Forgive or die trying

Repairing broken ties

As Aubrey continued to run, she felt as if her muscles would tear apart at any second. But she couldn't turn back. She didn't know how long it had been, but the frigid winds beating against her only added to her exhaustion. Her feet were bare, rocks embedded into them but she didn't care. She couldn't stay in that house anymore. She was weak.

She had felt immense guilt from the second her bat hit Hero's head.

Aubrey felt herself grow heavier and she stopped moving. She couldn't feel her legs anymore. She couldn't feel her arms or her head. Her body felt numb and she was panting for air. Her legs felt like they had been beaten with a bat, they felt like they had been burned with fire.

She could feel eyes burning into her, watching her every move. With any energy she had in her, she forced herself to keep going as her body screamed at her to stop. By now, she was getting deep into the woods in an unfamiliar part of town. Wood and dirt crunched under her feet, some sticks stabbing into her soles, and yet she continued.

The sharp rocks stabbed into her bare feet, her skin had been ripped and it was bleeding. But she didn't stop. Her legs felt like lead, her muscles were exhausted. She felt like she could collapse at any second. But she knew that there was no turning back.

Aubrey didn't know if she was hallucinating the eyes staring at her from all directions, clouding her vision with their piercing gazes. She felt every bit of pain that she had ever felt in her entire life being injected into her brain. A twig stabbed into her arm. She clutched it, the pain blistering her skin, but she couldn't see anything.

"You can't keep running like this. You'll hurt yourself. Give up." A voice repeated to her.

"Leave me alone," she yelled out as she crawled on the ground, legs having fully given out on her and feet bleeding too much to stand on.

The voice laughed. "You can't keep going like this. You're almost a mile away from the town, and it's dangerous out here. You've already hurt yourself. If you keep going, you might even die. Do you want that? Do you want to die?"

She took a few deep breaths in before continuing to drag herself along the dirt. "I can't go back."

"No. You can't," the voice mocked her.

"Why do you keep doing this to me?" She spoke to herself.

"Because you deserve it. You're a terrible person," the voice continued. It was louder than anything that Aubrey had ever heard in her life. It was speaking right in her ear, and she could feel its hands on her neck, almost choking her. She stopped for a moment pausing at it words and not wanting to believe it. She tried taking deep breaths in to center herself, but that didn't work.

"I'm not," she whispered to herself. She was trying not to hear the voice anymore. She was trying not to listen. But it just continued.

"You're a coward Aubrey. A coward and a liar. And that's all you'll ever b-", the voice was cut off as the sound of fast footsteps approached.

"S-shit! Hold on let me help you!", someone ran over to her and, quickly yet still gently, helped to prop her up against a tree. Her eyes felt heavier than ever before, her skin cold to the touch yet feeling boiling hot to her.

"Hey, keep your eyes open ok? Just stay awake for me," their voice was frantic yet tried to hold some calm as she forced her eyes to stay open, through blurred vision she could only make out a mess of dark brown hair and a dark blue sweater. She felt their hands gently wrapping bandage around her feet as they spoke again, the voice seeming to belong to a man the more she listened,

"You must be freezing, and there's some thing imbedded in your feet. I'll call for help, I'm not leaving your side ok?" As her head cleared more, her eyes shot open as it finally clicked.

Hero looked down at her with pure concern for her safety. He didn't seem at all mad at her for what she had done to him, strictly focused on making sure she was ok.

"H-hero? W-why are you helping me?" Aubrey's voice was shot from screaming and from hyperventilating so much, but the boy gave a soft smile in response,

"You're still my little sis Aubrey, and whatever made you do what you did I'm sure I deserved it. I made a huge mistake just up and leaving, and I see how much it hurt you." His charm never did leave even after all these years, Aubrey gave a small strained smile to him and began to lean against him.

"I'm..I'm really sorry for what I did," she began, tears pooling in her ducts once again as she shakily continued, "I just.. I knew you were going to side with Kel and I-"

"What do you mean side with Kel?", he looked confused, even moreso when Aubrey just blinked her eyes in response before realizing he wasn't messing with her and genuinely didn't know.

"Hero.. please if there's one thing I need you to know it's this.. please.. just please listen to me," with a deep breath, and with her heart racing fast in her chest, she finally blurted out the truth to him,

"Sunny killed Mari. I watched it happen. Kel believes Sunny's lie and the two of them made the town hate me. Kel will try to convince you Sunny is right but I saw everything. I saw him shove her down the stairs, I saw him wrap the jumprope around her neck and hoist her up. I even saw him hide the broken violin she fell onto." There was complete silence after, aside from the sound of her heavy breaths. The silence weighed on her shoulders like boulders until he spoke up,

"Aubrey.. y-you're not fucking with me right?" His eyes were filled with tears, expression a mix of confusion and heartbreak as she nodded. He didn't respond, tears flowing down his cheeks as he sobbed into his hands. She was concerned and gently wrapped her arms around him as he gripped onto her tightly. The two embraced on the forest floor, crying in solace until they ran out of tears.

"All this time...all these years...it was all a lie?" Hero's voice cracked, pain evident in every word. Her nod only solidified that pain even more.

"Why didn't you tell us Aubrey?" That seemed to be the wrong question as it set her off,

"I tried! I fucking tried Hero! And what did I get out of it?! I got called a fucking murderer!!! Even your shitty excuse of a brother is convinced I'm the one who pushed Mari to suicide! Everyone thinks I was a horrible person who made her kill herself! I was fucking twelve Hero! Twelve years old! I watched my best friend murder his sister and pretend it was a suicide and nobody believed me!" She yelled out, and seemed to be internally preparing herself to run off again. She flinched as he raised his hand, but relaxed as he only set it on her shoulder,

"Aubrey.. I'm so sorry. I promise you I'm never leaving again. As for Kel, I'll deal with him myself." She blinked her eyes in confusion,

"You.. you believe me?" His nod was enough to calm the girl down again, holding her gently against him and running his hands through her very tangled hair. He took off his sweater, putting it on her to help her warm up and just stayed there like that with her. After a few minutes, he looked down to find the girl fast asleep with her head on his shoulder. He smiled softly and, careful not to wake her, picked her up. He walked out of the woods and to his car, sitting her in the passenger seat and buckling her in. After getting in himself and starting up the car, he smiled to her soundly asleep.

"Let's get you back home little sis"
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(A/N: damn this turned out to be a longer chapter, I really wanted to make this one count though. Rip Kel lmao)