laconic ↦ luke hemmings {au}

four: glass

CHAPTER FOUR:

| luke's pov |

"You don't know what you're doing," Tabitha told me. I couldn't see her, but I was almost certain that she was disappointed and angry with what I was doing. "You don't know," she repeated over and over, just for me to stop with whatever it was I was about to do.

"I know what I'm doing. I know, I know, I know," I said, in reply, convincing her, but more of myself.

I vaguely remembered how I did this as a child; all I knew was that I was blinded with loneliness, that it felt like a need to do something like this.

I could recall some things, like how the wind was strong and how the room was cold, but that was all. Everything after it was too blurry, as if it was shut away from my thoughts.

With hesitant steps towards the middle of the dark hallway of a run-down apartment building, I carried the improvised board of letters in my hand, and a glass in the other.

I didn't know if it was fate that I was able to find and make these, with the limited materials I had, but either way, I was thankful for it.

The hallway was dimly-lit, the only source of light coming from the moon, through the broken windows beside me. I was scared; of course I was, but I knew better than to just let myself grieve the rest of my life, when I know I can do something about it.

Now, all I need to do is to be brave. 

I've done this before; I can do it again, right?

All I could hear was my frantic heartbeat and shaky breaths, when I sat down, placing the board on the dust-filled ground. I put the small shot glass, base up, down. The opening was covering the word "yes", which I sloppily wrote down half an hour ago.

I looked around me, finding a piece of broken glass from the window. This was stupid, I knew, but I didn't have much of a choice.

If I didn't hope for something better, then nothing is going to matter anymore.

Just as I was about to create a small cut on my palm, whatever glass was left on the windows broke. The defeaning sound it caused forced me to drop what I was holding to cover my ears and to shut my eyes tightly.

There were bits of pain coming from my arms and from the side of my face, where the shards seemed embedded. It wasn't bearable, but it was like I had no voice to shout, or to even whisper.

My eyes shot open, and I saw the shot glass moving on its own, while I struggled to move, from the hurt and discomfort I felt. 

"Wh-Who are you?" I found myself asking, at the back of my mind, with the same fear I felt long ago. I didn't know what to expect, and I had hoped it was just Tabitha, who was trying to scare me off.

It circled the letter "E" first and then to "M". It made another motion to the same letter and moved on to the letter "A".

E.

M.

M.

A.