Delusional

Number 26

Number 1 shook me awake. Dani was lying next to me still unconscious. I could barely move, my arms and legs felt broken, my head ached, I wanted to close my eyes and just lay there forever. Number 1 wouldn't let me, it was hard to tell what was a new injury on her, and what was already there. She used the railing to pull herself up. She looked like hell. Her body was covered in blood, her face was swollen, cut, and bleeding. She was holding her arms close to her body, her legs were cut and bleeding, and broken. There was no way she could walk up the stairs.

I forced myself to turn and shake Dani, lifting his head up, uncovering a pool of blood. He was breathing, and started to move his fingers. There was also no way he would be able to walk up the stairs. Pushing myself up, grabbing onto the railing I stood up.

"Sit, you can't walk up the stairs." I told her, she let go to tell me she could, but she fell back down. Nodding in agreement, she pulled herself to Dani to check on him. Using her fingers she checked for his pulse, she started to cry. "What? He was just breathing!" His eyes were wide open, she closed them for him.

"Son of a bitch!" I slammed my fist against the wall, "I'm ending this!" I pulled myself up the stairs, with every movement my body told me to stop by making a new wave of pain shoot up my body. I made it to the top of the stairs, the door was locked, I kicked it down, wincing at the pain. I stormed into the kitchen and grabbed the steak knife from earlier. I kept tripping over my limp feet, but I never stopped until I stood over his sleeping body. My mom was on the floor next to him, I ignored her, but I couldn't ignore the smell.

I brought the knife above my head, he shifted in his sleep. He pulled his hand out from under his pillow, a slip of paper in his hand. In the glare of the moon I saw it was a photograph. Curiosity overtook me, I had to know what it was. I walked around the other side of the bed. Shaking, I slowly moved my hand over to his, slipping the paper out of his enclosed hand.

I brought it over to the window, tears streamed down my face and stained the picture. It was of the day she had collapsed on the beach, it was a picture we had someone take of the three of us. Everyone was happy and smiling, my dad had life in his eyes, my mom had color in her skin, and red in her cheeks. This was who we really are, as long as I don't mess up like him, I'll be fine. I turned around to look at him, I wanted to hug him tight like I used to. He wasn't there. I got the same feeling I did earlier when we were at the stairs.

In the light, I saw his shadow behind me. Dropping the photo, I spun around with the knife in my hand. His arm was up and blocked it from stabbing him in the neck. He brought his other arm and gut punched me. With all my injuries, and as exhausted as I am, I should have gone down, but I didn't.

I took the knife out and brought it around stabbing him in the side. He yelled, and backhanded me, this time throwing me to the ground. Looking up, the photo was in front of my face. I picked it up and spun around, bringing it above my head facing him. All I could see was his feet, he had stopped moving, suddenly his body shifted and the he came crashing down on me, the knife ripping through the paper and missing my neck by an inch.

I grabbed his wrist, each of us were tugging to break the others grip. My palms became sweaty, my arms were weak from all the pain and anguish from the last couple days. My hands slipped and the knife went through my skin, cutting into my flesh, just below my collar bone. The blade was hotter than I thought it would be, my breath seemed to seize, I yelled louder than ever before, he pulled the blade out and the blood followed, I tried to stop the bleeding but couldn't, it was sticking to my hands like syrup. I couldn't breath, I was gasping for air, he had stabbed me in the lung.

I looked up at him, the bags under his eyes, the wrinkles in his face, his beard, were all gone, it was me, I looked about ten years older. The ripped photo on the floor beside me was no longer of me and my parents, it was of me, my wife and two children. I had become my father after all. He was holding the dripping knife next to my bleeding chest. I mustered up my strength, grabbed the knife, and drove it into his throat.

I pulled it out, the more blood that came out, the smaller he got, until he was the small boy in the photo. He fell to the ground, and eventually was nothing but blood stained clothes. The room lit up with the sun, it was so bright the walls disappeared, I heard footsteps approaching me. Number 1 sat beside me putting pressure on my wound. I could barely move, there was nothing around us anymore, just, whiteness. I could hear ringing in my head, it sounded like a heart monitor when someone goes flatline. Number 1's face became too blurry to make out, the weight on my eyelids forced me to close them. I couldn't even feel the pain anymore, the ringing continued until it suddenly stopped, and the sound of people yelling and a rhythmic beep in the background.

Then, no sounds, no yelling people, no beep, no pain, nothing. This is nothing new, this is me blacking out, into the all too familiar black void of nothingness.