A/N: Okay . . . So, finals are over. I did awesome, two A's and two B's. I'm proud of myself!

Either way, a rough draft of this has been sitting in my Google Docs since about the beginning of the semester, so when I stumbled upon it one night I decided to make a final version of it. This is what became of it!

To be honest, this one takes a slightly dark turn, I'm not really sure how to describe it. I was actually inspired by when the movie If I Stay came out. I read the book back when I was in high school, so I already knew the gist of the story. I figured, what the hell, I might as well try something.

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot line. Kudos to Satoshi Tajiri completely.

Where . . . Where am I?

Everything felt dark and cold. A dank feeling hung in the air as wisps of fog rolled silently along the ground. The quietness of it all seemed to absorb all noise, not that there was much anyway. Nothing moved except the fog. But then there was a sound, so small it was almost unnoticeable. It came from beneath the fog, a hand following it. It reached blindly through the low clouds, grasped blindly at the air, then slowly fell back to the ground once realizing there was nothing to grab above. Below the fog the hand fell to its owner's face, running their fingers through a messy shock of blue hair. Pushing it away from their eyes, matching irises stared blankly from a small, pale face as they roved the desolate area. They seemed to see everything, yet nothing at the same time.

The person—no, girl—removed her hand from her hair, lifting it to look at the back of it. Wiggling her fingers slowly, she watched as they gave off a slight ethereal glow in the darkness that surrounded her. It was amazing, she thought, so unreal. She could see nothing but her hand, the fog, and the ground she lay on. Anything else was invisible to her eyes.

As she studied her hand she noticed a long, thin scar that ran along the length of her forearm, reaching all the way to her shoulder. Following it with her eyes, she found that it twisted over her skin, marking something that had happened—she just couldn't remember what. Her hand fisted in frustration, the fog wisping away. Pressing the back of her knuckles against her forehead, she closed her eyes. It wasn't long before she felt something pull at her mind, tugging at her to . . . remember. It was a memory, she realized.

It came in small bits at first, so as the first flash came to her she sat up. With the back of her hand still held to her face, she frowned. Maybe . . . With shaky fingers she touched the edge of the scar with her other hand. It felt bumpy against her skin as she followed the length of it across her arm. Touching the scar seemed to jolt the memory, images of white sand and blue water flashing across her eyes. A beach, she realized. Pursing her lips, she furrowed her brow as she tried to see more: Fluffy cumulous clouds, foam on the crests of waves, seagulls crying as they dove for fish, a volleyball being tossed back and forth.

Wait. She opened her eyes. A volleyball? Where did that come from?

"Hey, Dawn!"

Dawn.

Dawn. That's right, her name was Dawn, she realized. Suddenly, she could see, actually see. She looked around wildly, life seeming to return to her eyes. Her armed dropped as she leaned back on one hand, her arm straining to keep her upright. What little she could see in the dimness faded for a moment, then snapped back to clarity so quickly it felt like it should have given her whiplash. The memory continued unheeded this time.

Folding the magazine in her lap, the blunette looked up. She'd been reading from the safety of her beach chair, basking in the shade cast by the umbrella above her. Her sunglasses slid down her nose, causing her to squint through the hazy sunlight in front of her. "What?" she called, pushing her glasses back up so she could see. Across the sand, someone was calling to her. It was a girl with brown hair tied back in pigtails, and she was holding a ball, a . . . volleyball?

"Why don't you come play beach volleyball with us? You could be on my team so we can gang up on Misty." The brunette held the ball above her head, waving it from side to side in invitation. Another girl stood nearby, a redhead. Misty, Dawn thought. She was standing with her hands propped on her hips, a wrap that had been tied around her waist swaying in the salty breeze.

I know her game, she thought to herself. "No thanks, May, Dawn called back. "You know how bad I burn." May. She leaned back in her chair, once again fully beneath the umbrella that protected her from the sun's harsh rays. Ignoring May's incessant begging, she returned to her magazine. To make a point to May, she exaggerated her attention concerning an article, as if it had captured her full attention. Even when her phone rang from a text, she paid it no mind. When May's groan of defeat sounded across the sand, Dawn grinned in triumph. Dawn, 1. May, 0.

Everything stopped suddenly, the last image burning away like broken film in a projector. "No!" she screeched, her voice echoing in the empty dark. Torment filled her. So close, she'd been so close. Somehow she knew the reason she was here was in that memory. But she needed to figure out how to get it back.

Pressing her fingers against the scar once more, she squeezed her eyes shut as she concentrated. Seconds turned to minutes as she waited. But there was nothing. Nothing. Slumping in defeat, she pressed her forehead to the cold ground, crying out in anguish as tears rushed down her face, pooling on the floor. Curling into a ball, she gripped her knees as she screamed, crumpling fabric she hadn't even realized was there. She pulled at it, realizing it was the skirt of a night dress, and pressed it against her face to dry her tears. Sobbing silently for a moment, she gritted her teeth against the soft cotton. Sniffling, she opened her eyes, frowning. Something didn't feel right. Quickly sitting up, she sniffed again so she could breathe, or at least attempt to. Through the thinness of the dress she could see the shape of her legs, pale and glowing slightly, just like her hands. Because of this she could see that the skin on her right leg was discolored. With shaky hands she pulled the skirt away from her leg, leaning forward slightly so she could see better.

Spots. There were spots of scars that ran all over the top of her thigh, as if someone had taken a hot poker and stabbed her multiple times. Some of them were connected, like a half-finished game of Connect the Dots. Her brow furrowed as she looked at them, tracing them with her eyes as she had with the one on her arm. As she roved her skin, something caught her eye. It was small, but there was a subtle movement between two marks. She watched, entranced, as a line began to connect them, almost as if someone were taking a glow-in-the-dark Magic Marker and running it under her flesh. The dots connected slowly, crawling all the way from the middle of her thigh, curving around her knee, coming to a halt on the back of her calf.

Fear slowly crept down her spine as she followed the line back up the length of her leg. The thinness of it slowly started to change, spreading out to become an ugly, uneven shape. With shaking fingers she slowly reached a hand down, barely touching it with a fingertip.

"Dawn!"

Slight irritation ran through her as she looked up where she was crouching. After she'd finally made her way out from beneath the umbrella, she'd wandered over to some shallow pools a few feet from the shoreline. She'd been soaking her hands in them until May had called her. Peering over the piles of sand that surrounded her, she looked for May. The small dunes had created an almost nonexistent barrier against the wind. It had been picking up as the afternoon had worn on, tossing her long hair around her face as she had been digging a small area for her to sit in.

"Hey, Dawn, we're leaving soon! The lifeguard just called that there was a thunderstorm warning on the radio for the area!" May stood a few yards away, her hands cupped around her mouth to amplify her voice. The wind whipped her pigtails behind her head, her bangs falling into her eyes. "Come grab your stuff before the waves get really bad!"

What was she talking about? The wind may have been acting up, but the water seemed fine. There hadn't been any crazy crashing sounds as she'd been sitting there. "I'll be over in a minute!" she called anyway. This didn't seem to appease her friend very much, but the brunette nodded, turned, and jogged across the sand to where her stuff lay on their towels.

Dawn continued to dip her hands in the pool. Small sea life creatures that had been washed into the pools roamed beneath the swirling surface, their little heads peeking out from their holes in the sand. Every time Dawn's fingers ventured close to them they escaped from her reach, scattering into their underwater holes. Usually this would have frustrated her to no end, but she just let it go; she didn't want something so small to ruin her fun. The shy little sea creatures weren't her main problem.

The baby crabs and tiny urchins kept her attention so much that she didn't notice the sand flying across the beach behind her. Grains of it were slowly taking over whatever beach apparel the people who'd come for a day in the sun had left. Umbrellas were becoming uprooted from their setting in the ground, flipping and flying away in the wind. If people hadn't began to scream Dawn probably would have never looked up from her amusement. Children ran behind her, calling for their mothers and fathers who were somewhere down the stretch of swirling sand. As Dawn looked over her shoulder, sand from the kids running by flew into her eyes, blinding her momentarily. But a moment was all it took.

Spluttering, Dawn stumbled to her feet. She rubbed incessantly at her eyes, trying to recover her vision enough to walk. No matter how much she rubbed or wiped at her eyes, though, whenever she tried to open them the pain made her squint them shut again. Drops of rain began to pelt her back and top of her head as the storm the lifeguard had warned everybody about started getting closer to the beach.

"Dawn!" Recognizing her friend's voice, Dawn turned in the direction May had called from. Her damaged vision caused her to see nothing but blurs, but she was still able to make out the bright redness of her tank top. She was waving her arms again, but this time in distress. It was hard to tell, but it looked like May was running toward her. The sand was so dense on Dawn's eyelashes and the pain so great that it was difficult for her to attempt to make her way toward her friend. "Dawn, hurry! The tide is getting strong, it's taking over the shoreline!"

The wind was so great that it drowned out the last of May's words. Sand was everywhere now, in Dawn's ears, her mouth, under her clothes—there was no escape. It was all so confusing that she stumbled, almost falling to her knees. Then the waves reached her feet, splashing past her and almost knocking her over as they grew in size. The rain made the sand stick, the ocean washed it away; it was an endless cycle as Dawn took feeble steps in May and Misty's direction—their voices sounded distant in the howling wind, even though she knew they couldn't be more than a few yards away, she just had to keep going—but then the storm really began.

Waves rolled past her, one strong enough that when it slammed into the back of her knees it knocked her flat on her face. Water rushed over her head as it was pulled back into the ocean; it clogged her nose, forced its way down her throat. She wasn't even in a foot of water and she was already choking. There was barely a moment for her to even take a breath before the next wave crashed over her—this time taking her with it.

The silence was a shock to her ears. It had almost seemed that the water had really been in her ears, blocking her hearing, its salt stinging her eyes with further pain. It had been so cold, robbing any warmth from her body as the wave had sucked her into the ocean. Presently sweat rolled down her face, dripping to the foggy ground. Tears mixed with the sweat as her vision became blurry. This time she wished it was sand, it would have given her a reason to scream in pain. The sound that ripped from her throat was almost animal, a sound so anguished it echoed emptily around her for no one to hear.

What did these visions mean? Were they showing her the future? Or maybe . . . no. No, she couldn't bear it. She was already so hurt: more scars had appeared on her body, creeping like ivy under skin. There was nothing to do for her to stop it, they just kept . . . showing up. This time she didn't need to touch them for the memories to play. She only wished she could stop them.

It was cold and dark. She could feel the water rushing around her, swirling into her own personal cocoon made of salt and her blood. On her way into the ocean, rocks had scraped at her skin, cutting jagged marks into her flesh. Idly she thought about how the blood in the water could attract sharks from miles around. But it slipped away as easily as the sand on the beach in the storm's wind. It was so calm under the water, so remarkable how different it was from the storm above her that rocked the waves. For a while Dawn's chest was exploding with fire as she began to suffocate, but then the pain just ebbed away as she slowly slipped unconscious. The sway of the water became soothing as she was carried further out to sea, sealing her fate.

No.

No, it couldn't be.

This wasn't true, how could it be possible.

But it was.

Dawn was too numb to feel anything anymore. She lay on her side, curled in the fetal position. Tears pooled beneath her cheek. She'd forgotten she was even crying. The fog around her thickened, curling around her as if to comfort her in her grief. If she'd had any feeling in her body she would have been grateful. But how was she able to feel anything at all?

She was dead.

A/N: So, yeah. This one is shorter than most of the rest, only 2,479 words. I mostly get to about 6,000, but oh well. Either way, for any of you reading my other story Ability to Tame, I'm still working on the latest chapter, school kind of got in the way.

Till next time, though. Ciao.