22. Cass
CASS
PLAYLIST: I WANTED(ED) TO DIE – CLEFFY
Iopen my eyes.
I don’t know where I am.
Bright light makes it impossible for me to see anything.
I’m moving.
Something is moving.
“Conscious,” says someone.
There is something on my face.
Mask.
No.
I want to move.
But I can’t.
Addy.
“ADDY!” I scream.
And scream.
And scream.
Until everything becomes pitch black.
Pain surges through me, and I scream out.
I open my eyes.
A room in white.
Monitors beeping.
Hospital.
“No,” I gasp out.
Someone looks at me.
Someone in scrubs.
“Where is she?” I ask with a croaky voice as a hollow sensation consumes me. I can’t do this a second time. I can’t—
“Please, Miss, you need to calm down,” says the young woman in scrubs. Doesn’t she understand—
“WHERE IS SHE?”
The woman has this pitiful look on her face.
No.
No.
NOOOOOOOOO!
I can’t breathe.
There is no air.
I am falling.
Falling into the depth of a hell I didn’t know there was.
And then everything turns blank again.
When I wake again, I stare into neon lights on the ceiling.
My entire body feels like ice.
Impossible to move.
Frozen by the horrors in my mind.
Images.
Sounds.
The crash.
A scream.
And I cannot escape any of it.
I stare into the lights.
And the God I always thought would lead me—he has left. Everything I have done was for the love of family. To avenge what was taken. To do it right.
And now, I am lying here.
Lost.
Alone.
With nothing left but an empty shell of a body.
My fists clench.
The nails of my fingers dig into my palms.
Pain.
Pain I need to feel right now, because there is nothing else left.
“Miss Riker,” someone says.
I ignore whoever it is.
“I will call you Cass,” says the person. “I’m Doctor Chang.”
As if any of this matters.
“Can you hear me?” she asks.
But I don’t react.
All I hear is the screaming. My own screaming.
Because I am ripped away from her.
From the burning car.
Tears overcome me, running down over my temples to my ears, where they leave me with an awful wet sensation.
But even that doesn’t matter.
Not the crying.
Not the sensation.
No nothing.
I’m so sorry, I tell her in my mind. I’m so, so sorry.
I close my eyes.
I need this world to disappear.
I need all of this to disappear.
I need to disappear.