My Nothing

Chapter #2

I practically fly down the stairs to the entrance of the dorm house. I reach the double-doors and smack into the finished wood, letting it fly open. I hear Simon calling after me, which is a bit of a shock.

"Baz! I'm sorry!"

"Not like it matters!" Go fail on your own back in the room. "You clearly don't want my help!" I shout back to him. He's not close enough to see the tears streaming down my face as I sprint out the doors.

Simon calls my name again and starts to say something, but the doors bang closed behind me, cutting him off.

I sprint for a while longer, until the dormitory is obscured by the smoke. Coughing and wheezing, I wipe away the tears with my sleeve. I guess this is it. It's not like anyone will miss me.

Dying this way won't be painful. At least, I don't think it will be. There've been accounts of people going into the smoke and never coming back. It was bad when we had no idea. It was worse when we started finding the bodies.

We couldn't find what the cause of death was for a while. They all seemed perfectly healthy at first glance. Other than the fact that they were dead. And then we saw that their lungs had been ripped apart from the inside. Completely shredded. The pictures are still all over the internet. From then on, nobody walked outside. This all happened when the smoke got worse. When they stopped trying to put out the fires that just kept burning. Now, the smoke gets worse every day.

I inhale deeply, and it burns my throat. Not as painless as I had hoped, but it's something. It was nothing actually. My nothing. My end. A relief.

After a few minutes, my lungs burn, and tears of pain join the tears of sadness. My breathing is ragged and raspy.

I know why I'm sad. It's because nobody will care when I'm gone. Not my "friends," not my parents, not my teachers. Not Snow.

My breathing gets louder and more painful than I thought was even possible. I collapse on the unmowed grass, the effort to stand too much. And then...

"Baz! Holy shit Baz!"

It's Simon. Of course it's Simon.

"Come on! You know you can't be out here! Baz!" He tries to drag me towards the school, but I bare my rows of razor-sharp teeth at him and he startles backward, dropping my shoulders.

I'm crying so hard now I'm shaking. I'm not even sure why anymore. I guess because I'm leaving. Leaving and never coming back. Maybe because Simon Snow thinks my life is worth saving. I just don't know. All I know is that everything hurts, and it's getting harder and harder to breathe. I'm starting to see spots.

"Baz. Come on." Simon's voice cracks when he whispers my name, and I see that he's crying too. He walks over, sits next to where I've collapsed. I don't even remember falling anymore. Black clouds my vision as he holds me.

"Just let me die, Simon." He seems caught off-guard by me actually calling him by his first name.

"No."

"Nobody... wants me alive." I can barely breathe anymore. "I'm a... fucking vampire... Simon."

"I want you alive. I love you."

And then everything fades to black.

Author's Note: Hey, if you're reading this, I really appreciate it. I finally worked up the guts to put one of my stories up here. Let me know if you have any suggestions, or if something I say conflicts with facts from the book (other than the entire plot being different). I've got the whole thing written already, but it'll take me a while to get it up, because I wrote it over time, and in a lot of different places. 

Thanks

-Unfortunate Seven