The scream heard from a room made my heart skip a beat. I ran towards the door, or what I thought was a door, nearly tripping over my own feet. The screams slowly morphed into sobs, sobs that caused cold sweat to run down my back.
I could hear the drumming of my heart in my own ears, a constant reminder that something wasn't right. I wasn't right.
Every moment seemed slow, as if my body couldn't keep up with my mind. I shivered slightly, wrapping my arms tightly around myself. I wanted to cry, but it seemed as if my eyes were dried and puckered from long ago.
I knew that I was in a room, it had taken me a while to feel around it blindly until I realized that it was just a square. A padded, small, locked room.
The screams started again, and I cupped my ears.
Please, please, please.
The person wouldn't stop begging, and I wanted to scream, shout, tell them that it wasn't working. No good amount of begging seemed to get anyone's attention.
Except, maybe it did. Light flooded the room, and I hissed, covering my eyes at the bright intensity.
"She calmed down," a deep voice observed. I opened my eyes to see about four men standing cautiously by a door, eyeing me warily. Mask covered their mouths, and they seemed to carry a heavy, drowning emotion I couldn't place. They had bright red scars across their cheeks, one with a black eye. Whoever did that must have been furious.
"Only because they gave her enough drugs to nearly kill her," a woman muttered, stepping towards me, fear and uncertainty clouding her dark eyes.
"She deserves it, monster."
M o n s t e r.
I blanched at the word. It seemed to slow down my heart, at least. I opened my mouth when the woman that had been approaching me quickly jumped back, as if I would bit her.
"D-don't say a word," she stuttered, pointing her trembling fingers at me. The other guards seemed to snap out of a haze, and jumped towards us. Two gripped my arms painfully, with gloves, I noticed. The other two walked behind us, but at a safe distance.
"What's going on? Where am I?" I finally got the words out. I flinched when the guards grips on my arms tightened to the point where I knew there would be a bruise later on.
I thought no one would answer me. The quietly dragged me through what seemed like an endless hallway. Everything was white. The tiled floor that cooled my bare feet, the white ceiling that had flickering florescent lights in them, and the white walls, that seemed like they had never been touched. "It seems like you have a visitor," one finally said in a gruff voice, as if forcing themselves to talk.
"Nora Black. 16. Quiet. Leading student in her class. You know, it's always the quiet ones."
I sullenly glanced at the table, watching the shadows from the overhead lamp flickering. The guards had dragged me into the room and in a chair sat the woman in from of me. Red hair pulled harshly from her face, and a cold smile that I wanted to slap off of her.
"Hmm, no talk? The guards said you put up quite a fight." She must have seen my quirked eyebrow.
"Oh, you don't remember? They had to send one of the guards to the hospital. A few bruised ribs-"
"I didn't do anything," I hissed under my breath.
"So you didn't murder your best friend, Amie?"
My blood froze in my veins. "W-what?" My voice came out raspy. The name was a distant bell being rung from the corners of my mind. Vague, but familiar.
"We found Amie. Dead. By the water at your summer camp. And you were beside her."
"Do you want to know what you were doing, Nora?" Her face curled up in disgust.
"You were laughing."
Like a wave it all came back to me.
*
"You'll never be able to do it."
I couldn't believe it. My own friend was taunting me, teasing me about the one thing she knew that I was terrified of.
The water.
I clenched my hands at my sides and looked at the way the wind blew the grass, tickling my feet.
"Look at her, she's about to cry," said a girl. Lily was her name, I think.
They were wrong, though. I wasn't about to cry. I was angry. Furious. The type of anger that made you want to hit, spit, hurt, even.
I could hear the faint waves of the water hitting the dock, causing my heart to speed up.
"Well," Amie said with a sly smile. "Maybe she just needs a... push."
The next second, I was pushed into the cool water by my friend. Instinctively, i gasped, and water rushed down my throat, leaving a fiery path in it's wake.
My fear of water was fueled by one reason.
I didn't know how to swim.
I reached uowards, to where I could barely see Amie still leaning over the dock, watching me struggle. Why wouldn't she help?
My feet touched dirt from the bottom of the lake, and I realized that the water wasn't that deep.
Slowly, I dragged myself out of the water, being dragged down by my heavy, soaking clothes.
Amie watched me with an unsure expression on her face. Her group of friends were gone.
"I'm sorry Nora-"
I was furious. My hands shook as I stood there, shivering when the air hit my wet skin. I wanted her to feel scared like I did. Hurt. Confused.
I wanted her to suffer.That's when a look of terror crossed her face, and she dropped to the ground. She didn't move.
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