The Shrink Program

Chapter 14

-Nine years ago-

"Maddison!"

The desperate cry, raw with terror, shocked me into taking a deep, sharp breath.

It was only as I felt that first freezing breath enter my lungs that I noticed the absence of the ones that were supposed to have come before it.

My chest suddenly convulsed, and I was wracked with a fit of frantic coughing, my chest heaving as it tried to expel the suffocating water.

It was too much, and I saw stars before I finally managed to clear my lungs. On the edge of fainting, I drew in breath after desperate breath, gasping as consciousness slowly returned to me.

With each breath that followed after, came a broken flash of memory.

Water. A hand. A flash of red. Then darkness.

I felt cold, but my chest was burning. Blinking my eyes opened, I dazedly watched the lake from where I lay on the damp grass.

Dimly, I remembered that I had tried to swim to the other side by myself. I had made it, but coming back...

"Maddison!" Suddenly I was being moved, turned so that my gaze faced the blue sky. Concerned red eyes filled my vision, bringing my focus back to what was going on around me.

I began shivered uncontrollably, noticing for the first time that there were arms around me.

I thought to look, to see who was holding me propped in their lap, but couldn't seem to drag my gaze away from Vain. The distress in his expression made my chest grow instinctively tight, made me afraid to look away.

"We need to get her back to the cabins." A stranger's voice said from beside me. I saw Vain look up, meeting the eyes of whomever it was who spoke. He nodded gravely, and I felt the arms around me tighten, beginning to lift me up and away from Vain.

Panicked, I clung weakly to Vain's sleeve, not wanting to be separated. In that moment of slight hesitation, I met Vain's eyes and finally, noticed the wetness staining his cheeks. Saw the tears rolling silently down his face. Saw that he was crying.

Vain never cried.

The shock of it made me loosen my grip on his shirt. He bowed his head, speaking almost too quietly for me to hear. "I'm sorry Maddison, this is all my fault. If I had stayed..." I was lifted up before I could hear the end.

I watched him as I was carried away, right up until the point I passed out.