as she sputters. “Whu-what? Why?” Her hands grab your own, suddenly forgetting about the man beside her.
“‘M tired. ‘N Claire and Colter need fed,” you reply, pulling her into a hug. Her arms wrap around your body, pulling you closer to her.
“Ya can’t go, it’s just gettin’ started,” she cackles. You smile then kiss her cheek. She smells like beer and honeysuckle. Sooner or later, she’ll smell like her companion’s cologne.
“I gotta. Can I trust yer date?” You say, standing up straighter and fixing the coldest gaze you can muster on the man. It works, because he practically withers under your harsh glare.
“Tyler? He’s fine, yeah. After this we’re gunna go to his house and-”
“Okay, don’t need to know,” you cut her off. She giggles.
“Bye, June-bug,” you say, detaching yourself from her hold.
“Bye, [Name],” she replies, kissing your cheek before turning back to her date. You pat her on the shoulder then push through the crowd of people. Loud music blares as people dance around you, their bodies moving in rhythm with the tune. You cross the threshold and stop by your truck.
You dig through Hank’s jacket pockets and find a half finished pack of Marlboros. You fish out your lighter and light your cig, then shove it back in your pocket where it clinks against your phone. You take an inhale then pull the cig out of your lips to exhale as you whip out your phone.
2:33.
“Damn, it’s late” you mutter. You were originally thinking of calling your mother to pick you up, but you figured she’d be pissed at you waking her up. You lean on the side of your truck as you work on your cigarette and mess around on your phone, finally changing your lockscreen to a picture of Claire and Colter. Your cigarette has been reduced to a smoldering stump, so you stamp it out under your boots and climb into your Ford. You fire it up and tear out of the parking lot of the small honky tonk you’d never remember the name of.
You make your way home and pull into the drive. Suddenly, it feels as if you’ve been punched in the gut. Your eyes widen and you rip a hand from the wheel to your lips. You slam on the breaks, put your truck in park, and stumble over to the side of the road and it’s there that you vomit.
It gushes upwards in hot streams, burning your throat and mouth. You retch and retch and retch until you can’t anymore. You cough and wipe a hand across your mouth, smearing leftover puke and snot on your face.
Maybe it was the alcohol.
No matter how much you desperately try to believe that, you know it wasn’t the whiskey. No, not when you begin to smell blood.
Your hands fly up to your nose and sure enough, they come away bloody.
You stare down at them in utter shock. Your hands tremble slightly.
A dog howls, the sound muffled by walls and doors and windows-
And it’s coming from your home.
You snap from your daze and race to your truck, throwing it into drive and tearing up the driveway. Gravel kicks out behind you, dust flies behind your truck. You barely stop before you rip the gearshift into park and jump out, slamming the door behind you.
You near the door and are instantly hit by the overwhelming and all-too-familiar scent of fresh blood.
“No,” you whisper into the night.
Your hands shake like leaves as you stare at your door.
Crimson sin stains the once beautiful oak, sliding down in small droplets. Your breath catches in your throat.
Your shaking hand reaches for the doorknob, slipping from the blood. You push it open, the old wood creaking on its hinges.
You locked the door.
Your hand pauses. You take your hand from the doorknob and step backwards, careful to keep your eyes on the door, back to your truck. You turn around for a moment to grab your .44 from the door’s side pocket then whirl back to the door and stalk towards it. You position your hands on the grip and kick your door open, blood smearing on the tip of your boot.
Never in a million years would you ever be prepared for what sits in front of you.
Claire lays in a pool of blood.
Her blood.
“No,” you whisper again.
You feel the world give out from under you as you fall to your knees.
Her stomach was split open where an autopsy would be performed. Her guts lay sticking out from her body, blood soaking her short, once tan and black fur.
“No,” you say, louder this time, your gun falling out of your hands and clattering against the floor.
Smudges of blood lay behind her body, and you crane your neck to see them.
TOO LATE
EXODUS 12:23
“No no no no no no NO!” Your voice rises in volume until you’re shrieking at the top of your lungs.
In the Bible, God had Moses and the Israelites sacrifice lambs then smear the blood on their doors so that their first-born sons would live while God passed over the land and smited every Egyptian first-born.
TOO LATE
“NO! God fucking damnit -” your voice cracks and the tears begin to flow.
From the bathroom, Colter’s howls and moans sync with your wails of grief, symphonizing in an oddly beautiful way.
-
That’s when you decide it’s time to leave.
Shoving yourself up from the ground, you proceed to call the cops then your mother. She gets there quicker than the cops ever could and holds you while you bawl onto her shoulder.
Colter was placed in your mother’s car. He drooled all over the backseat as he slept. You drank big gulps of water and tried every single trick in the book to hide your whiskey tainted breath. You couldn't deal with a DUI right now, not when your dog laid murdered inside of your home.
The cops show up finally, blue and red lighting flashing on your once peaceful home. Through sobs, you manage to tell them what happened. Seeing Claire dead on the floor sobered you up quickly.
You have never been more stone cold sober in your entire life.
Yellow tape wraps around your home and a few yards beside it. Officers stand near your driveway, keeping pesky reporters from entering the crime scene and disturbing potential evidence. Flashing lights shine in your eyes, painting everything in red and blue hues.
“Do you know of anyone who would be tempted to do this?” The sheriff asks, his sheriff’s hat high upon his head.
You know exactly who it was. But they’re supposed to be dead . No one could survive an explosion, not even those sicko fucks. Then again, they did survive gunshots to their heads, so maybe it wasn’t impossible.
“Maybe,” is all you say. His blue eyes scrutinize you, trying to dig deep under your skin for the answer. When he doesn’t find it, he sighs and begins to order his men around.
“I need all canine units to search the woods in a fifty mile radius! The killer couldn’t have gotten far on foot!” He barks. The dogs practically drag their owners through the treelines, noses pressed hard against the dirt, searching for a whiff of anything suspicious. He turns back to you once the dogs disappear from sight, swallowed up by the thick foliage. Just as he’s about to say something, one female and one male officer step out your door and quickly walk over to you.
“[Mrs/Mr/Mx] [Name], there were no signs of theft. Nothing was rummaged through, no money taken, nothing,” the female says, a pretty dark skinned woman with nut brown eyes.
“We did find something odd, though,” the man speaks up, a white man with green eyes and freckles.
He passes a polaroid picture in a plastic baggie to you wordlessly. You stare at it confused. It’s just a picture of your wall. You look up at him, the question burning in your eyes, and he points to something on the wall. You look and all the blood drains from your face.
It’s a circle with an X through it written in blood.
Claire’s blood.
In the back of your mind, you know that symbol is somehow tied to Rogers, Tim, and the man in yellow. You don’t know how, you just know .
You pass the picture back to him, staring at the gravel. You’re silent, but your mind races.
You were hoping this wasn’t them, that they were actually dead.
Guess you were wrong.
“[Name], do you recognize that symbol?” The female asks. Your mother squeezes your arm affectionately, tethering you to the earth and comforting you at the same time.
“No,” you finally say, your voice raspy from lack of use.
The police stare at you unconvinced. They figure out you won’t talk and halt their observation. The man and woman walk back to the house, looking for evidence of a break in on your door. The sheriff turns to you-Shane something-and addresses you and your mother.
“I think it’d be best if [Name] here stays with you for the rest of the night.”
Your mother nods.
“We’ll finish this up and give you a call later this morning when we’re done,” he finishes. You dismiss yourself and climb into your mother’s car, waiting in the deafening silence for what feels like hours. You pull your phone from your pocket and check the time.
3:12.
Your eyes catch on Claire in the background and tears prickle in your eyes. You shut your phone off and throw your head back against the seat, trying to will away the tears.
Finally, your mother opens the car door and slides in. No words are exchanged; they aren’t needed. Unspoken words hang in the air between you. She isn’t mad about getting woken up in the dead of night, nor you getting drunk and driving home.
She’s sympathetic, understanding the hurt you feel for Claire’s death.
Everyday you thank the Lord that you got an understanding mother.
-
The next morning, you pitch the idea to her of leaving. The event earlier that morning solidified your hidden desire to move somewhere far away. Of course, she was upset about not being able to see you, but understood why you needed to.
“Will you come back and visit?” She asked, arms wrapped tight around you. June wraps her arms around you both and you take a large inhale, breathing in her honeysuckle perfume as if it’d be the last time you ever smelled it.
“Of course,” you reply, smiling.
You started out small, selling your chickens and smaller items. You progressively got bolder and bolder until there was a FOR SALE sign outside of what was once your home as Colter jumps in the cab of your truck. Before you drove down the driveway for the very last time, you kiss your mother good-bye as she and June wrap their arms around you tightly.
“You answer my calls everyday, you hear?” Your mother demands.
“Yes, Mama,” you reply, giggling lightly. She pulls back and her eyes flick over your face, soaking up every detail and small flaw in your skin. June separates and stares at your face, giving you the same caring gaze that your mother did. They pull you back in and your mother speaks.
“Be safe, okay,” she whispers, voice on the edge of tears.
“I will, Mama,” you whisper back. They hesitantly let you go and stand a little bit away from your truck door as you climb in. Colter sticks his head through your open window and your mother gives him good-bye kisses and ear scratches. Her attention turns back to you and you see her bottom lip tremble as she fights back tears. She bites down on her lip hard as you push the key into the ignition, firing up the truck.
“I love you, [Name],” June calls.
“I love you too, June-bug.”
“I love you, baby. Don’t you forget it,” your mother says, tears now flowing freely down her cheeks.
“I love you too, Mama.”
You pull your truck into reverse then push into drive, flinging rocks behind you. Your eyes glue to June and your mother in the mirror. June takes a few steps towards you but stops. Tears stain their faces, and with a start, you realize you’re crying as well. You stop where gravel turns to road and wipe your tears with the cuffs of Hank’s jacket. Your gaze fixes on them one last time in the mirror and you slowly turn onto the road, staring at them until the woods obstructs your view of them.
-
It’s been about two weeks since you left. You’ve been slowly making your way across the country, stopping at night in shady hotels in towns with a population of fifty and eating whatever shitty fast food you can find. You drifted, never staying in one spot for too long, always on the move. For what, you didn’t know.
You’re somewhere in Oklahoma when you stop for the night. As you drove into the minuscule town, a neon bar sign catches your eye. Once you get a room for the night and get Colter situated, you drive back to the bar, craving a drink. One drink, then you’d leave.
You yank open the glass door and the bar is surprisingly empty and quiet. Only a few others occupy it, a handful of men and the bartender. George Strait plays like a whisper through the otherwise silent air as you walk your way over to the bar and sit down on an old rickety stool. You slap some money down on the counter and the bartender takes your request.
“Fireball.”
He turns to the shelves behind him and brings out a glass and your preferred liquor. He’s a balding man with tattoos in blue jeans and a muscle shirt. He slides it over to you and you take a sip, relishing in the burn sliding down your throat.
The door behind you opens, but you don’t care enough to look. Boots stomp across the floor, accompanied by a quieter clink. The boots stop right beside you. Your gaze flicks over to the boots and you’re met with cowboy boots with spurs strapped to the heel.
“This seat taken?” A male voice asks, deep with a foreign twang. The only ‘ twangs’ you’d heard was Southern, so this was a welcome change. You suddenly remember the man was waiting for an answer.
“Knock yourself out,” you reply. The man sits on the barstool beside you and the scent of horses and outdoors hits you like a slap in the face. Your eyes flick over to him and you’re met with arguably the most beautiful man you’ve ever seen in your whole life.
A pair of beautiful blue eyes stares back at you. Nicely shaped eyebrows sit above those dazzling eyes, and you find yourself in a daze as you stare into the electrifying blue. He had a straight nose with freckles dusted along his tan cheeks. A light brown, weathered cowboy hat sits upon his head of soft brown curls, blown frizzy by the wind from the dusty plains of Oklahoma. A thick mustache and trimmed beard lined his jaw and under his nose. His pink lips looked soft and pillowy, and you can just imagine yourself kissing them, feeling how soft they were first hand as his lips press into yours-
Wow.
You’re aware of your face burning hotter than the fiery pits of hell and you force your eyes back down to your drink. The bartender takes his order and you hear that velvety voice of his. You rack your mind for what his twang was. He wasn’t Southern, had to be Northern, maybe even Canadian. Your eyes flick back to him as he tips his drink back. His lips press against the glass and you’ve never wanted to be a glass of whiskey more than right now-
Okay.
Your face burned brighter, embarrassed at your own thoughts, as if somehow he was a mind reader and could hear your inappropriate thoughts. You look back down at your drink, your hand clenching the glass so tight your knuckles were white. You take another sip and attempt to calm down, afraid you’d do something unwise if left to your instincts.
He wore a pearl snap button up with plaid designs covering it, paired with Wrangler jeans and leather chaps. His right hand raised up to grab his hat off his head-and oh my sweet Jesus his hands- and he's got perfect hat hair. His hands were rough and scarred, thickly muscled from working with his hands for what you guessed was years. He set his hat in front of him on the table.
Fortunately or unfortunately for you, he addresses you.
“What brought you in ‘ere?” His voice rasps. “Yer clearly not from ‘round ‘ere.”
“‘M not,” you admit. “Bouncin’ ‘round.”
“Like a cowpoke. What’s yer name, honey?” The pet name in any other context would make you cringe uncontrollably. However, all you can think about is how right that name sounds falling from his lips and how your insides begin to feel all warm and fuzzy.
“[Name]. [Name] [Last Name]. What ‘bout you?” You direct the attention on him.
“Zach. Zach Thompson.”