Facing The Reaper

XXII

As I sat with Connor in his room and told him everything that I had been to scared to tell him before, he sat before me and listened with a deadly calm. As the conversation that I feared would cost me my best friend came to a close, I watched patiently as his made seemed to make him recoil further into himself.

His toes curled on the surface of his carpet as if he were picking the loose thread with his feet. His blue eyes were tinted with a faint red as the weight of my words settled on his ears in the silence of the room. And even though no words were being spoken between us, the silence around us seemed almost unbearable deafening.

He let out a deep, thoughtful sigh as he brought up his hands to run them over his tired facer and shook his head slightly. Each movement that he made caused my own limbs to stiffen up more and more with tension, and I could feel the acid in my stomach boiling over as my nerves grew more and more intense.

He moved his hands slightly down his face until only his eyes were visible to me, but even then, he didn't make any eye contact. Unable to move in this suffocating atmosphere we could only wait for the other to speak first and break the stalemate of our words.

Giving up with a sigh of my own, I decided to speak first. "I'm sorry for what I told you, and for keeping it from you. It doesn't make any more sense to me then it does anyone else I'm sure. But I don't know how else to help her without at least telling you exactly what it is that is going on."

"I should really brush this all off and call you crazy, but I can't. My told me stories about how Kia died in detail that you wouldn't have known. It matches the dream, every detail. I can't believe it's her but your right, it has to be. There is no other way that any of this could possibly make sense otherwise." His eyes finally met mine then, they weren't as red anymore, but his look was almost deflated, defeated. A look that never followed Connor. "I think the reason you haven't been seeing her recently lies in the dreams. She knows that something has changes, maybe she is blaming it on what's to come though as apposed to what has been."

I nodded my head slowly acknowledging his words as ones I had thought myself and wondering how I didn't come to that conclusion just as quickly. I also wondered why it had taken me so long to approach Connor about this. Granted I had expected a completely different reaction from him to this newly exposed information, but Connor wasn't one to meet my negative information. And I should have known better deep down then to assume so.

I don't know when it happened, but a floodgate of tears began to roll out of my own eyes as the fear and apprehension of the situation began to wear off. I didn't realise though until Connor was sat next to me with his arms around my shoulders and my forehead pressed closely to his chest. Our group of friends didn't show affection often, but the severity of the situation seemed to have broken that barrier as my own arms wrapped around his waist and I let my exhaustion consume me until it had finally drained out of me.

We separated from our awkward embrace when the silence and unspoken words began to weigh to uncomfortable and heavy in the atmosphere of the small room. We sat facing each other as I wiped the fallen tears from my face, my skin feeling slightly taunt from where some had already dried up and been absorbed into my flesh. I cough to clear my throat, but it was Connor who spoke first this time.

"I don't think we should tell my mum. I know you said that you needed our help, but where you are the only one who can see her, I don't think there is anything my mum can really do; and bringing this up now when she is only just healing her past isn't going to go down well."

"I understand, but with what else can I do? Its almost time for her final reaping or whatever it is that she is doing, which means that I am out of time. I cant keep waiting for an opportunity that will not come before it's too late."