Regret

Chapter 1 Narrator/ Sero: April 11

One day was all it took. Ariana and Sero were headed for school, Sero was driving a beat-up pick-up truck that he had inherited from his uncle. He slowed to a stop at the octagonal sign. He looked both ways and continued forward. Then the world was gone. All that was around was darkness, and a distant screaming, and glass. Glass. So, so much glass. It was filling his lap, cutting his face and hands.
        He was dead.
But he couldn't be dead, because in death, the pain would cease. But now everything was red, and he could hear sirens in the distance. There was no more screaming. Just silence. That couldn't be right.
        His sister had been screaming. His eyes flew open, and he turned through the mounds of broken glass and airbags and clawed towards the lifeless body of his sister, in the seat right next to him, but so infinitely far away. He clutched her shoulders and shook her limp body, like the rag dolls she used to play with. She hadn't been wearing her seatbelt. He always reminded her to, but today he had forgotten. How, how had he forgotten? Tears he couldn't feel were mingling with the sweat on his face, and falling to mix with the blood covering his sister's head. He tried to call for her, to scream, but his voice was gone. Dead. The sirens were close now. He started to gently brush the glass off of her shoulders and head.
       He hadn't checked for a pulse, but he knew. Knew that the rituals were over. It was all over.
       She was dead.
       It was his fault. His fault.
       These two words echoed in his mind as the firemen used the Jaws of Life to pry open the door. Echoed as he was pulled on to a stretcher. Echoed as his parents were told that their baby, their baby girl was dead. It was all his fault. Echoed as the paramedics tried to get some response from him. Other's voices were mere shadows to the increasing din inside his skull. His fault.
       His Fault. Those words would become his very life. Every stumble. His Fault. Every mess up. His Fault. Every bad thing that ever was or ever could be. His Fault.