Ascension

Elijah

Indiana is gone. I Com tracked him last night and he is not here anymore. I guess he couldn't wait to see his Fiance and Daughter. It guess that makes sense but I don't know who to talk to about Lorelei anymore. So I just don't really talk anymore.

I have gone through about a half bottle of mood correctioning pills so far. I blame Lorelei for it all. Whenever I feel a little normal it is because I am drugged up on the stupid little mint green pills. Lorelei did that to me.

I still dream about her every night. And every night it's the same thing. She is lying in my arms dying. Every night I wake up screaming at the phantom Lorelei to hold on as she drifts away. I have stopped taking insomnia pills because I don't get much relief from sleeping.

I'm sure I look like a giant wreck right now. My hair is messed up and I have giant black circles under my eyes. I get ready for the day when someone knocks on my door. I open it and it's the commander.

"Elijah, we are working on trying to prove that we are not on Jupiter right now and we want you to be on the job." She tells me.

I really have nothing better to do so I accept. When I get down to the astrology labs I see Lorelei. I freeze midstep.

I suddenly become very very self conscious about my clothing, hair, shoes and bags under my eyes.

"Elijah good there you are." The Commander says to me.

"Yep, I'm here."

"You are going to be working with Lorelei. I figured since you two are the same age you will work together better." She tells me.

The last thing I want right now is to work with Lorelei.

I except because I'm not sure what else I would do. I walk over to Lorelei and slide down next to her.

She barely acknowledges me. I look over at her. She has the same bags under her eyes as me and her hair is messed up a little. Was it possible she was aching like I was? No, it couldn't be. She broke up with me. Or maybe she was up doing other things. I shiver at the thought. She wouldn't have done that to me. Would she?

"Oh my stars! Elijah, you look awful." She exclaims.

I try to play it off as an illness.

"Yea, I know. I think I'm coming down with something." I tell her.

Nailed it.

"Oh no." She tells me.

"What about you? You look very tired."

"Oh yeah. I think I've come down with the same sickness as you."She tells me.

Right. I can't help but stare at Lorelei. Even though she seems tired she is still as breathtaking as normal. Her appendages that remain are both in casts right now. Even though her leg wasn't broken they still had to wrap it up because she had burnt it to try and keep it from getting infected.

She is very smart I'll tell you that. If she didn't do that they might have had to cut off her other leg and then she would only have a single limb left.

Anyway because of her casts she isn't in her normal Camouflage cargo pants and black long sleeved shirt. She is instead wearing coral colored board shorts and a flowy tank top. I kind of like how it looks. It makes her seem softer around the edges. Like she wouldn't kill you in a heartbeat.

If we were still dating I would have told her I liked the change of pace. However we aren't, so I don't.

Lorelei doesn't look very comfortable sitting with her casts. I feel bad to be honest.

"So, what do we do?" I try and make things not so awkward between the two of us.

"Did they not explain to you?" She tells me this with a bit of spite.

I don't know what I did to her. She broke up with me.

"No. I know what we are researching but I don't know where to begin." I explain.

Her face softens a bit. I try a little ghost of a smile. It seems weird to even have a ghost of a smile around her. She broke my heart into two and she still has this effect on me.

Her eyes though usually electric now just look tired and sad. And is that longing? No. Stars, I need to stop doing this to myself. Lorelei probably pities me.

Lorelei breaks the silence.

"Well I was thinking we go to the Star Charts."

"Sounds good."

I really wish this wasn't our first time stargazing together. There were a lot of things I wish I could do with her. However I can't because Lorelei decided she didn't want me anymore.

I feel a brief twinge of sadness as I look at her walking down the stairwell. When we get to the Star Charts all I see is a dome shaped room with screens covering every edge.

It's not very impressive until Lorelei flips the switch. I am full of disappointment until I see The screens go dark and are filled with stars. Lorelei limps over to a closet in the back. She pulls out pillows and a blanket. She freezes for a second and then puts them back and joins me.

I look at her prompting her to explain.

"Sorry. Force of habit." She mumbles.

"Habit?"

"Yea. Alivia and I used to spend hours here on blankets we kept in the closet."

I wish I had a place like that with Alaina. However we were constantly being monitored by her parents so that never happened. I guess the closest thing we had to our own little thing was the little Oasis we had found.

Strange how long ago that was. To be honest I hadn't thought much about it but now I kind of want to go back.

Lorelei was being really quiet and I wasn't going to be the one to break the silence so we sat there in the dark. Surrounded by a silence so thick and heavy that you could feel it on your shoulders. Lorelei pretended not to notice it and so did I.