Whispers

Packing up the car, Trystan felt like she was on auto pilot. She was trying to stay busy, to keep her hands fastened to anything long enough that they would not have a slight tremble. It had been a full 24 hours, but she still felt the shake in her hands when she thought about it too long.

Shoving the last sleeping back into the back of Harry’s car, she closed the trunk delicately. Harry and Rae had just shut their doors to his car and she heard it start Steam wafted around the muffler. Louis approached her, hands in his pockets to keep them warm and offered her a smile.

Smiling in return, she walked around him to get in the car, but he tapped her. “You okay, Trys?”

“We’ll talk about it when we get home.”

“You sure?”

“Yes.”

Shrugging he let her get in the car. This time, Niall was stuck next to the window seat, a place that the radio and it’s functions were out of his reach. If he noticed this, he said nothing, sipping the hot chocolate that Rae had made him. Trystan was lightly impressed with Rae’s camping skills.

All weekend, they had stayed out their in those freezing tents, making fires, going fishing and playing football among the trees. It was beautiful and it was something that Trystan knew she would never forget, but for more personal reason’s than just having fun.

Closing her eyes and leaning her head on Louis’ shoulder, who she had mostly forgiven at this point, she could see it all happen again. Trystan had been sleeping soundly in the tent, Louis next to her warm and secure, when she heard someone walking around outside.

Rationally, she should have known it was one of the boys and gone back to sleep. Or she should have remembered that all of the little white girls that go to see what the noise was, usually die in the movies.

Yet, Trystan got up from her sleeping back and walked outside, hoping maybe that it was Rae outside doing something and that she could talk to her about her situation with Louis.

Except it hadn’t been Rae. Trystan had followed the foot steps only a few yards away from the fire, several yards away from the tents, when she was smacked over the mouth, stealing the breathe and the scream from her throat, and dragged further down the path.

In those five minutes, Trystan felt raw fear for the first time. Raw fear was nothing like she had ever seen in the movies or read in books. It doesn’t creep up your spine- it slams into you like a gale force wind, so hard that it steals the breath from your body, and so powerful that your mind can process nothing, can feel nothing, can be nothing but the fear.

It wraps itself around you, making every single nerve in your body scream out, and it feels like you’re in an empty room with no windows, no doors, all alone in this ever closing darkness. The only thing in the room with you is fear, ready to steal you away.

It is the most basic of feelings but the most palpable of horrors.

When the fear had died down and her brain was able to think logically, it was already too late. Her brain had needed to be logical when she was being dragged backwards. It needed to be faster if she wanted to know what the hell was happening to her, but by the time she was ready to think, her answers were in front of her.

Leon had spun her around to face him, giving her a look that told her if she screamed, she would die. She wasn’t sure how she knew that she would die, but she could see it there, her death certificate in his murderous green eyes. So when he let her mouth go, she didn’t scream. But her lip trembled, and there is something significantly terrible about a lip tremble.

“God,” he muttered, shaking his head and smiling. There was nothing particularly appealing about Leon’s smile. He may have been an attractive person, but there was something exceptionally razor like about the way he smiled. “I’m thankful that you’re a lot more obedient than Rae, she would have hit me. She has before, you know?”

“Give me one good reason that I shouldn’t hit you.”

He shrugged. “Because a knife between the ribs is an exceptionally uncomfortable way to die.”

“Well, I suppose I could think of a few better ways to go.”

And they had talked. Leon had talked to Trystan for an hour, and each minute that ticked by, she wanted more and more to run away from him, to scream out and feel the cold air rip against her warm throat as she cried for help. But she didn’t, she listened to his warning, argued with him about what he had said, and when he was done, she had walked away.

A bump on the road made Trystan open her eyes, the memory washing away for a moment. Her head had jostled on Louis’ shoulder causing her to squirm and try and get comfortable again. He patted her leg, as if trying to console her. Louis didn’t know that Leon had been there in the late of the night. Only Trystan did.

A million questions had not been answered. Even after talking with him for an hour, Trystan did not know how he had known where they were, and she had not really figured out why he was there. But it made her skin crawl to know that he had been there, doing whatever he was doing.

Looking at Rae and Harry, everything seemed to be fine. Trystan watched as Rae looked at Harry as he drove. There was such a strong look in Rae’s eyes as she looked at Harry, reaching her hand across the center of the car to link their fingers, that Trystan had to look away. Rae looked at Harry the way every girl looks at that one boy that they want to be with forever. The only difference, is that Harry looked at Rae the same way. Louis didn’t look at Trystan like that.

Two hours into the drive, Niall seemed to have realized he couldn’t touch the radio, his annoyance with the Lana Del Ray coming through the speakers audible. He sighed several times, muttering to himself as he pulled the hood of his jacket over his head, pulling the strings so that it tightened and hid his face from the world.

“Invest in headphones,” Trystan suggested, smiling in amusement. Niall flicked her off. “You do work at an apple store, Niall.”

“Yes, but I work in tech not sales.”

“That’s no excuse not to go get a pair of headphones, mate.”

“Trystan, have I mentioned I don’t like sitting next to you in the car?”

“Has anyone mentioned they don’t like hanging out with you?”

He made a sour face. “Yes.”

Louis laughed, reaching over Trystan’s blonde head and ruffling up Niall’s hair. Niall swatted his hands, making a sound that mildly sounded like an angry cat hissing. “We love you, Niall.”

“Yeah well I want to kill you all.”

Trystan flinched. He wasn’t the only one.