Not long after we left the hotel, Mike and I made a stop at the nearest Walmart to get some road trip necessities: chips, loads of water, something to get rid of the hangover and some really sugary candy - Mike and I were both suckers for the Starbursts’ red line. We walked inside hand in hand and started looking for all the things in our list. The first section we found was the pharmacy, so while I was subconsciously dragged towards the makeup section, Mike went and got us our cure.

“Ew babe not that one,” I said as Mike dropped the original Pedialyte on our cart
“What’s wrong with that one?”

“It tastes like ass, babe. Get the berry one,” I said and Mike stared at me, raising his eyebrow and with a slight smirk.

“Babe?” he repeated with a cute tone; I hadn’t even realized I’d said that and we still hadn’t talked about pet names.

“I’m sorry it just kind of rolled off my tongue,”

“Don’t be sorry, I like it,” he responded as he disappeared into the next aisle. I smiled to myself at his response and knew I had to tell Lisa about this.

Me: I just called him babe and he liked it. Shit I feel like a 12yo rn. Wtf’s wrong with me?

Seconds later I got a response.

LizzyBoo: Awh y’all are adorable <3 You’re not gonna like what ive to tell ya, but I think
You’re falling for him

Me: shut up im not in love

LizzyBoo: No one said love but you ;) but anyway, keep lying to yourself can’t wait to laugh at ya when you realize you’re wrong

Maybe Lisa was right, what if I really was falling for him? I didn’t want to think about it, I wasn’t ready to confront that or even make it more serious, we were good like this and I didn’t want to rush into anything, so i simply tried to shut my feelings down so I could enjoy our relationship one step at a time. Thankfully, right after Lisa’s last text, Mike showed up and was able to distract me from our talk.

“I found you some cream for your tattoo”

“Oh fuck, I’d forgotten about it! At least I’m dating someone who knows how to take care of them, I didn’t even know I had to put cream on it.”

“Yup, I’ve learnt over the years as you can see,” he said, lightening up the mood.

We kept strolling down Walmart, trying to pass as unannounced as we could - honestly I wasn’t feeling that well and all I wanted to do was head back to the car. Mike got a Monster at the cashier line as we waited to pay.

“Mike, it’s $17 please let me pay,”

“Why do you always insist?”

“Because you already spend too much money on me,”

“I like doing that!” he retorted but instead I stared at him with puppy eyes, tilting my head a little so you could see them better through my glasses “Fuck, fine!” he gave up and I smiled. The cashier couldn’t help but laugh at our stupid bickering.

“Y’all are adorable,” she said and I blushed as I handed her $20 and told her to keep the change before Mike and I headed back to the parking lot and left the cart in their slot. We got in and the first thing Mike did was take out his bag of chips and opened the bag. I could smell the spices from the other side of the car and I knew it must be real spicy.

“I can’t believe they had these Takis here!” he cheered as he showed me the label -- it was “Takis Fuego” which meant fire in Spanish. “You want some?”

“I can smell the spices from here, I think I’m going to pass, you know how bad I am with spices,” I giggled before taking two big gulps of Pedialyte followed by half a bottle of water and two cherry candies to get the taste out of my mouth; the aftertaste was the worst part.

“Eh you’re not that bad, you handled Lucila’s food way better than I expected,”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” I responded, goofing around and sending Lisa a Snapchat of our goodies captioned “road trip munch” to what she responded with a picture of her healthy salad.

For a while the car ride was silent between us, with the occasional humming of whatever song was playing and even the rare sing along -- or sing off -- until my phone started ringing. It wasn’t a phone number that I recognized, but it was a 212 area code which means it was coming from New York.

“Hello?”

“Hi, is this Sarah Hayes?”

“Yes this is she, who is it?”

“My name is Jacob Hunt and I’m calling from Pearson and Associates in New York, I just wanted to talk about your case against --” he began but before he could continue his sentence I hung up. I was terrified that this day would come, and this was not the place or appropriate time to have that conversation as well as dying to run away from the problem as long as I could.

“What was it?” Mike asked.

“Uhm, nothing just spam,”

The car was silent for a couple more minutes until the phone rang again -- same number.
“I’m just going to let it ring, maybe then they’ll stop calling,” I said as I attempted to ignore the ringing. I turned the music a little louder and leaned against the door. I always found that whenever I felt stressed in the car I should look out the window; seeing us fly by other cars or other people relaxed me for some reason.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, just tired,” I lied.

“Maybe you should take a nap, that should make you feel better,”

“You sure?” I asked, feeling guilty of leaving him alone during the drive.

“Yeah don’t worry you need to rest,” he smiled and went back to focusing on the road. I leaned my seat backwards and kicked my shoes off before placing them on the windshield and closed my eyes hoping I’d forget all of this.

---

It was dark and cold, the wind was blowing strongly and dragging the pouring rain towards me, making it crash against me harshly. I looked around as I tried to situate myself; there were buildings around me and all I could hear was the sound of the rain crashing onto the concrete and the puddles it had created -- not a horn, not one voice, not a sound.
I walked along the streets of the dark and unknown place, making sure to check my six constantly like my self defense coach had taught me a couple of years back in case someone were to appear. As I approached the lamp post at the end of the block, the buildings around me became clearer and then I finally realized I was near where I lived back in New York. I used to walk this way in order to get home from work after riding the metro, it was a shortcut to avoid the huge crowds from the busy streets of Greenwich Village. The rain was beginning to hurt my skin as it poured harder and harder, and there was no shelter around me. All of the buildings lacked roofs over their entrances, and after walking up to a couple and failing at opening the door I simply gave up and began to walk aimlessly, turning in circles and trying to find someone who could take me home.

“Hello? Is anyone there?” I yelled, but I heard no response.

I was ready to give up when I heard a noise from relatively close yet it was more of a murmur.

“Hello? I need help, I’m lost,” I kept going as the murmur came closer and closer but whoever it was didn’t feel like responding to my pleas for help. The murmur became louder and turned from a muffled nonsense into two sets of laughs -- more like giggles, female giggles. There were two sets of them, and as they grew louder and louder, I safely assumed these had to be young girls. My first thought was what kind of parent would allow their kids to be out this late, but then I remembered that my father never really set any sort of boundaries and more often than not he was too drunk to care.

“Hello? I’m lost” I said once more and just as the words came out of my mouth, I saw two silhouettes walking just a little ahead of me -- they must have been the girls laughing. Where had they come from though?

“You’re it,” one of them said.

“I don’t want to be it, I always am,” the second girl muttered, slightly angry, while the other one laughed. They were running around in circles through the empty streets, the shorter one trying to chase the other one who was clearly faster and possibly older.

“Hey, you two, I’m lost could you help me?” I asked and the girls froze before turning around to see me. They stood side by side facing me but it was so dark I could only make out the shadows of their features.

“You’re it!” they both said at the same time as they began to jump around and away from me.

“Please come back,”

“If you want us, you’re gonna have to chase us!” they giggled and began to splash puddles.
I realized that if I wanted to get an answer I would have to follow their game, so I began to jog towards them, trying to keep my eyes open despite the rain and although with every step I felt they were farther and farther away, one simply stopped and waited for me to reach her. I stood behind her for a couple of seconds in silence.

“Who are you?” I asked her.

“Don’t you love me Sarah?”

“Wh-what?” I stuttered “Who are you?” The girl stood still for a couple of seconds, and after the tension had built up, she slowly turned towards me and simply stared into my eyes. I gasped and tears instantly began to blend in with the rain that rolled down my face.

“Wh-what are you doing here?”

“You don’t love me Sarah,”

“Please stop it,”

“If you loved me, you would have saved me,” she kept going, torturing me with every word “Go save me Sarah, you still have time,”

“I don’t know where to go,”

“You do, follow your instinct. If you love me, save me” were the last words she said before she disappeared, vanishing into thin air.

“What the fuck is this?!” I yelled “What’s going on? Is this some sick game? It’s not funny I want to go home!” I continued, but all there was was silence.

“SARAH!” I heard the blood curdling scream from the next street “Help me!” This was happening, again, and I needed to stop it this time.

“I’m on my way!” I screamed before I began to run as fast as I could.

“Sarah!!” she kept going, but I couldn’t respond since I was almost out of air. I ran to the point past exhaustion but I hadn’t gotten this far to simply get this far. I quickly made a turn into a small alley and there she was, laying in the pool of her own blood that was slowly diluting with the rain. I was too late, again…

“Oh God no, not again, not again!” I screamed as I fell on my knees next to her body and attempted to do CPR but her heart had stopped, too much blood had been lost and the stab wounds were too deep to stop. Her heart had ceased to beat, her lungs had stopped taking in air -- her life was over.

“Please come back,” I begged, trying my hardest to pull her towards me and placing her head on my lap; she wasn’t heavy for a 22 year old but they called it dead weight for a reason. I cried loudly between shallow breaths as I tried to convince myself that this wasn’t her, that this wasn’t happening but there’s no denial when you’re covered in blood. Once I had accepted her fate, I entered a state of shock which only allowed me to look at the floor as the rain kept going, filling every dent and crack in the road with dirty water until I was distracted by someone walking towards me. I could only see their shoes -- they were brown and worn out. I slowly looked up and fear shock my body as I discovered who it was.

“You’re next,”

---

“NO!” I screamed off the top of my lungs and swung my arms around as I was brought back to reality,

“Hey, hey it’s alright it was just a dream,” Mike said, quickly turning towards me as he tried to calm me down. I alertly looked around me and found myself within the four doors of his car, driving on some highway; it really had been just a dream. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,”

“You don’t seem fine,”

“Mike, I’m fine just drop it,” I retorted with a snarky tone. I immediately regretted acting this way, it was childish and rude and Mike was only trying to help, but for some reason the apology was just not leaving my mouth. Mike stood silent and simply looked away, turning back to focusing on the road alone and moved his hand from my leg. I peeked at my phone and saw that this time the number had left a voicemail and I wasn’t going to be able to avoid it.
For about twenty minutes there was silence between us, the only sound was music playing and even that couldn’t get rid of the nasty tension in the car. However we needed to make a quick detour to get gas for the rest of the trip. As soon as we parked, I slammed my door opened and got out of the car as Mike did the same.

“Sarah where are you going?” he said, frustrated yet trying to stay calm.

“Bathroom.” I felt bad for being such a bitch with him, and I was trying to stop myself but there was just the shock of what had just happened and knowing I had to listen to the voice message that was eating me alive. I fast walked into the bathroom and locked myself in before simply staring at myself in the mirror, taking deep breaths and pulling my phone out of my pocket. I could do this, right? It was just a voice message. No one said I had to do anything other than listen to it. I pressed listen and pulled my phone to my ear.

“Hi, this is Jacob Hunt from Pearson’s and Associates in New York. I wanted to inform you that as of today, the trial has been confirmed for November 7th, and am assigned to your case. I’d love to set up a meeting so I will call you later today or sometime this week to arrange something.” He began before sighing “Sarah, It is crucial to have this statement from you. If you want justice, you have to stop running away. I’ve been in contact with Owen and he’s caught me up on the case. I know it’s hard, but please just take my call and listen to me, have a good day,”

My heart stopped and my lungs stopped taking in air. This wasn’t happening, this couldn’t be happening. I thought that since bail couldn’t be posted I wouldn’t need to testify, much less revisit the entire accident and that Owen would take care of everything. Tears began to roll down my face but I quickly wiped them away and tried to calm myself -- I didn’t want to ruin this trip more than I already had. I left the bathroom and made my way out of the building; Mike was leaning on the hood of his car looking at his phone as the gas pump finished filling the car tank. He turned towards me and we made eye contact. I could clearly see that he was hurt. As I walked, we held the stare until I couldn’t do it anymore and I simply started crying.

“Hey, it’s okay I’ve got you,” Mike said as he rushed to my side and wrapped his arms around me tightly.

“I’m sorry I was so mean,”

“I know you didn’t mean it, but I still worry,”

“I know,”

“What happened?”

“I promise I’ll explain all of it soon, but right now I just want to forget it okay?”
He gave me a short smile and kissed my forehead, signaling that he was okay with respecting my decision which made me feel a little better. We got back in the car silently and as he began to drive he placed his hand on my thigh again, and rubbed his thumb lightly over it. I didn’t say anything, instead I smiled and placed my hand on his before leaning my head back and shutting my eyes once again, hoping the dreams were over.

Notes

hey everyone! sorry its taking so long to update I've been working hard this summer but more ideas are coming, slowly but ill try to update as fast as I can.

Anyway, tell me what you think about this chapter in the comments or message me :)

Love you all, and thanks for reading <3