A Vigilante

016

I can't register pain right now. My mind is racing too fast for my physical body to keep up. I am aware of it. Of how the damp and warm the blood soaking my leg is. I am aware of a slight spin of my head- from blood loss. But I'm numb to it all. Physicality falls secondary to the situation at hand.

My aunt. My aunt has been helping Epifano- working with Epifano. No it can't be right. He was taunting. He knew this would get to me. And it has. Because though I'm dizzy and pained, I drive steady and fast on the road to my aunt's apartment.

I'm not sure how much blood I've lost. The white leather seat of Ace's car was painted with the dark red seeping out my thigh. After I lost sight of Epifano's mansion, I did my best to wrap the wound. Hence now my hoodie is zipped up with no shirt under it.

But the fact that I could still see straight is a good sign.

The sky is still darkened by the night and the city is dulled, fortunately. I zip passed familiar closed stores and emptied streets. The clear roads make the speed that I am going safer. Ace's car is fast.

My eyes stay glued on the road, trance-like I weave through the streets with a clear destination in mind.

AsI round into the apartment's parking lot, my blood loss had gotten bad. I know when my vision becomes more blurred than before- black spots dotting my world. I shut down the car, and tighten the shirt tied to my leg. The quick action sends a spike of pain up my body. I ignore it which is not hard to do when my eyes zero in one specific window on the fourth floor.

I can feel the ground shake when I get out of the car. Or maybe it is just me. I couldn't stop to assess it, so I limp forward. The apartment complex is hardly secure. I walk in, blood soaked jeans and all. I take the elevator, seething as I watch the floor numbers ascend. Seething as I no longer see the digital numbers clearly.

I'm not hindered, I stagger on towards the door. A golden fuzzy number printed on. I bang against it with no care for neighbors or the late hours. I need answers. Now.

But when the door opens I almost fall forward, but I steady myself on the frame. My head pounds. The woman before me is revealed in her sleepwear no less, I can only make out a few words she says. And despite my anger and my pain, the words are filled with familiar concern.

My eyes narrow as I look at my aunt. The woman who raised me. I watch as her eyes widen and fall to my leg. But I could care less. As the room around her begins to darken and she is the only figure I see in a black landscape, I still have to ask.

"Why?"

♧

Everything hurts.

My leg stings. I can feel it now. I couldn't before. But now it's a throbbing ache that won't stop.

My head is pounding. I don't think I can even open my eyes.

My chest is hurting. Because the memories of what happened are replayed in my dreams. Words ringing in my head over and over and over again. Epifano said my aunt's name. Him saying she was working with him.

My Aunt.

Working with him.

I pull through the migraine and open my eyes. I'm met with the ceiling of my old bedroom. I knew it too well. When I try to move is when the pain strikes again. My leg hurts.

I managed to pull my upper body up. I'm on my old bed. My clothes are different. A tank top and gym shorts. My leg is bandaged now, white covering the entirety of my upper thigh. Some red stains it, but not nearly as much as last night. I feel nauseous when I think of last night. All that blood- I drove in that state.