"It's your fault."
I lay in my hospital bed, staring at the ceiling and trying to ignore the increasing pain in my stomach and the voice that floated towards me from the windowsill that was the cause of it. She wouldn't leave me alone. She just sat there, on the windowsill, tormenting me. I kept my face impassive and did my best impression of a dead fish lying in the hospital bed instead of a person but I knew that she knew that she was getting to me. That's why she did it.
Plus there was the small problem that she could read my mind. I couldn't think anything without her picking up on it and talk to me. So it didn't matter what my body language said; she was able to read what my thoughts said and that was enough to tell her that she was getting to me.
The problem was, it didn't matter that she was getting to me, that she'd got what she wanted, to torment me, she just wouldn't leave me alone.
"Is it any wonder?" I heard a noise and looked up. She was walking towards me, the cool anger that was everpresent in her eyes glaring out at me. I wanted to cower away from those eyes, but they had a power over me I could not hope to control. So I sat there, paralysed by eyes I knew so well but that were compleetly foreign to me, thinking that this was why I never made eye contact. I ended up just sitting there staring. At least I hadn't started screaming this time.
She was stil advancing on me, looking angrier by the second. It was almost like when she got within a 2 metre radius of me her anger reflex, which was on full all the time, hit the roof. "Is it any wonder?" Her voice was rising to a hysterical shout. I looked around nervously, somehow finding it easier to look away now, hoping no-one would come in to see what a l the commotion was about. That would be an awkward one to explain.
She let out a strangled angry scream. "Look at me!!" she screamed with so much anger I flinched into the adjustable settings, causing the back of the bed to jerk forwards, giving me no choice but to look forlornly at her face. It was probably intentional.
She was breathing heavily now, right at the foot of my bed. I was curled right up at the other end of it in extreme fear. The closer she got to me, the colder and more scared I got. "Is it any wonder I won't leave you alone, Johanna?" she implored of me, looking slightly more normal for a split second, her head cocked to the side. Then, just as I was relaxing, her lip curled in extreme hatred. "You made me into this!" she screamed at the top of her voice. Then she lashed a out at me visciously. I cowered and covered my head with my arms to shield myself from the blow. I waited and waited but it never came. It looked at her apprehensively through a chink in my arms. She was just standing there, staring at me distastefully.
"I don't know what your cowering for," she said. "I can't touch you." then she spun away from me, suddenly weary, back to her bloody windowsill. Literally.
Dripping form the sill onto the floor was bright crimson blood. All the stuff I had been trying to hold back nearly came flooding back. I refused to let it. It didn't stop the blood flowing silently onto the floor from imprinting on my eyelids and running down my vision.
Just as I was recovering, my mother walked into the room. How opportune. I waited to notice Amber sitting on the sill, in her own blood, but she didn't. She just walked into the room and sat down on one of the visitor's chairs, her eyes never leaving mine. Since I had been admitted permanent lines of worry had taken up residence around her eyes and between her brows. She tried to reach for my hand but I hid it under the covers. I tried to pretend I didn't see the look of hurt flash through her tired eyes. I just couldn't summon the energy to feel anything towards her anymore. I could still feel the love that I used to feel for her, but it felt like it was far away, at the end of a tunnel I could never hope to trek through.
From the window I heard a chuckle, with no humour,or even any inflection in it. "Your turning into me Johanna." I turned and looked at her trying to see past her to the trees but she seemed to be blocking out any view I might have had fromthe window. My mother caught me looking and followed my line of gaze. I held my breath and waited for her to see the grotesque figure in the window.
But she just turned to me and smiled, a fake smile I could see all the way through. "Do you like looking out the window? The sight is very pretty isn't it?" She turned back to the window and appeared to actually be looking out of it. I was speechless. Could she not see her?
Then it hit me.
She couldn't see her. Nobody could. Nobody except me.
My mum had long since turned her head to look back at me. I was just staring vacantly at her and I could see her smile beginning to crack. I tried to cover up the fact that I had just been sitting there staring at her like she was mad. "Uh. . ." I trailed off. My mother looked at me with a sad and worried face. If I hadn't wanted to die before I certainly did now.
She reached fro my hand again and my reflexs were so slow after my little realisation that I didn't have time to pull it away. She tried to look into my eyes too but I fussed with the loose thread on my hospital blanket with my spare hand and gave it all of my attention. I heard her sigh heavily. "You've had a rough few days, Jo, and if there's anything-"
I spun my head to look at her and spoke so savagely she flinched. "I don't want to talk about it." I yanked my hand from hers visciously and turned away from her, squeezing my eyes tight shut so I didn't have to face Amber sitting in the window.
I flet my mum touch my back gently. I ignored her. She carried on anyway. "Honey, if you don't want to talk to me, there are grief counsellers-"
I turned back towards her. "I don't want to talk to anyone."
My mum sat back and blinked, obviously taken aback by my outburst. She recovered herself fairly quickly but she still looked nervous. She tried another, more safe line of enquiry. "So," she said brightly. "How are you liking it here?" She said it like I was staying in a fancy 5 star hotel where I was getting spa treatments and cavier withe champagne for breakfast. I just looked at her.
"It's a hospital," I said. She looked at me. "I'm recovering from a near fatal stab wound." She stared at me, like none of this made any sense. After several seconds of the blank staring without a reaction I decided it might be best to humour her so I looked around. It was simple white walls with a window which was always occupied by a permanent visitor I wished I didn't have. I couldn't tell her that. She'd lock me up in a menatl institute. It had the heart monitor and drip and everything too, but I don't know if that counted. So I just turned back to her and shrugged my shoulders helplessly. "It's just a hospital," I repeated.
She turned to me, in a daze. Then a suddenly as she had entered it she snapped out of it and plastered a smile back on her face. "The doctors said that we could get you onto a ward soon." I just stared at her, her fake cheerfulness not washing on me.
"What did you come here for mum?" My mum looked shocked and hurt and it was only then that I registered that it was me that had said those words. I was as shocked as she was. I couldn't believe that I had said those words. I was never rude like that to my mother. Never.
She blinked and looked at me, her model daughter who was suddenly flipping out at her. I guess she rationalised it in her head that I was going through a period of grief and this sort of behaviour was acceptable. "Well . . ." she said. Whatever ti was couldn't be good if she didn't want to say it. "The thing is, Jo, Amber's. . ." she trailed off again and checked how I was doing. I had frozen when she said the word Amber but I hadn't really reacted yet. She took this as a good sign so she carried on. Little did she know that there was a psychopathic dead girl sitting on the windowsill, listening to her every word.
"The thing is . . . well I came to tell you . . . Amber's funeral is next week." I sat there, dumbly, while to my left Amber flipped out. She stood up and let out a high-pitched hysterical scream and turned to us with anger in her eyes. I looked at my mum to see if she could hear but she was just gazing at me. She was waiting for me to say something. Meanwhile, Amber was shouting at me.
"You're being allowed to go to the funeral?" She was absolutely livid. If dead people could go red, she would be bright puce. I looked at her, then back at my mum, torn betwen who I should answer. If I answered Amber, mum would think I was mad. If I answered mum Amber would most definately try to kill me for ignoring her.
In the end Amber saved me the choice. She suddenly calmed down, just deflating. I turned and looked at her. She was staring at me with a mixture of incredulity and hatred, the first proper expression she'd ever worn. "She doesn't know?" I looked at her for a few seconds hoping that this was enough for her to deduce that she did not know. She just looked at me and turned away back to her window.
I turned back to my mother. "Jo?" she said tentatively. I felt so drained all of a sudden. i just lay back on my bed, grabbing the seating buttons and pushing the recline button. I closed my eyes and sighed. I finally registered my throbbing stomach telling me I had over done it. My mum reached for my hand and this time I let her grab it. "Jo?"
"When is it?" I asked, my voice cracking.
"Exactly a week today." I sighed. No time. I heard Amber gasp in the corner.
"Is there . . ." I paused and swallowed hard. "Is there anything you need me to do for it?" I said, turning to look at her. I didn't bother with sitting up. It was too much effort and would hurt my stomach.
My mum looked sad and stared, at me rubbing my hand slowly across the top with her thumb. "No sweetie, Ambers mum is handling everything. She thought it would be best to leave you to rest. You've been through a lot these past couple of days." I stared at her.
"Jilly?" I said, dumbstruck. She nodded. "Did you agree that I needed to rest?" She looked uncomfortable. I attempted to sit up and failed. "Did you?"
She sighed. "I didn't have much say in the matter," she said eventually. "You know me and Jilly have never seen eye to eye. She didn't really give me a choice without making me look like bad mother." I looked at her, suddenly angry with Amber's mum. I'd never liked her anyway.
"I can't believe Jilly's arranging the funeral. She never knew Amber as well as I did. She'll do it all wrong." My mother looked at me with sympathy in her eyes.
"I know sweetie, but there's not much we can do about it now. Just you rest now. Things will look better in the morning." I doubted it, but I smiled absently anyway as she brushed her lips over my forehead and left the room.
After she left, I lay there, drifting into the lovely land of nod. I was nearly there when a voice jerked me from my half-sleep. "I can't believe you havn't told anyone." I shut my eyes and willed her to go away. She didn't. "My mum knows, though," she continued annoyingly. It was the first time I'd felt anything but fear towards her. "That's why she's not letting you organise the funeral."
I opened my eyes and stared up at the ceiling, anger at my so-called friend finally starting to appear. "Just shut up Amber." And, bizarrely, she did. I turned to the window. She wasn't there. Neither were the bloodstains.
And, as I watched the sun begin to fade behind the trees I could now see clearly through the no longer obscured window, I wondered if it would always be this easy to get rid of her.
If only.