Fate Is Insanity.

I stared into the dark of my room. It was too dark to handle. I could hear the wind, howling down the branches of the trees outside my window. The mattress under me was stiff, no longer comfortable.

I needed a smoke.

Unfortunately, I used up my last stolen one on that strange girl outside my house.

I vaguely wondered if I trawled back down the stairs to dig it up from the snow would it be too late.

Nah, it’s ruined.

I stared off into a distant corner that I could just make out. Who was she? And where was she going?

I mean, who wanders around in the dead of the night, with a light jacket and an attitude? All I was trying to do was help. I mean, fuck. How rude.

I didn’t even get her name….

I flipped over and thumped my pillow with a grunt. She was so mean to me. And all I did was ask her if she needed help. I mean, it’s fucking snowing. Who takes a walk when it’s snowing?

Who takes a walk crying, in the middle of the night, while it’s snowing?

I sat up, curling my pillow into my arms, leaning against my bedroom wall. From here, I could see out the window, onto the street. It was empty now, and I had an inkling of a feeling that it would stay that way.

I had taken a moment in time. I had taken it and thrown it away. Left it lying in the snow.

I remembered her hair, her eyes. Her lips, chapped from the wind. Her cheeks, so red. Her makeup was smeared under her eyes, her hair wild around her face.

It was like that sex hair they always talked about.

I closed my eyes and let my head fall back against the wall with a thump.

You always hear those girls giggling about how so-and-so is the perfect “sex on paper” or whatever it is they call it.

Well, she was my sex on paper. She was that racy scene in Titanic, not the car scene, the one where he’s drawing her. Naked.
I bit my lip and groaned, banging my head harder against the wall. Somewhere down the hall, I heard my father grunt in his sleep.

I froze.

Silence.

Thank God.

I flung the pillow to the side and slipped out of bed once more. My bare feet slipping across the wooden floors. The smooth wood, cold. The shock of the cold sent a shiver up my spine. When I reached the window I leaned my face against the frozen glass. My breath fogged up the window and with my fingers I drew happy little patterns.

The road was empty.

It had stopped snowing.

The wind was picking up. It was below freezing, most definitely.

I was willing to bet that she was most uncomfortable.

I sighed, the pictures disappearing and a red Subaru drove slowly by.

I watched it out of the corner of my eye, not bothering to turn my head.

It was just a car.

She was just a girl.

I turned, beginning to make my way over the clumps of clothing when I heard something that made my heart stop.

Somewhere, in the distance, the sound of brakes. Screeching in the dark. The brakes screamed into the dark and then I was flying.

I was thudding down the stairs, rushing past the kitchen, the living room, down the hall, out the door. I was sprinting down the walk and leaping over patches of ice.

Up ahead, I could see the headlights, they were tilted, like the car had suddenly turned, they pointed the wrong way, nearly all the way around. There was a dark shadow moving and then, as I got closer, the sound of voices, shouting into the dark.

No, no, no, no.

I sped up, my bare feet scraping at the pavement, slipping through the fresh snow and over the raw ice.

Closer.

“Where the fuck did she come from?” I heard a man shout. More voices, like a woman’s answering him.

No, no, no, no.

I was close enough to see it now.

The patch of ice, the car, the girl.

The girl, splayed in front of the car, like death.

I fell to my knees, pulling her away from the monster that had stolen her name from me. She was limp, and cold. Her hands, like ice. I was fascinated by them, their size, and their shape. They were so white, like the snow her head rested on.

Her lips stood out, bright red against the marble color of her flesh.

Her lashes. They were dark.

Her veins, a blue map across her temples.

The people from the car were all around me, dark shadows on a white background. Their voices were like snow. The murmured hush. A frantic whisper.

Lights.

Red.

And then…I saw something that made my heart stop.