AM13 Outbreak Shorts

One Year On - Thirty Five (Rachael)

Rachael

This mattress...I don't recognize it. I don't know where I am. There isn't a damn thing in this room that I know. It definitely doesn't belong to me.

So, why doesn't that scare me?

I don't remember the last time I felt fear. Or happiness. Anything, really. Somewhere along the line I have become a numb bubble of nothingness, and I don't think I can escape it. I don't know if I can ever get back to who I used to be. That person is gone.

Vanished, dissolved, never to return.

Once upon a time, my biggest problem was getting Zac to notice me. Having moved to a new town, I just wanted the cute boy to kiss me, and that was the biggest thing I had to fear. The idea that he might not like me back drove me a little nuts to be honest. Silly now, considering what's happened since. What a pathetic issue.

Now, it's the end of the world, and I can't get off this mattress.

I don't think my body would move even if I wanted it to, but I don't. There isn't anything worth getting off it for. Food, water, bathroom breaks...nothing will make me move. I even heard Alex's voice a while back, begging for my attention, and that did nothing to me. He's the best thing about the apocalypse, and even he isn't enough.

Nothing is.

It's the drugs that's done this to me, I know that. The drugs have claimed me and turned me into a shell of the person I used to be. I could handle all of this before them. I thought it might be fun to get high, to block everything out for a moment, to hang out in my safe space with Alex, but they destroyed the part of my brain that made me feel anything and now I'm just this. This mess. The empty, hollow, useless mess that isn't any good to anyone.

I never wanted to become a burden in this camp, that's always been at the forefront of my mind. I decided early on to never be a person who everyone else has to carry because they don't have anything to offer themselves. But that's what I am now, isn't it? I can't deny it to myself any longer. There isn't anything for me to stick around for anymore.

It's time to go, my brain screams at me in a desperate attempt to make me do anything. This mattress can't protect you forever.

I know that moving is the first step to taking any kind of action, but that's my impossible task right now. That's the one thing I can't even begin to make happen no matter how hard I try.

You have to. I stare at the door, knowing that's my goal. This is essential.

Maybe if I tackle what I have to do next one small step at a time, it won't seem quite so overwhelming. Little movements in the right direction.

Starting with moving my head just one inch off this mattress. Surely, I can do that?

Here goes nothing...