Weak
It was turning out to be another restless night as Zelda sat up in her bed and took a deep breath, running her fingers through her hair before pressing her feet to the cold floor and making her way into the kitchen. She headed straight for the refrigerator and pulled out a beer, popping the lid off and leaning against the counter as she took a swig, trying to erase the memories that haunted her mind.
It was always nights like this that she wished she had someone... Someone to be there and hold her... tell her it was alright, that everything would be alright. But, she rolled her eyes and took another drink as soon as the thought entered her mind. That was weak. She wasn't weak. Not anymore. Not since that night.
She could still remember everything. Every scream... the smell, the ashes... It all stuck out in her mind like a flashing red light, never giving her a moments peace in times she needed it most.
She was fifteen. Her baby sister laid in the crib next to her bed, and her parents slept in the next room. They had heard of AV's... of course they had, it was everywhere. All over the news, in the papers... The schools were even teaching about it... How equality was best... and at the time, she didn't see why that shouldn't be. They seemed like okay people... they'd never hurt her.
But that night it changed. She was awoken by the whispers of her mother as she shook her, telling her to wake up.. take the baby and hide. Zelda had no idea what was going on, her mother only kissed her head and made certain that the bedroom was secure.
She remembered the feeling of the tears running down her cheeks as she held tightly to the sleeping child in her arms, hoping and wondering when her mother would come back and tell them it was alright.
That never happened though. She heard his scream first. Her fathers... screaming in pain and crying... She had never heard him cry before that night.
Still, she sat there... holding the baby... hoping she wouldn't wake up and attract whatever they were hiding from. Then she heard an unfamiliar voice... It sounded sad... almost disappointed... ashamed. "What have I done?" it asked, as she heard her father let out another sorrowful cry.
Then another voice appeared, telling the sad one that it was okay... it was their nature. Zelda wanted so badly to step outside the closet door and see what was happening... to save her mother and father. But she couldn't... even if the swelling fear in the pit of her stomach hadn't been holding her back, the small baby in her arms was another anchor holding her to the ground, and keeping them both safe for the time being.
She continued taking deep breaths until she couldn't take it any longer. She laid the still sleeping infant in the floor of the closet, surrounded by blankets for coverage, and slowly crept out.
All she could see were four people. Two men and two women, standing around her father, who sat and wept next to a pile of bones and ashes... There was one man who seemed to be the leader... the others just looked uncomfortable... like they were holding back... trying to suppress something.
"I don't like this... I don't like hunting." one of the women said, looking over to the leader. "It's cruel."
The man simply looked over at her disgusted and scoffed. "I can't do everything for you your entire life... You've got to learn to hunt... now take him."
The woman looked down at Zelda's father who was still distraught over the ashes, and she could feel her heart begin to beat faster and faster at the impeding end of these events... she didn't want to believe it was true, that it was really happening, so she just sat there... unable to move or speak up... and in a matter of seconds, her father was nothing but ashes and bones as the woman sucked the life out of him. Zelda held her hand to her mouth in attempt to drown out the noise, as tears trickled down her face.
"Good." he said, as he looked over to the next woman. "Now go. There are others in this house. I can smell them."
With that Zelda snapped out of her fear, and raced back to the closet as fast as she could, but when she got there, her baby sister was no longer in the closet. She looked up, searching frantically for the little girl, hoping that she'd woken up and crawled away. But that wasn't the case, because not two seconds after that, she heard her sisters cries coming from the living room.
"It's a baby..." the woman said. "I can't do this to a baby..."
Zelda crept back to her corner and observed...
"Then starve." he said to her, even more disgust apparent on his features. Zelda was finding it hard to keep her composure... but she was also finding it difficult to breath as everything started going black, and she slowly slid down the wall.
When she awoke, there were police officers standing over her, and whispers of death and 'that poor girl'.
She sat up slowly, trying to listen to what the officers were saying, but all she could do was stare at the three piles of ashes and bones laying in her living room floor...
As Zelda came back to the present and pushed herself up off the counter, she took another swig and tried really hard to breathe... to relax... but it was nights like this that, though she longed for companionship, she knew that no one would ever put up with her, and in this moment she was glad that she lived alone, as the beer bottle was slung from her hand and smashed up against the wall into tiny shards, soaking the floor and splattering the wall with its contents.
She was weak that night, eleven years ago. But she promised herself that she'd never be weak again...
