Five Blue Birds

Moths - Emilia

It was dawn, three days past Naomi's death that I went to check on Noah, no one else had to the will to do it, so I mustered what strength I could and decided to check on him. I always found my self re-checking my phone to see when the storm would stop, or when it would stop. My phone just kept saying, three for days, five more days, seven more days. Like a never ending story.

"Noah," I said, my hand rasping on the door, trying to keep hold onto the sheer slice of reality that I had left. "Noah?" After a bit I become concerned, and went over to Layla, who just looked me up and down, as if expecting something in return.

"What do you want me to do?" Dread creeping into her soft voice, I just shrugged and motioned to the door, she looked at me like I was crazy, "Knock it down or something?" She then walked over to Mason who was still heart broken, and too weak to open the door.

"I guess I have to do everything myself, then," I said, annoyed at Layla's stubborn nature.

I proceeded to walk outside, the door shutting with a harsh gust of wind behind me, cradling the jacket close around me, like a warm embrace. Something suddenly felt odd as I left the house, someone must've been watching me. I could feel their hot stare through the dense trees, but I brushed it off as me being crazy. I never was strong, so I decided to go to the bathroom window, (Which did not have curtains, odd, but I bet they thought we would've been secluded enough that it wouldn't matter much.) The wind kept pushing me away, giving me freezing chills all on my back, and splashing sharp twines of rain and air at my face. This caused me to hold the jacket closer to my skin.

I walked over to the bathroom window, it was one of those that was dark to look into but not if you stood close enough to it. I screamed when I looked at the scene. Noah was on the floor, his head banged up against the wall, and pills lying all around his dead body, lifeless.

"Layla!" I screamed, running back into the house, this caused Mason to look up for once, and walk over to us. I told them wheat I saw, and Layla brushed it off as a lie, but Mason just looked me up and down, nodded, and broke down the bathroom door using a set of pliers for the bolt to come loose, and his sheer force of the matter and situation. Dedication.

Layla gasped at the scene, but I felt like I could no longer cry.

"Who-" I just turned back to Mason who covered his mouth, seemingly trying not to cry again. "Who would do this?" I just looked at Layla, who just looked back at me and back at the body on the floor.

"The door can only be locked, and unlocked from the inside," Layla started, now crouching down and picking up the pills, "I'm guessing he-" she stopped her sentence when the wind burst through the door and a strange figure was standing at the door frame, the silhouette of the night staring back at us. 

"Who the fuck are you!" Mason screamed, but the figure didn't move. It just stood there. 

"It's no-one, it's just the wind," Layla said, walking up to the door and closing it, although she did this, I still had a strange feeling that I was being watched, my every move accounted for. 

The open door had left traces of rain, and red liquid, a note had blown in during the outburst, Mason was the first to react and pick it up.

He just stared at it blankly, before trying to read it aloud, sheer panic raising alarm in all of us as he read the following:

"Looks Like Someone Isn't So Innocent After all."

I turned to Mason who had no clue what it meant, then to Layla who had shrugged the letter off once more. 

"We have to leave," I said, it felt like the only option at this point, and I followed promptly with pigging up a bag and shoving small objects into it, some food and a spare tent James had bought for us only a few nights before.

"We can't just leave! There's a storm, or did you forget!" Layla screamed at me, but I could tell she was just as scared as anyone in the room.

I snatched the letter out of Mason's hand and started ripping it up, giving anyone who left it a friendly reminder not to mess with us.

"I'm with Emilia," Mason said, starting packing his bags the same. A loud thunder noise came from above, and it was almost as if someone's footsteps outside were louder, as if we were the prey and the figure were some crazed animal, trying to survive off of one very last meal.

"I'm not going!" Layla screamed at the both of us, but we didn't listen and just zipped up our remaining items, I slouched the heavy bag over my shoulder. 

I hoped the rain would let up any day now, it has been over two weeks, and the closest police station is about twelve miles away, I remembered where it was well enough and decided it best we head there.

"Layla you are not staying here, come-" I started, shoving her bag in her face before she threw it down, and proceeded to climb up and into the bunk bed, tucking herself in.

"Goodnight guys." She said, covering her face with the covers, trying to hide out of the reality that brought her into this mess, I wish I could do the same thing. But, my instinct was telling me to run as far from here as I could, and I just had to listen to it.

Mason took my hand firmly, and basically threw me and him out of the cabin, His bag of items in his other hand, and the harsh rain started to splatter against us mercilessly. The feeling of being watched slowly started to dissipate as I realized what was happening.

I started to cry when I realized that if there really was someone trying to kill us all, then Layla would be the next one to die, and I would never see her again. But, Layla was a big girl now, even older than me, and I trusted her with her choice. I'm just not sure if I shouldn't have pushed her to join us, or if leaving her there was best. I wasn't sure of anything anymore.

Mason just kept walking, any direction, just straight, and as far away from the log cabin as we could. The growing flame of anger gradually taking me over, but the rain started to put it out when we started getting drenched. All I could think of was getting as far away from the cabin as we possibly could, Mason guiding me through the night like a little light in a kids room, where moths were drawn to it only to be the first to die. 

Maybe we were the moths, in this case.