You Can Sit Beside Me When the World Comes Down.

“Fancy a ride?”

It was like a chemical reaction in my body, after those three words fell from his smirked lips. Eyes rolled, eyebrows raised, and just quietly, a heart speed up in it's time keeping. I turned to the boy in the flashy car beside me, and gave him my best stare down, hoping I could fool him.

“What if I say no?”

“Then I’ll have to think of some other way to make you fall in love with me.” It annoyed me how he said it, like it was something simple, something without thought. Love was not a simple thing, it was so complex, something that had no formula to figure it out with. This time I gave him a real eye-roll, and a real sigh of impatience.

“Go home, Trohman, stop embarrassing yourself,” I muttered, turning away and letting my feet drag at the path once again. He smiled. He seemed to take my ignorance as a challenge, and of course, his ego wouldn’t let him turn a competition away.

“It’s going to rain,” He pointed out, fooling me to turn my head to the sky, looking dejectedly as I saw he was right. Not wanting to give up so fast, I turned to him with a glare sharp in my eyes.

“Oh, so you are a weather man now, huh?”

Joe flashed me his most innocent, yet cocky smirk, and I tried to ignore that chemical reaction imploding inside me again. “Just one of my special talents. C’mon, get in the car, I’ll drive you home.”

The games were over, and as he let me into his car, I let him into my life. I often wonder, if I had just written him off as another testosterone-fueled teenage mistake, would it hurt so much now?

In some sort of parallel universe I seemed to have gotten myself trapped in, I almost seemed grateful towards the Blank that had been pawing through my shoulder-bag, helping themselves to whatever valuables their dull eyes sought out, the movement waking me from a disowned memory.

I flinched away in repulsion from the creature in front of me, a creature that although was made of the same fiber as I, was created in the same way and had the same body functions, was not like me in any sense at all.

I flung the bag away from my body and toward the Blank, causing the figure to let out a screech of protest and scamper out of my sight, and very soon after, my mind. Running a hand through my dirty hair, the grease collecting under my fingernails was enough to make my cringe; I stumbled to my feet and began shaking the sleeping nerves awake.

The shoulder bag that I collected from the ground held nothing sentimental, nothing important, it was simply something that I could connect back to my old life, just a mindless habit that helped me get through.

Making a mental note to stop sleeping in accessible places, I stepped off the curb into the desolate land that used to be one of the busiest cities in the world. With a slip of the mind, the ground filled with rubble slowly builds itself up again, back into the majestic buildings, the flashing lights and colors, the sounds of life humming happily in the background. Then all too soon, the memory crumbles back into the dusty, destroyed place of what once was.

Trying not to dwell on the thought, I ambled along the broken down street, reminiscence still strong on my mind when I came across a movement that caught my attention.

The movement was too fast, too stealthy for it to be something of the human kind and in a fraction of a second, my mind had connected to what it was, and my heart was suddenly trapped inside my rib cage, crumpling like a paper bag.

My mind was trapped in its own fear and indecisiveness. There was no way I could outrun an Invader, they had five times the strength and agility than a human, and had instincts far more superior than anything I could ever imagine. Trapped in time, I watched through glazed eyes as it smelt it’s way slowly, almost teasingly, in my direction, the fear of being caught welling up inside me and becoming unbearable to stand.

And in the form of a Blank, the miracle that saved me happened. The same creature that had awoken me earlier by looking through my belongings, stumbled out in front of the Invader, throwing ominous objects toward it and yelling out empty words as if it would make it disappear.

A course of guilt streamed to my heart when I saw the Invader grin, a menacingly cold smile, sharp razor teeth protruding from it’s bumpy, discolored lips. I had a sudden want jump up inside me, perching itself on top of my chest with the pressure of a decision. Somewhere inside me, the innocent, loving, caring person that I had once been hazily awoke, wanting me to do all that I could to save the Blank that only had mere seconds of breathing time left.

I knew it would be a waste, even if there was some way I could save us both, as soon as the Blank recovered from fright, it would lash out in fear and anger. I knew I needed to let go of my caring side, there was no room for it now, I had to only be focused on me, what I needed to do to keep alive. Already I knew I had been lost in my thoughts too long, and as inconspicuously as possible, I slid behind the remains of a hairdressing salon and as soon as I was out of sight, I ran, heading for the block of apartments that were still slightly intact, about two blocks from where I was.

My feet only slowed once whilst hitting the pavement in the few precious seconds that I flinched, hearing the distorted cry of the Blank, so much pain and terror weaved into the sound, and then nothing at all.

Curling my legs around the pipes, I managed to hoist myself up to the window on the first floor of the apartment, my numb fingers colliding with the broken glass still attached to the bottom of the frame. Fear kept me from feeling the blood seeping out from the pricks, and after pulling myself through the window, my paranoia kept me running until I felt certain I was in the heart of the old building, with an emergency exit close at hand.

It was then that I collapsed; cheeks pressed into knees as I doubled over and sobbed dry, body-racking sobs. Crying was a sign that the body was healing from pain. I was yet to cry. And maybe, maybe if Joe was here to hold my hand, it wouldn’t be so bad. But he’s not.

It’s been two months, four weeks and one day.