**Hey, so I've written this story before, 3 years ago, when I was 13 and for some reason I just stopped, I guess? Well, I'm 16 now and I accidentally stumbled upon this again, so I decided to continue it, fixing a couple of things here and there. I deleted the original story, "Of Monsters And Men" and renamed it, and copy pasted all the chapters, so i can re upload them and continue the story, so pretty much the first 4 chapters will be re uploads and from then on I'll continue the story, if I feel people are interacting well with it**
A dim ray of gray moonlight shone in through the curtains. My mind spun with images of Hazel as I tried to pull it together. I took in a deep breath through clenched teeth as I balled my hands into a fist. I pushed the thought away into my subconscious mind, knowing it will surface again and haunt my nightmares.
Hazel is just fine. I promised myself. She's in Atlanta, in the refugee camp. No reason to freak out. She didn't have all the symptoms of the virus.
I can't sleep, dreading the horrors that will appear before my closed lids. The wall clock ticks like the timer on a bomb. I can't stop it, reverse it or slow it down. Each tick drags me forward, helpless and nervous to the allotted time. I can no more avoid it than the beating of my own heart as it pounds with futility against it's cage of bone and cartilage. The dread is an invisible demon sitting heavy on my shoulders and only I can hear the sharpening of it's knives. I sweat and become pale, then the tremor in my hands begins. My head becomes a little giddy and my stomach nauseous. All I can do is lay on my bed, awaiting the first beam of sunlight that signals dawn.
It was my own stupid decision, leaving at dawn. I can't face that world, I can't face anything. Shame forces me to accept my reality. A disoriented 26 year old, with no fight, no family-except my youngest sister-and no daughter. My stomach cramps as the truths settle in. It feels like when Hazel used to kick my ribs when I was pregnant with her. A sudden blow from the inside that left me breathless.
My eyelids began feeling heavy but I fought against them, sleep would only bring that one nightmare back. There are no ghosts, no serial killers. I'm stuck in a dark forest and no matter which path I took it always came back to the hangman's noose at the center of the forest. There was only one way out.
That's when the screaming begins. Luckily, I always stifle my shrieks using my pillow. For if Bella hears them, she would very certainly be terrified. She's already got enough on her mind, mourning mom and dad. It's different for her, she watched them die, I didn't.
I got up, my feet gingerly touching the ground, I guess I am still not entirely convinced that I was hallucinating the night when the floor turned to pitch black scorpions, I walked on silent sock feet, as if not to awaken the ghosts in the house.
After half an hour or so of aimlessly pacing the house, I paused in front of a mirror and looked at the woman trapped in it.
The woman might have been called beautiful before the world went to shit. But now a double layer of dead skin covered her features. Her once soft lips were cracked and crusty. Her eyes were the most changed, though. The electric blue color that perhaps wasn't the brightest at the best times-come to think of it, it was a dull blue, almost gray-had lost the shine in it and it was now harbored by undiluted misery. The circles beneath them were bruise-like and they didn't intend to leave. Her blonde hair was once straight, yet now tangled and limp with grease.
I sighed and tore away from the painful image of myself. I found an old wooden chair and settled down on it. Enveloping myself in the warmth of a spare blanket as a memory surfaced to my mind.
I made my way through the room, which was once filled with the giggles of my bubbly, energetic daughter, Hazel. Now a withered spirit, with a deathly white face. Those ecstatic blue orbs no longer demonstrating glee. Instead, they are lusted after by distress and pain.
And now, here she lays. Her skin moist with salty sweat beads that swiftly drift off her forehead and land on the pillow, struggling for mere seconds, trying not to be absorbed by the pillow, nonetheless, even with those dynamic battles against the laws of physics, they always end up disappearing into the pillow, presumably unleashing shrill cries of death.
Upon the first beam of light that lands on her eyelids after I clicked on the lights, she opens those crystal-blue eyes and quietly scans the room until he eyes meet mine.
Her chapped lips moved to summon a single word into a cracked voice. "Mommy?"
"How are you feeling, cupcake?" I asked in the lowest voice I can attain whilst still being audible, for the last thing she deprives is a loud voice. She had been fretting about an ear-infection all morning.
"My ear is ringing again." She moaned
"They doctor said you'll get better tomorrow." I assured, wishing that it would be. I reached out to brush her blonde hair out of her face, spreading it across the pillow into golden strings.
She shut her eyes and murmurs a "I hope so."
"You should go back to sleep."
I was expecting her to purpose a story to read, or ask me to sing her to sleep, still, her lips moved no more, the only motion that she made was a simple nod. I felt my heart break into a million pieces. What happened to my daughter? Where is the little girl with the swinging blonde hair and bright blue eyes that glittered with glee?
I loathed myself for not taking precautions. I knew this virus was dangerous, yet I let her leave the house, now god knows what she caught on. For all know, 975,000 souls had fallen victim to this epidemic. But there is still that little string of hope that maybe, just maybe, she only caught on something different, something more... merciful.
I fumbled for the light switch.
The room seemed much more eerie and hunting in the darkness. The light of the moon cast dancing shadows among the walls, precisely illuminating Hazel in her bed, creating a white pool of light over her.
I blow her a kiss as I almost exited the room, but I stopped in my place as she faintly called out for me.
"Mommy?"
"Yeah?"
"Will you be there when I wake up?"
Her question froze me in place. Why would she possibly think I would abandon her? I wanted to assure her that everything was going to be okay, but it seemed dishonest to assure any living creature that all was fair with the world which contained such an atmosphere. I reflected that a mother's duty lay in part in the perpetuation of such a lie. Every lullaby sang of that lie.
And yet, if a child has a mother and a father that loved her and would die for her, was it falsehood to promise the child a safe harbor? But Hazel didn't have a father anyway, so all the falsehood shall lay on my own shoulders.
Unhappy with my thoughts, I frowned and gave her a short and straight to the point answer.
"Of course I will."
As if! I yelled at myself through mental lungs. I shut my eyes to keep the tears from spilling over. I loved her with all my heart, I loved her more than a mother had and shall love her child. My pregnancy was unintended, I was eighteen and drunk, that's all I remember, yet I loved Hazel more than life itself and now that she is slipped away, I am only a shell of the woman I was. But I only had one reason left to survive: Bella.
And she cannot see me so weak, she need to be strong, I need to be strong for her. So I splashed my face with water from a bottle and tried to look as calm as possible as I crept up the stairs to awaken her...