A/N:
Hey guys, so this is a one-shot that I originally wrote as a creative writing piece for an English assessment, so it might be a bit different to my usual style. I just thought it was something different to upload. So after changing a few details to make it into a 'fanfic', this is what I came up with. As I wasn't going to originally put this on the site, some details may be the same as in some of my previous stories, and as I liked them I just put them into my assessment. The same goes for future stories that I have under construction now, where I liked the idea and it worked with my stimulus so I threw it into the assessment, so some ideas may pop up in another story that is on the way. So yeah, I'm not just using the same ideas for every story I write. So now that's out of the way, I hope you enjoy the read! Don't forget to tell me what you guys think in the reviews :)
Thanks guys
Gemma Cane x

"But Sister Maude shall get no sleep, either early or late." - 'Sister Maude' by Christina Georgina Rossetti

The room was eerily silent. All I could hear was my own breathing. In front of me, his body lay as still as a tomb. I froze. Did I really...no, I couldn't have. Around me, the kitchen was a mess from the destructive shell that had struck it. Me. I did this. All of it. I was so angry. So upset. So hurt. But now...now the pain is even worse.

Broken plates, cups and glasses littered the floor, the sharp pieces glinting in the dim light. The bulb too was shattered. Everything blurred as tears slowly rose to the surface, a swelling tide just waiting to drown everything. Tentatively, I crouched down beside him. My whole body shook. Each breath shuddered violently. A steady pool of blood oozed out around his head. Hand trembling, I gently held his face. His glasses were askew and cracked on his face. His eyes were closed. His lips were a thin line. Combing his sweeping fringe from his forehead, my breath caught in my throat. Already he was ice cold.

"No..." I breathed, my voice choked. "No, please. Come back to me! This wasn't supposed to happen! It can't end like this!" Howling wasn't going to bring him back. But I couldn't stop. "It just can't!"

But I knew it was too late. His chest was still. He had no breath. Placing two fingers on his neck, I felt he had no pulse. He was completely gone. Forever. My hand was now covered in blood. His blood.

Leaping to my feet, I slowly backed away. My heart was in my throat. Suddenly, I felt something bang into my heel. Jumping, I turned to see a red cylinder on the floor. Blinking hard, the tears flooded my cheeks, and I realised it was...a fire extinguisher? Glancing around, I spotted the empty wall bracket on the other side of the room. I swayed on my feet. Images flooded my head, memories from only a few minutes ago that I had already buried deep inside myself. The extinguisher in my hand, the fear in his eyes. The pain in my heart. The sickening crack of death, closing its hand around him, crushing him...

My hand flew to my mouth. Barely noticeable, blood stained this too. Crimson on crimson. Looking back to his body, I could just make out a deep dent in his head, his skull shattered. An even deeper wound was settled under his ginger hair, bleeding out. What had I done? My fingerprints were over everything. Running a hand through my short hair, the red caught my eye again. His blood was on my hands! It was just a matter of time. It was hard to breathe. The room was spinning. What had I done?

Reaching out for the door, I fumbled with the handle before finally falling out into the street. The cold wind hit me full force, but I hardly noticed it. I felt like screaming out loud. My heart was breaking so much, the jagged pieces piercing my chest. There was no turning back from murder. Taking off at a run down the street, my mind was racing. What was I going to do? I'd just killed the love of my life! My emotions had clouded my judgement. Badly. The jealousy was eating me alive! Things got out of hand... What the hell was I thinking? I hadn't meant to do it, it just...happened. What was going to happen to me now? The future was a blur of confusion and fear. But one thing was certain. I can never outrun the past. I may try. I may even try to hide from it. But as I thought of the crime scene I had left behind, the piles of evidence covering every inch of that room, his body sprawled in the middle of the floor, I knew that what, my past would always find me.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

The seconds crawled painfully by. From somewhere in the darkness, the clock mocked me. When I could stand it no longer, I switched on the light, squinting in the sudden brightness. The clock covered its face with its hands, but never stopped its relentless ticking. It set my mind on edge. The pain had turned to bitterness and dreadful guilt. It was eating me alive. I had lain awake all night. On the rare occasion sleep did come, it was ravaged with savage nightmares. All of them showed me and him. Together. Happy. Then all of that was ripped apart, until we reached the end. The fire extinguisher smashed down on top of him. A river of blood streamed his face. His body lay still. I tried to shake the images from my head, I could bear it no longer.

Angrily, I pulled the clock from the wall and ripped the batteries from it. It went quiet, dead. As though it had burnt me, I flung it on the floor. It landed with a crash. I backed away from it, terror clutching my heart. I was getting too used to this. Killing things.

A feeling of sickness overcame me and I rushed to the bathroom. I leant over the sink. Looking up, I caught sight of myself in the mirror. My jaw-length, magenta hair stuck out at odd angles, my skin was deathly pale and my dull, grey-green eyes were sunken hollows in my face.

Looking closer, I saw... I saw him. But not how I knew and loved him. I saw his face, white as a sheet, eyes blank and unseeing, hair matted with blood. I recoiled in pain, only just forcing myself to still look.

Next, the image contorted into my own face again, well, almost. My features sharpened, my eyes got bigger, black and tinted with green. My skin took on a greenish hue. The reflection smirked.

"Murderer..." It hissed.

"No, i-it was an accident!" I shouted. "It wasn't supposed to end up like this! I didn't mean to kill him!"

"MURDERER!"

"No!"

Violently, I punched the mirror, silencing the voices in my head. Gripping the edge of the sink, I leant over it, sobbing uncontrollably. Facing the mirror, the glass had shattered. A broken reflection of an even more broken girl with magenta hair and grey-green eyes stared back at me.

I glanced at my knuckles and winced. Shards of glass were wedged in my skin, and blood ran across my hand. It was then that I truly noticed the pain. And the weird thing was...it felt good. I enjoyed it. I deserved it.

Anger brewing in the pit of my stomach bubbled to the surface, and I began to push the glass deeper and deeper into my hand, watching the blood run down my arm, over my hand, streaming into the sink. I saw red, loud and clear. But I didn't stop. I had jumped, and was already flying through the free fall, without a parachute there to slow me down.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

Lying down in the darkness, each breath shook with the tears that couldn't even fall anymore. In my hand, I clutched a large, sharp shard of glass from the mirror. I had already cut my palm from clinging on to it too hard. Doubts ran through my veins, pulsed in my brain. I tried to shake them free. I missed him. I wanted to be with him again. To right my wrong, to have a second chance. In a place where there is no suffering.

If only I had listened to him. Made the decision to try and fight for us. He had followed his heart, and his heart led to her. Not to me. But then he realised his mistakes. He came back to me. He left her. He tried to make up for his mistake. But I couldn't see that then. My emotions got the better of me. Lead me here. Now the guilt and regret won't leave me alone. The demons can't be put to bed.

With a shaking hand, I raised the dagger of glass to my neck, scrunched my eyes tight shut. Surely death would hurt less than life? With a swift movement, I slid the glass across my skin. It tore through my flesh, cutting deep. I gasped, eyes flying open in shock. But the pain lasted only seconds. Soon, it faded away, faded away to nothingness. Black spots darted across my vision, getting bigger until they merged together and everything went silent. I gave into the blackness and let it consume my soul...

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

"Tecna...no, please!" He cried out. "Tecna, wait, NO!"

I silenced him. For good. The fire extinguisher made contact with his head. He collapsed to the floor, and lay there, completely still. Breathing heavily, I stared down at him.

"I loved you!" I screamed. "How could you do this to me! You were the first person I ever loved, and you threw it away!"

He didn't move. My breath caught in my throat.

"No..." I whispered.

He was dead. I killed him. I killed him...

"NO!" I howled, kneeling beside him. "No, no...I-I'm sorry...I-I d-didn't mean for this t-to happen. No! Come back to me..."

Everything around me faded away, all I could hear was my own screaming.

But slowly, a voice became audible above my own.

"Murderer..."

"What?"

"MURDERER!"

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

My eyes snapped open. I was surrounded by darkness. Sitting up, I stifled a scream. What the hell is this place? When I pictured heaven...well, it didn't look like this. Squinting, something moved in the shadows.

"Hello?" I called. "Who's there?"

This time I couldn't contain the scream that sounded from my mouth. There were people sat there, in front of me. They hugged their knees to their chests, and stared at me. They all looked so miserable. I thought that in heaven...there was no suffering? Here all these people felt so much pain. It seeped from their bodies into the thick air. They all looked like they had lost the most precious thing in the world...life.

Everything came flooding back to me. "No...no, get me out of here!"

The people began to crawl nearer to me, murmuring.

"There is no escape."

"You are dead."

"Sentenced to spend the rest of eternity,"

"Right here,"

"With us."

"Get away from me! Leave me alone!" I screamed.

"Why all the fuss?"

"You chose to die."

"Why don't you like us?"

"We're all you've got now."

"Aren't you happy now? You wanted to come here. You thought it would save you."

"From yourself."

I backed away, only to find more coming from the opposite direction. "Shut up! I don't want to be here! I thought death would be different. Stay away from me!"

"You're here now."

"Make the most of it." The little girl that spoke reached out her hand and took mine.

I screamed and wrenched myself from her grip, clamping my hands over my ears to block out their awful voices; closing my eyes to hide from their pain filled faces.

"Shut up!" I yelled. "Just shut up!"

"Tecna?"

At the sound of my name, I opened my eyes and looked around, lowering my trembling hands.

There, right in front of me... It was him! He looked just as I remembered him. Casually, he stood there with his hands in his pockets, his shoulders slanted. His red hair was just as messy and carefree as ever, his fringe covering one eye, glasses positioned at the perfect angle on his nose.

"T-Timmy?" I sobbed.

"He smiled slightly. "It's me."

"Oh Timmy! Thank God!" I cried, running over to him and throwing my arms around his waist. "I've been so afraid. I'm just so glad that you're here with me." I buried my face in his shirt, breathed him in, took in his familiar scent.

But he didn't hug me back. Frowning, I looked up at him. "Tim? What's wrong?"

His face was like thunder, his eyes cold and hard as he stared down at me. "You killed me."

"W-what?"

"Thanks to you, I'm stuck here!" He yelled. "I could be living my life right now, not trapped here in this place! I could be with my family-" He stopped for a moment, his eyes filling with tears. "What are they going to do when they find out I've been murdered? We could have sorted things out Tecna! We could be happy again. But you...you killed me!"

"B-but we can be happy now!" I tried, holding his hand.

He pulled away from me. "Here?" He scoffed. "In this place? No. Never. No one is ever happy here."

"That can change! Timmy, I took my own life to be with you!" I sobbed. "I don't know what came over me. I regretted it ever since. Please!"

"Yeah well maybe you shouldn't have bothered." He said bluntly. "I don't want you here. I don't want to be with you, Tecna. You may have taken your life. But you took mine too. And that's not something that easily forgiven."

"Tim-"

"Just leave me alone already!" He shouted, turning away.

I stood there in silence.

Then he stopped. He turned his head back to me. I looked up at him, hopeful.

"You should have rotted in jail." He spat, walking away. "Murderer."

"I'm not a murderer!" I cried out. "Stop it!"

Now, everyone else joined in, closing in on me.

"Murderer, murderer, murderer..."

"No!" I screamed. "It was an accident! Please!"

"Murderer, murderer..."

"NO!"

But there was no escape. I can't leave the dead. I'm trapped here. With nothing but my own guilt and regret to keep me company. Forever. Forever bearing that awful title. Forever reminded of my actions.

Murderer...