Alive

Chapter 29

Oliver

(Friday, May 17)

My leg. My fucking leg. What's happening to me? What's fucking happening to me? It's gone. This isn't just a bad dream. Something I'll wake up from. It's gone. It's not coming back. I'm stuck like this for the rest of my life. Me, the freak show with a robotic leg and super senses. Fucking put me in a circus already.

I'm running. And it's clumsy at first because I can move this leg but the touch receptors are dull. The ground is under me, but it still feels like I'm suspended. Held up. I don't know. But it's weird, so I just run faster. Try to get used to it. Ignore it. Get away from Elle because fuck she's the last person I wanted to see me like this. The last person I wanted to see. I don't think I'll ever forget that look on her face. That look...

I just want to hide. Lock myself away and never come out. So I know exactly where I'm going. I need my cave. Even if it's an hour away and my lungs are going to explode. I don't care. I don't fucking care. I'll die if I have to. Right now I want to. Right now I don't even feel real. And my ears hurt. They're aching, like it's a cold day and the wind is nipping at them, except it's a fucking warm spring night.

I've made it across the parking lot and into a cluster of trees. But I have to pause, catch my breath, double over because fucking hell everything hurts. Hurts. And my ears.

I reach up to rub them, try to warm them up. But my hair's covering them, so I try to brush it aside a couple times. It won't budge, and I get frustrated and grab it, yank it back. Then yell.

Fuck. Fuck. No. What the hell? I swallow, then reach for my phone. Except I left it in the hospital room and I'm outside practically naked, and now I have no way to tell for sure but...

"Oliver!"

Elle. Her voice rings through my head, followed by something like bad feedback on an amp, but the next time she calls I can hear every decibel. Everything in it. Her fear. Her determination. She has something to say, and I want to hear it, I need to hear it, but...

I reach up again, running my hands over my ears. And I'm tugging against the hair. There's just a little. Like the peach fuzz grew out at the tops, which is a pretty gross mental image. I don't really care about that part, though. Because I don't usually go around groping my ears, so this is just a wild guess, but my ears don't feel like their original shape, either. They're...longer. I think. That's all I have time to think before I have to duck down because Elle's reached the outskirts of the trees.

I smell her before I hear her, and I hear her before I see her. But now I'm just watching her over my arm, my back to her. I can see her face. Her lips, parting as they form my name over and over. My heart lurches, and it's all I can do to hold still. So much of me wants to run to her. Throw my arms around her. Wipe her tears away and tell her I'll make everything okay.

But...

I can't, right? I fucking can't. I'm not good enough for Elle. I wasn't before. And now... I look down at my leg. Rub my ear again. Whatever this is, it's even worse I think. So much worse. Elle was right. Fucking right to tell me to leave. I'm just a burden on her.

People like me aren't made for relationships. When did I forget that? What made me think I was capable of anything else?

"Go home, Elle," I say. Force the words out as I squeeze my eyes shut. It's better. Better if she forgets me and everything and all of this. Move on with her life before I destroy it.

She stops calling, but she doesn't move either. She's just standing there, and now I can hear her breath. Heavy, breaking into a sob every couple seconds.