Chapter 6

"Don't, please!" I beg him, but I know that he's not himself nor will he answer me. He approaches with fluid movements, as if he had choreographed each of his steps leading up to this moment prior. I know he hadn't, but the way he now advanced with death written in his body language, that makes it hard to believe so. The dagger gets closer to my throat. I back up against the wall, praying that he'll wake up.

He tilts his head in a sadistic fashion, and presses the cold blade on my neck. Tears now spill down my face, I think he'll actually do it this time. Sensing my demise, I try to keep sane. The thought of death does things to you, crazy things, anything, to hold on to what little you have. If only this dagger wasn't on my throat, I could at least calm him. This is the worst he's ever been before.

"Heath," my voice cracked as more tears fell, "it's going to be okay. I promise." He presses the dagger a little harder, the mask he wears makes him expressionless in his actions. My skin stung with the pressure, I think I'm starting to bleed.

Instinct again pushes me to save myself, but I think I'm getting sick too. What's saving my short life over his? It's nothing, absolutely nothing. I suppress any desire to fight back, better that I go than he. Angst pounds in my heart as I come to realize he won't make it anyway if I'm dead. No one will take care of him.

The venetian mask just stares at me for a moment while I whimper. I feel the heat of sticky blood slide down my throat to my chest. My thoughts turn frantic, there had been times when I felt like dying. But I didn't know that when I got there it would be so frightening. Let alone that when I stared death in the face it would look like my brother.

"Empty promises." he whispers in my head and draws the dagger back. He tells me now to stay still, I fight the persuasion but it's so hard. I don't feel like trying anymore, my will power is so weak from all the times he has attacked me.

My body obeys the command as he rises the dagger in the air.

I try to find his eyes, to see if I can snap him out of it. But the cracked mask shadows them, and his sea green eyes are darkened, missing, like his mind is. The only thing I can see is part of his chin and the corner of his frowned mouth.

He plunges the dagger towards me, I shut my eyes tight.

"I really did try love." I think. And I know that Daemyn would have been proud of my efforts.

I feel the force of impact, to the side of me. I open my eyes, Heath is panting, leaning down in front of me. The dagger is driven into the wall on my side, his hand still on it. He starts to coughing again, always coughing so much...

"It's okay," I drop down to my knees and try to calm him. The dagger clatters on the wood floor. He collapses down on his knees and I rest his head against my shoulder, stroking his dark brown hair.

He doesn't cease though, and it worsens. I ease him into a laying down position and put his head in my lap. He coughs until that purple black fluid comes out, it spills down the corner of his mouth, the one that I can see, and down his chin onto my tattered dress.

"Make it stop..."

"I don't know if I can do that right now...What if you don't wake up? You know what happened to-"

"Please..."

He pleaded, without persuasion. This was the brother that I knew. I started to hum the tune Shattered Humanity, we would listen to it as children. The same one we had overheard the composer playing on the piano, right here in this theatre many years ago. Heath shivered, and his breathing evened out as he fell asleep. I had only tried to calm his mind, at least I didn't knock him unconscious.

He rested peacefully now on my lap. I longed to take off the mask that covered his face, but I know I can't. Ever since that incident, it's like it was molded onto him. And since then he has become...I don't even know the word for it. Inhuman, he's never been the same. He developed this alternate personality that became more prominent when he got sick.

I take in a breath of air, relieved that his episode was over and that he hadn't tried to commit suicide this time.

Anguish washed over me as I contemplated what I would do next. I don't know. He keeps getting worse and worse. Is there a cure anywhere? Even if there was I couldn't go get it and leave him here alone. But I can't very well take him with me, not in his condition.

A drop of the purple black fluid falls onto Heath's mask, startled I look up at the ceiling, nothing but the sunlight that spilled through the many holes in the roof. I look down at my ruined neckline of my dress, it's soaked with it. I realize it's spilling out from the cut on my throat. It's okay though, I don't feel it very much. My head just feels a little light...

I look back down his prone form, he looks like a child when he sleeps. I decide then and there that if I can't cure Heath, the least I can do is give him the best that I can. It doesn't matter to me if he's nineteen going on twenty, he'll always be my little brother.

"We'll get through this together, always." I smile down at him, and cough.