One of Them

“Are you one of them?”

The question hung still in the stagnant morning air after it left Sarah’s lips, her eyes fixated on the wall in front of her. It was cracked and crumbling just like every other building around her. Just like the dry skin of her hands as they twisted uncomfortably at the silence that came. Rough calluses combined with the peeling of her fingers have always served her as a reminder - a reminder that her skin was real, that her thoughts were real, and that the boy beside her...was likely not. At least not anymore.

“It's okay, you can tell me if you are.” She continued when there was no response but the whistle of wind rushing past her ears, hurrying to correct herself in concern of scaring off her only friend. “I don't mind. I just…” She paused, ignoring the tears that were threatening to fall. “I want to know if I can stop looking. I want this to be done.”

She looked back over to the pale boy, whose lips were still sealed shut, knees pulled up close to his chest. His clothes, unlike hers, were pristine in a way almost incomprehensible for the world around them. He looked so perfect in the midst of it all, so unblemished. She wished that she could reach out and touch him. She was too afraid to try.

She needed to know.

“Please.” She hated the way her voice cracked when she spoke. It sounded as if she were nothing more than a dog begging for a scrap of food. . . Not that she was above that, to be truthful. She would do anything for a decent meal, but she hadn't found many people to even have the chance to ask.

Depending on his answer, that could easily change to not finding many to finding none. She didn't want to have to think about that right now, but as he finally opened his mouth, looking as if he hadn't taken in a breath at all, she braced for the worst.

“I am. I'm sorry.”

He looked at her, and for the first time in a very long time, Sarah really looked back. She looked into the green of his eyes and saw. Saw the way that the green had lost the liveliness of the nature that surrounded them, lacking the glow that life always seems to carry with it. Like that of a freshly chopped down tree, his light was fading. His eyes were dying.

He was already dead.

Her grandma always said eyes were the gateway to one's soul, after all.

Sarah let out a shaky breath as she turned her face away, the tears staining her face with stinging trails as they slid down her dirty cheeks.

Wordlessly, she got to her feet, tattered dress feeling as if it were weighing her down. For a moment she wondered if the world was trying to tug her down deeper and deeper until she suffocated into the earth. She almost wished that it would.

Nevertheless, she turned around and smiled, like she always did. She held out her hand as she had so many times before, and watched as he raised his to try and get pulled up by her. It went right through, just as they both knew it would. She almost would have believed that she saw tears reflecting in his eyes when she pulled away, but that's impossible. Dead people don't cry, even if sometimes, she wished that they could. Then maybe she wouldn't have the only tears in the world.

“It's okay. I'll keep looking.” She said as she turned and slid back down the wall, facing where the boy sat, still. “Thank you for keeping me company.”

The boy smiled, but she felt nothing. She cared for no one - there was no reason to anymore. He disappeared, faded back into the very air that she breathed, and the tears stopped.

Once again, she was alone. The last person alive in this hell.