I have had serious writers block for the last few days, but I promise updated will be up tomorrow or Monday. For now, I wrote this a really long time ago, and I hope you enjoy.
I absolutely suggest listening to Story of my Life by One Direction when reading this. Unless you're a dude. Then no.
It was late. It was always too late. I didn't care though, I couldn't sleep anyway. Nya was in and out, reminiscing better moments, but she probably couldn't even tell. Their memories were covered with mine. Papers. Pictures. Words, that never even came close.
Lloyd came in too. Mostly to talk to me, or rather, to himself, because I never listened. He believed I never listened, but I was. More than he knew. His words were also getting justice, as much as I could give.
I had spent night after night doing what I promised. What I had promised Jay. I was keeping them alive. Alive, though I wasn't sure they even wanted it. The last time I saw them, they were begging for death. Pleading to be put out of their misery. I had been forced to watch.
Mixed in with the words I had written, were words of encouragement for me. For Nya and Lloyd. Pinned to each wall, were thousands of sheets of paper, hundreds of pictures. Covered in black words like my arms were covered in bruises. The room that had once been a workshop was now the honest representation of the inside of my head. Four walls. One for each story. My story was in there too, along with anyone else who has crossed our path. I recorded everything, in fear that I would forget. Sometimes, I would close my eyes, and I would get lost in the memories of their final moments.
With Cole, it was the beating of his heart, loud in my ears as I was pressed against his chest, fading away, getting softer. The entire right side of my head soaked in his blood and my tears. The smell of salt and iron, now part of me. An invisible scar. I remember his taunting, the way he smirked. I remember the gun, the sound of it firing. Above all, I remember the sounds, the sound of bones cracking and organs exploding, the sound of the bullet hitting the stone wall and shattering into a million pieces, the ringing in my head as I held him in my arms. I watched him die. He wanted to say something to me, but his lungs were destroyed. His final words died with him, leaving me to guess what they were. Leaving me to pick up the pieces of my broken family.
With Kai, it was the running, the pain in my shoulders as I carried him, as far away as I could manage. He told them he would be better off if they detonated the bomb right then. I was simply blown back a few feet. I remember the stickiness of my hands as I ran, how full they were, because I had to keep going back. I had to keep going back for pieces. I had to bring him back to his sister, all of him. I remember arriving home, bloody body strewn across my shoulders, the thump as I dropped it to the ground. The sound of the full grocery bag I had found on the street, the sound of it's dripping contents, hitting the floor with rhythmic precision. Nya's cries. Mine.
With Jay, it was the nothing. The absolute silence. The true sound of ending. Each injection, the plunger causing the needle to push deeper into our already sore skin. There were no honors. No last meal. No crime so great that it had come to this. No. It was a believed justice by weak people. People who thought that power was a crime when it didn't belong to them. I remembered the thud of his head hitting the steel table, the foam at his mouth. His begging, only moments before to see Nya. His words to me, cut off, leaving me to fill in the blanks. He went out like a criminal, not like a hero. As far as I am now concerned, no one deserves to die from lethal injection. No one deserves to know, to be forced to count the last second they have before it's over.
With Zane, it was the sound of electric currents snapping, uncompleted, but mostly, it was the sound of my heart breaking. A fatal blow, meant for me, meant for my heart. He begged for himself, he begged for my life, barging his in exchange. When they wouldn't listen, wouldn't crumble, he took the exchange forcefully. I remember my sai, their intention to kill me with my own weapon, sticking out of his chest, pieces of ripped hardware strewn across the floor in front of him, on the tip of the weapon, covered in synthetic blood. I remember the sound of him whispering to me, comforting me with his last breaths. The sound of him ripping out his power source, his heart, it's blue energy no longer pulsing as he handed it to me. His last action. I kept it instead of placing it back into his abdominal cavity. His heart was rightfully mine, anyway. Now, it always would be. I always think it would have been easier if I had taken that blow, if they had taken my heart. It would have saved me the trouble. Would have saved me the pain.
Above everything else, I remember the black clothes, the tears, the sobs, kept hidden tightly in each of our throats. The thud of the caskets as they were closed, the sound of the gears in the machine that lowered them into the ground. The light sound of the roses that we each threw down there, to be preserved forever under a layer of stone and clay. I remember the day after. The freshly packed dirt beneath my feet. The feeling of the words carved into stone under my fingertips, now carved into my memory.
I was taking my time. With any luck, I would never be finished. I would never have to write that part of their stories. Tell the paper that every attempt made in that single week on my life, took someone that it shouldn't have. The picture of us all on my desk, the way I swore every day that they were fading, leaving me alone. The way I felt Zane against my cheek or lips. Jay in my ears, voice echoing around me head. Cole on my shoulders, his legacy left to his sister. Or Kai on my hands, the way he never backed down, the way he held on to the end. That should be the story of their lives, not what u described. Not what I watched happen. I don't remember when it hit me, whether I was in the cemetery, or in the workshop.
Their stories were heroism, strength, sacrifice, belief. Everything they've ever stood for. Everything they've ever said. The face of every person they touched, including mine.
What I remembered, was what they had left behind, the ghost of everything they had ever done. It was never their story.
It was the story of my life.