Deadly Daybreak

Open your eyes, breathe.

Don’t breathe; you’re underwater. Look everywhere—below you, to the left, to the right, look up. Swim up? You can’t tell which direction is up because the depth of darkness doesn’t alter. But you seem to be going in the right direction. To be able to breathe.

Your heartbeat pounds in your ears as if your cheek is pressed against a bass drum: your own pulse is deafening. But you HAVE to reach the surface: you HAVE to take a breath. You will not drown.

You see nothing but pure darkness ahead.

You have to breathe.

Leaves crunch beneath each controlled step as she calmly makes her way through the moonlit forest. Hiking alone is her therapy, regardless of the time of day or the weather. The pain, the inadequacy, the numbness. Somehow, in the presence of birch and leaves, even deafening thoughts are silenced.

Breathe.

Silence shatters as the sound of a chainsaw darts through the woods—run.

With nothing to guide her strides but filtered moonlight, she runs. The direction doesn’t matter, as long as it’s away from where the ground meets her feet now.

Her pulse pounds in her head, in her ears.

He appeared instantly from her left, a towering but innocuous figure. She recognized him immediately. Two became one as their hands grasped each other and they sprinted together, hurdling fallen trees. The chainsaw’s visceral noise still shooting despair through her like sharp arrows through and through, there was a slight glimpse of some form of comfort that she was not alone in this nightmare.

Collapse.

The two tumbled simultaneously into undergrowth but hesitated before regaining composure and continuing to flee.

She sat upright as the moonlight reflected off of his knee-as if it was bouncing from the warm sunlight off of a gleaming ruby.

Her still heavy breath quivered.

Shaking, she stretched out her arm and barely touched his skin—a wince escaped his clenched teeth as he leaned back on his arms to rest.

She slowly turns her palm upward to the moonlight: the sunlight became the moonlight, the ruby was his blood.

“Oh my God..” Her voice trailed, shaking as she moved closer to him, attempting to aid his injured knee.

The skin around his knee cap was torn and mangled. Blood was running over the once beautiful tattoo—numerous rivers of deep red covering the magnificent blues and purples.

Helpless.

Tears began to flow down her cheeks as she failed to alleviate his agony. Every slight touch resulted in a bolt of pain for him. Every soft wiping away of blood unleashed an inaudible moan desperate for her to discontinue her efforts. She had to stop. Helpless, she fell back and leaned against the nearest tree behind her. She watched the blood continue to run over other areas of his leg and create new red rivers. She could see his bone now, the convex of his knee cap, emerging from the flesh like a broken glacier.

The realization of her inadequacy choked her.

The amplification of her crying grew as she began to gasp for air through her wailing.

Just as you begin to panic: you can’t hold your breath any longer, you see a difference in color. The darkness begins to fade into a lighter hue, more and more as you continue on until the darkness fades away completely and the blinding light has overcome the darkness. Muted sounds flood your ears but all you know is you are taking the deepest breath you have ever taken in your entire existence.

The worst is over now.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

She felt a recognizable warmth on her face. Keeping her restless eyes closed she weakly turned her head, the morning sun’s rays heating her skin. She barely opens her eyes and realizes she is alone.

You were inadequate.

Breathe. You were trying your best.

You couldn’t save him.

Breathe. The terror is over.

She closed her eyes and let out a deep, long breath, preparing to stand and find her way back home.

A sound broke the quiet of the morning. A sound that made her heart stop and her bones cold.

Focus on the beautiful golden rays of the warm, rising sun.

She let one final exhale out into the chilly morning air as she saw in her peripheral the irrefutable form of a chainsaw.