abhorrence // proxies

two

we all stared over the what felt like an never-ending edge, our eyes fixated on the body that would inevitably be at the bottom, staring up with scared eyes, hair dirtied with the muck and droppings that was positioned at the bottom of the drop. we all were either still with terror or shaking beyond belief. i remember reaching my fingers slowly up to the skin on my upper arm, pinching with such force that i wanted to break the skin, to wake myself up.

wake up and please say we all went home, wake up and turn over and see my childhood stuffed animals draped across the bed beside me. instead i got a sharp pain in my arm and an eyeful of the body on the ground, there was no blood splatter but the limbs of her body had splayed out in such unnatural ways that a blood splatter would have only made us all more nauseous than we already were. jess walked away from the edge, he didn't even look over, his hand was resting over his mouth and his face was lighter than usual, a lot lighter than usual. "t-t-this was a joke!? right!? right!?" he practically yelled in fear, but we were just as scared as him. just as scared as orla was. "yuh-you guys are kidding!? i-i know you are!" jess accused, his voice louder, and while we were all frightened of that unknown force that caused orla to step to her death, we all told him to hush.

"i'm going to her body!" jess stated, and eoin reached out and grabbed hold of his shoulder roughly. "you go down there, you risk all our lives" he told him, his voice shaking but yet calm. eoin always knew how to handle situations, even if he had never been in them before.

i turned back to look over the edge, to peek at her body...her corpse once again, and try understand what was out there that scared her so bad. so much as to slip off the edge to her death. i looked up from the body, out towards the building opposite, the static that rung in our ears died down the moment my sight turned to the building. "there's something there..." i whispered, still staring out the opposite building. the building was much smaller than the one we were on, a few storeys lower, but it had a wider build, spanning out quite far compared to the other, taller and thinner buildings. a lot more room to run if needed.

"there's nothing there, we're just...stuck! okay? we're stuck! you want to hear me say that? because we are, i don't know what we're stuck from, but we are not going down there! you hear me?" eoin demanded, voice stubborn as he stared down all of us, he put up a strong, angry front but behind, in his voice, we could all hear the scared tone, that he didn't want to go down or look away from us and realise how toxic of a situation we got ourselves into.

jess slowly inched over towards the opposite edge, eoin following and holding him back, to avoid another drop, avoid another death. jess looked out for anyone, but only rocky terrain and trees as far as could go were in place. he stepped back, hands shaking and glistening with sweat as he stepped backwards, turning around and his eyes just as glossy as the sweat coating his forehead. "come on, jess..." eoin's voice relaxed, embracing him as his sobs rained down throughout the entire barracks, tears shining on his usually dark complexion, "i'm just...so bloody terrified" he muttered against his shoulder, and i distracted myself by turning away. the sounds of his crying were haunting enough without having to look at it.

i know splitting up is the number one reason that every character dies in a horror movie, it's the first cliché to look out for. splitting up seemed unreasonable, none of us were trustworthy enough to go, and with our group of four dabbled down to three, we couldn't risk losing more of us. the building however, was so tempting, and i knew we had to go there, i just knew it. someone, or more likely something was in that building that lured orla over that edge, the edge that crumbled beneath her frail little feet, that cracked until it broke away like the cliff's end and sent her to the unknown land of the afterlife. 

"eoin, jess..." i said under my breath, my throat felt so hoarse and i couldn't muster more than a few syllables. they both turned their head, unwrapping their arms from around one another, their comforting grips losing each other leaving their scared, exhausted bodies from a comforting embrace. "i have to go...to there" i pointed towards the shorter building across the barracks. i knew they'd react with fierce disagreement, how i was insane to think they'd let me out and down those stairs and walk all the way to that building...alone. "don't...we can't lose you too" jess choked out, eyes still streaming like a river that couldn't find it's way to the mouth and escape to the ocean where it belonged. "you won't lose me, i need to go there...please, i'll be safe" i promised and while eoin's mouth hung open slightly, not a word of protest slipped past, he let me grab the flashlight and i could remember their tight embrace just before i walked down those creaking stairs.

suddenly the whole ground seemed foreign, like stepping off a plane into an unknown country. except i wasn't in italy or france, i was in a dirty army barracks, with rodents and dead sheep, and a corpse with a permanently shocked face lying next to the tallest building with the limbs out like a cartoon. my shoes crunched the rocks beneath my feet, shifting them as twigs cracked along with them, i took a deep breath and pushed back my horrified tears and marched forward to the wide building across the hauntingly cold army barracks.