The Darkness Within Her

Chapter 8: What's Wrong With Me?

I was still in my bra and underwear; there had been a pair of pants and a t-shirt folded up on the corner of the bed. But the exhaustion that weighed down my eyelids won over and I had fallen asleep. Now though I was wide-awake, I couldn’t sleep at all. My heart was racing and my entire body was covered in chilling goose bumps with sweat slathered over my skin.

            I shivered violently, curling up tighter into a fetal position. I don’t know how long I remained in that position. My eyes watered, my nose ran, and nausea was resting in my throat like a disgusting frog. My thoughts were foggy, as though some sort of veil was wrapped around my brain. Through the haze I heard the door to the room open. There was a muffled exclamation and footsteps before I felt a hand on my arm. The skin on skin contact burned. I recoiled with a cry, instantly regretting it as my stomach tightened with a slew of sudden cramps.

            “What’s wrong Stone?” a woman’s voice. It sounded oddly like Heather, but I couldn’t be sure. It was like treading through water trying to organize my thoughts.

            My stomach cramped again and I curled into myself with a cry, clutching my stomach. The disgusting frog that had been sitting in my throat leapt higher. I gagged, “I feel sick.”

            Hands helped grab me and pull me off the bed. I staggered as my legs gave out, my muscles unable to flex and support my weight. Pain shot through my stomach again as the frog jumped from my throat into my mouth, resting on the top of my tongue. I broke free of the hands holding me while I got violently sick. I could hear Heather screaming for Timotheus and Jon. She picked me up and tried to drag me back to the cot but I fell from her arms, as I got sick again.

            I was sobbing; the pain in my abdomen was suffocating. And my throat. It burned from throwing up. My eyes and nose ran, mixing with the sweat that ran down my face. I tried to hit Heather when she came near me again, I didn’t want to be touched. I screamed in her face, “Leave me alone!”

            “Jaye. Jaye!” a deep, velvet voice called. Timotheus, “Calm down!”

            “What did you do to me?” I cried, my voice hoarse. “Why does it hurt?”

            My body spasmed when another round of vicious cramps tore my stomach in half, causing me to scream and curl into a ball. I clawed at the floor with one hand, letting another sob to shudder through me. With blurry eyes, tried to find where Timotheus was. But all I saw was fire. Fire everywhere. Red, and blue, and white.  A furious American flag. In my delirium, that’s what it seemed like. I screamed and tried to crawl away, “Please don’t burn me! I haven’t done anything! I swear. Am I in hell?”

            “Timotheus, calm her down! She’s going to hurt herself!” someone cried.

            Hands grabbed me roughly and jerked me up into a kneeling position. I screamed in pain and terror, incoherent words escaping my lips. Hands gripped my head, holding it still. I couldn’t move, I couldn’t move. The hands holding my head were burning me. Blue fire was all around. I was burning, I was dying. I had to be. The pain inside had reached crescendo. I was dying. Please someone help me! Make it stop! I begged. I just wanted it to stop. I wanted everything to stop.

            In the end, the welcoming black curtain of unconsciousness cut through the pain and the fire. All I felt was peace.

It felt like there were cotton balls stuffed in my mouth. I swallowed thickly, licking my lips. I could feel the cotton of a pillow underneath my head and the comforting sheets that were wrapped around my body. I shifted, realizing that someone had changed my clothes. Well, added clothes, seeing as I had only had on a bra and underwear. Now I had on a pair of pants and t-shirt, the fabric sticking to my skin from the sweat that still coated my skin. The tips of my fingers and toes felt like blocks of ice and my stomach was uncomfortably empty, but there was no more pain.

            I shoved the hair away from my face and struggled to sit up. I looked around warily before flinching. Timotheus was sitting on a chair next to the cot I was lying on. I swallowed again, “You know girl’s don’t really find it sexy when someone watches them sleep, right?”

            Timotheus chuckled, “But what about all those teen paranormal romance novels that are best sellers? The girl always falls for the stalker.”

            “That’s not realistic,” I rasped. I coughed, “Is there any water?”

            “Mhmm,” Timotheus stood and walked over to the opposite side of the room where apparently there was water. He came back over with a glass, handing it to me before spinning the chair he had been sitting in around so it was backwards. He settled back in it with his legs spread.

            “Thanks,” I muttered as I drained the glass of its contents.

            “No problem,” Timotheus watched me closely as I clutched the empty glass between my hands.

            “What?” I asked, frowning at him.

            “What is your story?” Timotheus interlaced his fingers in front of him, “Your body is covered in bruises although we made sure to be careful with you. Then you get incredibly sick. We thought you were going to die. Yet, when we checked your medical records to see what we needed to prepare for, it said you’ve never even been to a hospital. What’s going on? Do you have some sort of eating disorder? Are you hooked on drugs? What?”

            I licked my lips and turned away, “I’d rather not answer.”

            “Listen,” Timotheus’s hand gripped my jaw in a bruising grip, turning my face so I had to look into his eyes, “Jon checked on you while you were unconscious, and he ran tests. Your internal organs are failing; your heart has holes, holes, in it. He said it is a miracle you are alive. It’s like acid was put in your veins, I need to know what the hell is going on.”

            I had holes in my heart? My organs were failing? I couldn’t breathe, it felt as though I had just been sucker punched in my diaphragm. I tore my face away from Timotheus’s hand and scrambled away from him, glaring at him through narrow eyes. It wasn’t his fault, but I didn’t want him to see the fear that was causing my heart to beat erratically. My heart that had holes in it. I covered my fear with anger and hissed at Timotheus, “I’ll be just fine.”

            He watched me for several bated breaths before standing suddenly and throwing the chair against the wall next to the cot, causing it to shatter. I screamed at the loud bang it made. I turned to look back at him with wide eyes. The fire around him was crackling, on the verge of transforming into an inferno. He pointed at me, his handsome face twisting with fury, “I will not have you dying on me Stone!”

            I rose up to his tone like a cobra, except I didn’t have any deadly weapons on my side, “So you can get your money, I got it. I hope I do die before I get it so you will never get that money!”

            “This isn’t about the money!” Timotheus roared throwing his hands in the air. I thought he was going to attack me, kill me, something. But instead he merely spun around and stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

            What had I just done?