The Hunters

Part 13

13.

Rowan

     Sometimes you just have to let go of reality and fall. You need to forget everything you know and realise that what you are seeing has no explanation. There will come a time in life when something will happen to you, something big, and you will want to reject it. If you don't believe it, it cant be real right? The thing is, having this mindset only helps for so long. You cant pretend forever and as soon as you let down your guard of pretence, the truth will hit like a freight train.

     This is one of those times.

     Tyler left a long time ago but here I sit still. There should be a body on the floor beside me. It should lay there waxy and decomposing. It should look at me through eyes of glass and feel cold to the touch. But the space I am staring at has not changed. The body hasn't magically reappeared before my eyes.

      I have never seen someone die, except those two guys who attacked us and those two didn't disappear with a puff of smoke. I have never seen someone die, but I am sure that wasn't how it normally happens.

     Normal.

     Normal. Normal. Bloody normal! My life isn't normal, not anymore. Nothing about this situation is even the tiniest fraction of normal. I have to stop comparing and let go of all measures of normalcy. Because as of the moment I met Tyler, my life transformed. Now it is undoubtedly abnormal.

     I scrub at my eyes with the heels of my hands and breathe out a heavy sigh. I cant do this anymore! But I have to. For someone else there might have been an escape. However, as Tyler keeps reminding me, I'm not someone else. There is no running away for me.

     I don't want to see Tyler right now. With my emotions running high from sleep deprivation and the trauma of the past few days, I worry I might not be able to control myself. And, after what had just done, there is a hole lot of pent up hatred and anger that is just waiting to burst out of me.

     When you are locked up in a cell for a long time and the only thing you have - other than your own thoughts - is watching other people, you will be surprised at how much you will learn from observing human behaviour.

      Tyler, for instance, is very much like a wild animal. He feels comfortable outside in the open rather than cooped up inside. In the restless, troubled state he left in, my bets would be that he's wondered off somewhere so he can get some fresh air.

     I'm glad for this because I know if I stay here much longer I will drive myself crazy with my relentless thoughts, not to mention that I am struggling to keep my eyelids open. Dreams tug at my drowsy mind and my muscles ache with every movement. Pushing myself up off the floor with much effort, I open the door and head to the hotel room.

Tyler

     I think. A million and one thoughts are flying through my brain all at once and I need to sort them out. It's better outside, I don't feel so isolated or trapped. The cold is free to nip at my arms and the air can rustle my hair. There is no one else. No pressures. Out here it is just me and that's the way I like it.

     I feel a but bad about leaving Rowan on her own and then I start to feel bad for feeling bad and so on in the never ending paradoxical cycle of me feeling crap. Happiness isn't in the job description I remind myself, but then again neither is kidnapping unsuspecting girls.

     All this time I have seen Rowan as one of them. I thought that since she had their powers and they were after her, she was exactly like any other Terrigena. Now though, now I'm not so sure.