The Sickness

Chapter 6.

Cy's feet smashed against the pavement and shattered the carefully made rain puddles. Everything she'd ever known or counted on was nothing. She'd have died if she'd stayed in the only home she'd known, but she was dying from the inside now that she was here. Which would've been better? For the first time since leaving Neapolis she felt a firm attachment to the AMIG no longer in her head. She traced the tender, ripped, flesh, and craved the safety of sterilized memories.

Everything was filled with the sound of her own sorrow. The rain was a chorus of people, whisper-weeping against the asphalt, and she thought if her heart could make a sound, it would rival thunder: a ferocious colliding of boulders, the rendering of stone into dust and fine particles; the sound of never being whole again. Through this orchestra of grieving rain and crashing stones, Cy could do nothing but continue running. She kept replaying the image of Isa and Kelli kissing, feeling the knife in her chest push and twist. She could hear the slapping of her feet on the road below her, but not the beat of her own heart. It occurred to her that maybe the sound of her running feet had replaced her heart altogether. If she stopped running, she'd find she'd been dead this whole time: a corpse running in the rain. Perhaps this would not be such a bad thing, Cy thought, her chest and lungs heaving.

Lightning flashed and Cy's right ankle rolled beneath her as she bounded forward. She crashed to the ground, her hands breaking her fall and cutting open on the rough pebbles of the road. She sucked in a breath but did not stand or make a sound. Laying here felt better, somehow, and she rested her cheek against the wet concrete, willing the rain to wash her away.

How long she lay there, Cy couldn't know. It could've been seconds, or hours, but eventually, there was the singing of a car coming to a stop beside her, and a gentle hand on her back. She couldn't really expect anyone other than Isa, as she knew no one else, but she certainly hadn't expected it to be Kelli.

"Cy," her voice was gentle and kind. "Isabella isn't with me," she shouted through the rain. "Let me take you somewhere warm and we can talk."

Cy spat out the rain that leaked into her mouth, and no longer felt the warm, sympathetic chorus of rain. Instead it was a cold, unfeeling jet on her back. She considered for a moment, the fleeting possibility that Kelli was here to do Cy harm, that she had driven through the rain, plotting to find her and drive her somewhere she'd never escape or be found.

Cy closed her eyes and felt the sting of remorse. She did not want Kelli kissing the woman she loved, true, but it was evident from her face that she was nothing but kind. So, feeling defeated, she stood and allowed Kelli to help her into the car. There was no heater, but it was dry. She didn't want to feel relieved, but she did. The ankle had thrown things in sharp relief: running had been unwise of her. Who knows what could've befallen her in this sparsely populated town, where wild animals had long gotten used to having first rights over the land?

"Here," Kelli draped a towel over Cy's shivering shoulders, before shifting into drive.

"P-please d-d-don't t-take me back-k," Cy begged. Her body was wracked with spasms. She didn't realize her fingers and toes had gone numb until heat started painfully returning to them.

"Don't worry. I wouldn't do that." Kelli glanced at her, and her eyes portrayed a relaxed sort of sorrow. Cy wondered if she'd figured it out somehow. Was Kelli feeling the same agony Cy was feeling?

"I'm sorry," Cy said, softly.

"You haven't done anything wrong," she replied gently.

They drove in silence for a moment longer, and then Kelli spoke again.

"How's your ankle?"

Cy looked down at her foot. She had caught most of her fall with her hands, which had saved her from snapping the ankle. She knew it would recover quickly. No doubt she'd only twisted it, but it was still a little swollen and sore.