Haunted Ends

The night is quiet and not so still. The wind is rustling the dying leaves on the withering trees. The grass whistles as it bends and the air streams through the blades. Dust at the side of the street is picked up and whisked away with the fallen leaves and blown in a vortex around the front lawn of the old white house. She closes her eyes and takes in a deep breath as she lies on the cold grass beside the street. Her arms are outstretched to allow more air to enter her lungs. Her hair blows in the gusts of wind now gathering strength and falls across her pale face. Her wet dark eyes open and look to the sky. Searching. Seeking. There are no answers to be found anywhere.

She consciously makes an effort to listen for that still small voice within her mind or her heart...something deep within that will guide her or bring comfort or hope or courage. Her mind races despite her wanting it to pause for even a moment. Her chest heaves and her heart feels stiff and as cold as stone. She lies in the dew watching her breath form small clouds above her face and begins, once again, to cry.

She knows what is coming. She fears it. She also thinks it is taking too much time and finds a second to wonder how long she will have to wait. She can feel the cold of the wind, the prickly jabs of the blades of grass, the cold dampness of the dew, but is warmed from the inside from her blood rushing to the sites of her injuries. She is simultaneously cold and warm. Her legs are hot, both of them broken. Her ribs are broken and the combination of the two (three) injuries keeps her from moving, keeps her from saving herself. There is no one home at the old white house, no one home in the houses nearby. No one home to hear her cries, to answer her futile prayers for help. It is too late and too cold for anyone to be out walking their dogs, or going for walks or kissing a date goodbye beneath a nearby tree. No one.

She winces in pain as she lifts an arm and moves a hand to rub the tickle at her ear. Her small white hand is covered in blood turned black by the moonlight. Her head begins to throb as the initial rush of adrenaline fades and her head wounds make themselves known. Various lacerations begin to burn, and her breathing begins to slow. Feeling dizzy and cold, she breaths in and hopes for the best. She knows it is too late for her. She knows even if someone were to find her at this moment it would not matter.

It begins to rain. A gentle autumn shower falls on her upturned face, drenches her clothes, washes away her blood into the uncaring grass. She closes her eyes to sleep as she realizes that the burning, the warmth within that she had had is gone and she has time to think how odd it is that her body and heart are turning cold like the headstone that will guard her grave soon. She looks one last time at the stars flickering above her. A celestial goodbye. Her eyes close once more, the vapor puffs of her breath dissolve in the night rain and her small body loses its personage and changes into a thing. It is no longer HER. It is IT. The body. The remains.

What remains of someone's daughter, someone's sister, someone's friend, someone's lover...all that is left behind in this world. The broken bleeding shell of what once was. Her body turns as cold as stone. Somewhere she knows and agrees.