Ethan Daniels: A Thousand Words

"Aiigh!" I shouted as I held my ears. "Do you hear that?"

Shiloh was still shaking and squeezing his eyes tightly shut when he answered, "H-hear w-what, m-man?"

The screeching continued. It got gruffer and more fierce. It pierced my ears and one of them started to bleed.

"That sound, do you not hear it?" I asked again.

"I don't hear it." He replied. Suddenly his eyes began to open, and his expression turned from nervous to absolutely terrified. He wheeled around and faced in my direction, his eyes now wide open, "The banshee... she's calling you, isn't she?" His eyes were now full of tears, "You're going to DIE, bro!"

Well THANKS. THAT'S reassuring, I thought. Shiloh started losing all sense of self-control and he went ballistic. And so did I. I knew my life was about to take one of two roads: Horrible pain or absolute death. Would you explain to me again why I'd want to chose either of those?

I unplugged my ears and looked at my hands. My fingers were covered in blood that had come out of my ears. My heart beat faster and faster and faster. The screeching became more and more unbearable. Then, everything came to a halt. All I could hear was a high-pitched ringing in my ear and my heart began to go slower and slower. And slower.

Shiloh ran up in front of me screaming something I couldn't comprehend. He was pointing in the direction of the entrance of the woods, his face in complete shock, his veins bulging from his neck. He must have been shouting at the top of his lungs, but I couldn't hear him. I couldn't hear anything. All I could hear was the high-pitched ringing in my blood-covered ears. I was petrified. I felt frozen in position, almost as if I had been cursed by the banshee's scream.

And this is where it happened.

Shiloh looked behind him, then back at me in distress. Suddenly, he dashed away, completely out of sight. I tried to gather the strength to turn my head in the direction he had darted off to, but the ringing in my ear became too intense and I stumbled backwards, slamming my head on a hard rock. It all seemed to go in slow motion as I looked up to the sky and saw a bright, blinding light. Slowly the light began to grow and grow. And then, complete darkness.

***

I woke up with a jolt. My chest flew up and fell down as I tried to remember how to breathe again. My vision cleared up and what came into focus brought a stinging pain in my heart. My sister, Grace, was sitting on the edge of a hospital bed -- MY hospital bed -- staring into my eyes as tears rushed out of hers. I blinked a couple times as my eyes adjusted to the scene around me. A brightly colored hospital room, mostly white, and my sister right in front of me, holding my hand as her delicate fingers caressed my palm.

"Ethan?" She said, softly. "Ethan, are you awake?"

"Do you think he can hear her?" I heard Shiloh say. He walked up from behind Grace and sat down on his knee. A nurse came up behind him and smiled down at me.

"Ethan, dear. Can you hear me?" She asked. I looked up at her with just my eyes. I swallowed hard and tried to say "Yes" but it came out more like "Ehhh-mm..."

"I'll take that as a 'yes'!" She said as she walked over to a counter on the other side of the room.

I looked back at Grace. She smiled, but I could see it was forced.

"Ethan..." She looked over at Shiloh, then back at me, "Something happened..."

Shiloh nodded, and also forced a smile. "Everything will be okay, though, man. Aiight?" He cleared his throat, trying to make his voice remain stable, "I mean- at least you're not dead, right?"

I made an expression that I hoped conveyed the words, "What happened?" Grace seemed to understand when she replied, "You've been unconscious for a whole week."

Now my expression said, "That's ALL?"

I have to admit, being told I was in a week-long coma could not have sounded sweeter. I thought it was something WAY worse, like I'd gone deaf or something and I was wearing weird-looking hearing aids. I was so elated, I decided it was about time to leave the stupid hospital room and get on with my life. After all, I had spent enough time there. I managed to gather up my energy and thrust the covers off of me. The next thing I wanted to do was jump out of bed and throw on some jeans in place of that itchy blue hospital gown, but it wasn't as simple as that. Grace and Shiloh gave me a pitiful glance, then they exchanged looks with each other.

"THIS is the damage the banshee did to you, man...I'm sorry." Shiloh sighed.

There were two roads my fate could have chosen, and at that moment I had wished it was the death one.

I stared down at the damage in absolute terror, my whole body shaking. My left leg reached the end of the bed, but my right leg didn't even make it half way. All that was left of it was a nub that went on about two feet from my waist, and that was it. No knee. No ankle. No foot. Nothing but a couple inches of useless leg. My head was spinning. My thoughts were all jumbled. I thought maybe this was some horrible nightmare and all I had to do was wake up. Then I would have my leg back and all would be fine. I could hop out of my bedroom and bolt down the stairs, and laugh with Grace about my scary dream. Then my thoughts shifted to reality. This had really just happened to me. I really did lose my right leg. I was officially something I could never change. I was permanently handicapped, and no amount of wishing or hoping or praying could change that.

Thoughts rushed faster through my mind. Boatloads of negativity rammed its way into my brain. I would never learn to drive. I could never monster hunt again. I wouldn't be able to play outside with my little sister, or teach her how to ride a bike. I would never be the Ethan I was last week. And I wanted to know why.

"How did this happen?" I looked up at Shiloh and Grace, "Why did this happen? Who did this to me?" My voice trembled and my eyes started to sting.

The nurse walked up and smiled, "You don't have to worry. A very nice man has donated money for you to get a replacement."

Right then, two questions came to my mind: First, why was someone other than my parents giving me medical help? And second, where was this replacement? I asked the nurse both questions. Her answers were enough to give me a heart attack.

"I guess you wouldn't have known about this..." She looked down her feet, obviously not wanted to make eye contact with me when she broke me the horrifying news, "Your parents have been missing for almost an entire week now. Police are still working on what happened. There's even an investigation going on at the Daniels' residence as we speak."

I looked over at Grace, who had her face buried in Shiloh's chest as he comforted her.

"There, there, Lil' Squirt," he always called her that, "things can only get better from here, right?"

"Did you two know about this?" I asked.

Shiloh nodded, "I tried to tell you, but... well, you couldn't really hear me, anyway..."

I looked back down at my one and a fourth legs. The nurse broke the long silence with the answer to my second question.

"Your replacement leg is over on the counter. I am going to have it fixed to you very soon."

"Make it quick-- please! I want to go home and see what the investigation is about." My eyes begged her, but my voice's pathetic state of being was not enough to convince her to let me leave.

"It will take a while for you to get used to walking with your new leg, Mr. Daniels." She said, sadly, "So I would suggest you stay here for a few more days."

"No- look, I'll find a way." I replied, "I NEED to see what happened to my parents!"

"I don't think that's possible at the moment." She knelt down on on e knee, and pulled her long blonde hair behind her ear. She looked intently into my eyes with her beautiful blue ones. Her red lips curved into a reassuring smile, "You can stay here a few more days, and you and I won't have trouble getting along. I assure you of that, Mr. Daniels."

I smiled at her a little nervously. But my smile soon faded the more I looked into her eyes. They were like deep vortex's of...of something, I couldn't tell what. But everything she said suddenly seemed more and more okay with me. I nodded, "I guess a few days wouldn't hurt."

She patted my head, "Good. Since we're friends, I should tell you my name." She said, "Its Jennifer. But you can call me Jenni."

I smiled, but I think it only went half way. I was in too much of a beautiful-nurse-trance. Or, I guess something like that.

"Oh, Ethan!" Shiloh said, forcefully breaking the awkward silence I created as I stared at Jenni, "I just remembered. Your camera has a heck of a lot more luck than you do, bro. Take a look." He handed me the camera and it was in perfect condition. "It was on your front porch with a note on it. The note was written kinda funny-- I actually don't know what it was supposed to say."

I frowned and looked at him questioningly, "Do you have the note?" I asked.

"Sure," He took the note out of his pocket and handed it to me, "There, see. Its just gibberish."

I looked down at the note. It said: Neo Rouh, There Stimune, Inne Cossend. "What is this, Latin or something?"

"I don't know." Shiloh said, "But I thought with all your research skills or whatever, you'd be able to figure it out sooner or later."

"Hey," I put the note on my lap, "Who do you think brought this to my house and wrote this note? That's kinda weird, don't you think?"

Shiloh shrugged, "I'm not sure, bro."

"And- and, you know what else I'm still wondering?" I ruffled my hair in frustration, "WHY am I now a one-legged freak?"

Shiloh told me what he knew about the story. He said that after I heard the banshee call, a huge truck started pulling down the path in the woods, the path I had backed directly in the middle of. It was coming at me so fast, the only thing Shiloh could do was yell at me to jump away. He said I looked so dazed, there was no way I heard him. He ran to the truck to try to stop it, but it was no use. It was going way too fast and it was way too dark outside for the driver to notice him or me.

"I screamed at the top of my lungs, but you didn't hear me. You just fell backwards onto the path in front of the truck." Shiloh said as he held back tears, "That's when I looked away. And I would have looked back to see if you were alright, but I was so scared, I just passed out right there."

"So," I tried to wrap my mind around everything he just told me, "you think my leg got run over by a truck?"

"Not sure...but the doctors said that when you were admitted to the ER, your leg was cut clean off."

Well THAT sounded fishy. Everyone knows that cars can't cut legs clean off. It had to have been something else. And I was determined to find out what it was.