The Dead Zone
Chapter 1 – In the Dark
The night was dark and unforgiving, the cold wrapped itself around the air and squeezed any warmth that was left back into the sky. The heavens were mourning, their tears falling softly down to the ground, floating like feathers on a breeze. Laying in the middle of the snow was a young girl, on the brink of death. The snow pierced her skin like needles, but she was going numb, and the pain was dulling. She took a deep wavering breath and looked up at the sky, the stars speckled the blackness like holes in fabric, shining a light down upon her. Closing her eyes, she thought she heard a scream, but she was probably imagining it. With one last shiver, the blackness consumed her, and all was quiet.
Sarah groaned and reached her hand up to her face, the coldness was gone and she could feel her body tingling. There was something over her mouth, she could feel air being blown at her nose, and she weakly tried to push it off. Opening her eyes slightly, she was met with a bright light, and instinctively closed them again. She moved her hand up to her forehead and pushed her hair off her face. Where was she? Once more she opened her eyes, squinting as the brightness slowly faded away and the world became clear again. The light was coming from a square panel in the ceiling, it was surrounded by a bunch of plain white panels with little black dots sprinkled across their surface. Turing her head to the side, her gaze met an elegant purple vase with a bunch of different colorful flowers sprouting up from the inside. At the bottom of the vase there was a card glued to the glass, with the simple phrase 'Get Well Soon' neatly printed upon its surface.
"Get well soon...?" Sarah mouthed the words and turned her head to look the other way, her eyes widening in surprise as she found her mother slouched over in a chair. Her hair was tangled and disorderly, her face red and her closed eyes puffy. Her chest was moving up and down in a slow and steady rhythm, she must have fallen asleep. Slowly, Sarah reached her hand out and rested it on her mother's thigh. Suddenly she jumped up, her eyes fell on Sarah and fresh tears streamed from her eyes.
"Oh sweetie! You're okay!" Her mother fell on top of her, wrapping her arms around her waist and sobbing loudly. Sarah was built slightly bigger than other girls, but she wasn't fat. Her hair was a dirty blonde and her eyes were light green. She simply sat there in shock, looking down at her mother's shaking figure. She tried to speak, but her throat was sore and she could only manage a few disgruntled noises out. Giving up on her attempts, she simply wrapped her arms around her mother and patted her back. Eventually her mother stopped crying and let go, but not before grabbing hold of one of Sarah's hands.
"I thought I'd lost you, the doctors said you'd gone into a coma!" Sitting there in shock, Sarah finally realized where she was. Looking past her mother she could see outside of a door, beyond it were nurses hurrying about their business and patients shuffling around on canes and in wheelchairs. Sarah groaned and leaned her head back onto the pillow below it, feeling rather dizzy.
The dizziness faded and Sarah could hear someone coming into the room. Opening her eyes, she looked up to see her father. He was looking quite a bit like her mother, his hair standing up and the area around his eyes red. A smile lit up his face, but was quickly replaced by a look of anger. He came closer to the bed where Sarah lay, and looked down upon her menacingly.
"Why on earth would you do something so stupid!" Sarah's jaw dropped and her mother stood up, trying to calm down her husband.
"Now, dear-" She put her hand on his shoulder and he swatted it away, cutting her off and continuing his rant.
"You could have died Sarah! Do you know what you put your mother and I through?" His face was going red with anger, veins becoming visible on his forehead and throbbing at her. Sarah simply sat there in silence and fiddled around with the bed sheets.
"That's enough, Robert!" Her mother cried out, rather insistently pulling on his arm.
"Don't you think she's been through enough without you screaming at her?" The red slowly faded from her fathers face and he looked down at the floor in shame. Sarah's mother was extremely calm and even-headed, but her word was rule and everybody knew it. Robert looked back up at Sarah and sighed, shaking his head.
"We thought you weren't going to recover. You had us so worried... Why would you do something like that?" A single tear streamed down from his eye and he furrowed his eyebrows questioningly. Sarah tore her gaze away from him and looked down at the bed, her eyes clouding over as the memories replayed in front of them.
Sarah slept peacefully on her bed, the moon cast a beam of light onto the floor and provided the sole source of light in the room. A soft thunk rang through the room, Sarah heard nothing and continued her serene slumber. A second, louder thunk rang through the room, this time disturbing Sarah's sleep. She opened her eyes and dismissed it as nothing. Just as she closed her eyes to go back to sleep, yet another thunk echoed through her room and Sarah dragged herself out of bed. Walking to the window, she looked down and saw a person standing in the yard below. They waved, and Sarah narrowed her eyes, trying to see who it was. The person turned their head to look at something, and she saw long curly brown hair tumbling out from underneath the hood on their jacket.
"Emily?" Sarah mumbled under her breath, backing away from the window and putting on warmer clothes. She ran downstairs and unlocked the front door, immediately shivering as the cold washed over her body. Emily waved her over, and Sarah reluctantly ventured out into the snow to greet her. As she approached, she noticed the sadness splayed across Emily's face, and she began to get worried.
"Emi, would you please explain to me why you're outside my house at 4 in the morning?" Emily sighed and looked down at the snow.
"Because... I-I have bad news... And I can't handle good-byes very well..." Sarah raised an eyebrow and looked at Emily questioningly.
"What news, are you going on vacation or something?" Emily laughed a little, then sighed. She lifted her head and stared into Sarah's eyes.
"I'm... Leaving. As in, moving away from here." Suddenly the world became still and the cold didn't matter, everything was quiet and the only thing Sarah could hear was a million voices in her head all screaming out in despair.
"But, Emi, you're my best friend! When are you leaving?" Emily shook her head and looked up at the sky, trying to avoid Sarah's gaze.
"I-In a few hours..." Sarah went silent and stared at Emily as if she was an escaped mental patient. She couldn't think of anything to say, though her thoughts were moving a mile a minute. Emily looked back at Sarah guiltily and tears started to fall silently from her eyes. It was all Sarah could do to keep standing, every muscle in her body wanted to collapse to the ground.
"I'm sorry..." Emily whispered and turned away from Sarah, walking away into the darkness of the night. Sarah couldn't hold herself up any longer, and collapsed onto the snow, sobbing.
Sarah felt tears forming in her eyes and reached up to wipe them away before anyone noticed. Her father shook his head and turned away from her. A doctor walked into the room and Sarah looked up at him, trying to wipe the memory from her thoughts.
"How are you two holding u-" A look of surprise spread across his face and he stared at Sarah in shock.
"She... She's awake?"
Sarah stared back at him, questions starting to fly around in her mind in search of answers.
"How are you feeling?" Sarah tried to speak once more, forgetting about her last failed attempts. She whispered out a reply, but it was too quiet for anyone to hear. The doctor looked at the machines next to her bed and nodded, writing something down in a notebook. He turned to her parents and asked them out of the room, leaving Sarah in silence. She sat there for several minutes, trying to listen to their conversation. Stuck in her own thoughts, she couldn't avoid her memories, and wallowed in her misery.
Chapter 2 – Reunion
Soon enough, the door opened again and the doctor came back in.
"Your parents have gone to sign you out, your vitals have stabilized and you should be fine." He turned off the monitors next to her bed, removed the mask around her mouth, and carefully took out the iv in her wrist. Sarah sat up and pulled the covers off of her legs, rubbing her wrist absentmindedly. Her parents came into the room once more, her mother carrying a pile of clothes and her father rolling in a wheelchair. He rolled it next to the bed and her mother handed her the clothes, telling her they would leave so she could change. The doctor left the room, followed by her parents, and she was left in silence.
She changed quickly, and wobbled over the the chair, more collapsing than sitting down. She rolled over to the door and took one last look around the room. Her gaze fell upon the purple vase, and she gasped. All of the flowers had wilted and were shades of black and brown. She blinked, and they returned back to the healthy flowers she remembered. Shaking her head, she stared absentmindedly at the vase for a few seconds before pushing it out of her mind, rolling herself forward and opening the door. She rolled herself out into the hallway, and over to her parents. Her father grabbed the handles of the chair and started to push her forward. Sarah put her arms in her lap, happy to have someone else doing the work. Suddenly she started to feel tired, her eyes having difficulty staying open. She closed them and let the sleepiness take over.
Someone shook her awake and she opened her eyes once more, looking around she saw that she was in a parking lot and their car was in front of her. She stood up slowly, grabbing onto the door for support. Pulling it open, she crawled into the back seat, shivering slightly. Her mother leaned in over her and wrapped her in a blanket, kissing her forehead softly. Sarah smiled and once more slipped into the blackness. Except this time, it was darker, and seemed to swallow her whole. This darkness was not the peaceful black that she was used to, this darkness wreathed around her maliciously. She tried to wake up, but realized that it was too late. She felt air rushing past her, and opened her eyes. She was falling down a deep tunnel, the only light was a white dot below her. She squinted and stared at it, the task becoming easier as she fell closer to it. It was getting brighter, and she could feel the warmth radiating from it, a sudden calmness taking over her body. She stopped panicking and let herself fall, no longer worried about anything.
She approached the light and closed her eyes, ready to be engulfed by it's warmth. Instead, she hit it hard, and it shattered into a million shards like glass. She grimaced in pain, fear taking over once more. Suddenly, she felt herself stop falling, and there was no more pain. Opening her eyes, she found that she was standing in the parking lot once more. She hesitantly stepped forward, no longer shaking, and looked around. Turning around she saw her parent's car. Sighing in relief, she ran towards it and saw her mother clinging to her father, sobbing. Her father was staring into the car door silently, his mouth hanging open. Sarah furrowed her eyebrows and came closer, reaching out to touch her mother, but her hand went through her body, and she stumbled forward. She stopped and stared at her hand for a moment, her face frozen in a look of pure shock. Slowly she stepped towards the car, peering inside the open door. To her horror, she saw herself, lying on the seat in silence. Looking closer, she could see that her body wasn't moving, at all. She wasn't breathing or snoring or twitching, she was just still.