Whispers in the Dark

Chapter 10: Blood and Halluciantions

Whispers in the Dark

Chapter 10: Blood and Hallucinations

As I try to catch my balance, a freezing, heavy shove rams into my back and pushes me forward. I try to scream as I fall onto the concrete, but my voice refuses to reach my lips. My body slams onto the ground first, immediately followed by my head, as if it's my body's shadow and has to follow the rest of its movement.

Straight after my head greets the sidewalk, it's like an unsteady wave of dizziness flows over my body and everything blurs. I try to blink away the itching black spots that dot my eyes, but with every blink my head hurts even more. A dull ringing sound clogs up my ears and I can't seem to hear anything anymore.

I can't stop. I can't let this person get me because of how clumsy I am. I just can't.

Slowly, I force myself to sit up even though everything's spinning. I have to catch myself from tipping over several times before finally managing to stand up. I lean against a near light post until I can manage to stand up straight without any support. I finally lift my gaze to see whose eyes I can feel firmly latched onto me, but when I look around, no one's there.

But as I spin my heel to look all around me, I wish someone else was here besides me. Oh God please no, not now, I think to myself as I bring my hand to my mouth and clamp my eyes shut. I hurl over and try to gag up a breath, but instead I get the bitter taste of puke beginning to tickle up my throat. I force the nauseous feeling back down and open my eyes again.

I snap my head behind, above, beside, and even below me but the landscape doesn't change, no matter how much I mentally beg it to. A crisp, gentle breeze whispers against my skin making me shiver, even though it's not cold. I suck in my breath and stand back up. Removing my hand from my mouth, I breathe in a heavy, thick gulp of the air and flick the bangs out of my eyes. I can do this. This isn't anything new.

I begin to walk down the narrow dirt road leading off into the distance I can't see. The sky seems to have been dyed a dull, lifeless gray, impossible to tell if it's a fog or if there's even clouds laying above me. This landscape is much duller than the other two places, but seems to be much... much more calm; but the eerie feeling that nags onto this place cannot be hidden like the clouds in this sky. I allow my gaze to attempt to fall onto something, but there isn't anything to look at. Only dark brown grass spreads on both sides of the thin, endless road blending into the sky in the far distance. It's as if I was on a road trip to some paradise but halfway there I just got dropped off into this empty field with only a single road.

I keep walking quietly until I can see tall, dead black trees beginning to appear lined-up by the road's side. They look as if they have been stripped of all their leaves and color, or maybe they never had them in the first place. As I pass the first one to my left, I stop and stare up at the thick, dead tree.

A small weep of a scream manages to escape my dry lips as I stumble a few feet back, but I never rip my gaze away from the tree - from its empty long branches. Hanging from the thick twigs and limbs of the tree are black ropes tied in loops around themselves - nooses meant for hanging.

I scratch my gaze away from the tree and stare at the ground as I quicken my pace down the middle of the bleak road. I never lift my gaze to another passing tree as I try to shake off the burning temptation to look back up. "This isn't real," I whisper to myself in a voice that sounds almost filtered, unfamiliar. "None of this is real. You'll wake up soon."

Then I hear it.

I hear the same sound I heard only ten minutes ago.

I hear the same scratchy gagging sound behind me, far in the distance.