“Nightmare, despair, and glare,” he says, matter-of-factly.
“Nightmares?” I ask. I have already figured out that whatever this virus is, it affects the brain in some way, but I’m not sure I understand what he means about nightmares, and what’s with all the poetry and rhymes? Does this guy think he’s Shakespeare, or what?
Again, he begins:
Nightmares are real, they don’t happen only at night
Nightmares happen when your eyes are at full sight
Your world shifts and you lose the control
Finding what’s real only leads to a black hole
“How can you know the difference between what’s real and what isn’t?” I ask.
“Some know and some don’t know. I’m fortunate enough to know those who don’t know.” He turns around, looking down at the people perched up against the wall.
“Was the reaction to the water instantaneous?” I ask Shakespeare, still questioning for the sake of my own sanity, now remembering what my anger and hunger have caused me to do.
Again, he shakes his head. “No, what’s better than a little surprise? For the sleepers all wanted it to be a disguise.”
“Do you need help?” Sin asks. Clearly, the man is beyond help. “We aren’t staying here. There are patrols out front. They know we came in here.”
The man’s eyes widen and his forehead crumples into a hundred wrinkles, showing despair like I’ve never seen in another human being. “You just killed my family and me.” His words turn to cries. “I’ve kept them safe in here for what feels like an eternity.” An ache in my heart takes over every nerve in my body. Telling this man it wasn’t our intention to cause harm won’t help right now because I know exactly what those patrols will do when they find them.
I place my hands over my heart, clutching the material covering my chest. “I’m so sorry,” I whisper.
The man falls to his knees and turns to his family, gathering as many of them as he can within his arms, crying into the head of a young man who couldn’t be more than fourteen or fifteen. “I let you all down,” he continues to cry out before reciting another rhyme.
I did my best to keep you safe from the devil’s wind.
Forgive me. Forgive me, God, for I have sinned.
Please, please protect them from the tough.
We have suffered enough, God, we have suffered enough.
What have we done? I know what it feels like to lose my family and now I’ve caused this for someone else.
The man stands back up and walks past us across the room to a closet. He presses up on his toes, reaching up to the top. Retrieving a pistol, he brings it down to his chest, holding it tightly as he closes the closet door.
For a moment I think that he might want to kill us, and I wouldn’t blame him. But if he’s thinking with logic, which I’m not sure he’s capable of, he probably already knows that won’t stop the patrols from coming in here. I don’t want to take my eyes off of the man, but I look over to Sin, needing his face to focus on. I find Sin’s eyes large, pained, his mouth agape, and his hands clenched by his side. Not much scares Sin, but he is most definitely scared right now.
I take a couple of steps back, taking Sin’s hand within mine. We have no weapons, no form of protection. We’ve been cheating death for far too long and we both know it’s a only matter of time before it catches up to us. The man turns to face us. “You killed my family, and this is on you.” Tears are still rolling down the man’s cheeks.
“What’s your name?” Sin asks. We’re running out of time. I can feel it.
“Why don’t you just call me Romeo?” He takes the pistol and presses it up against his head. “Though, poison would have been a much better way to go.” He pulls the trigger, and I squeeze my eyes closed against the loud blast. The floor thumps below me as his body makes contact. What the Hell? Rhyming? Romeo? Suicide? I’m afraid to open my eyes, afraid to see the aftermath. Sin pulls me in against him, cupping his hand over my head, hiding my face in his chest. I cling to him, trying to absorb strength to deal with this reality we have uncovered.
“Dad?” A grief-stricken voice startles us both. We look up, finding a teenage boy crawling across the blood-covered ground until he reaches the man. He’s pounding on his chest, crying and screaming, “No, no, no, please don’t leave me. I wasn’t dead. You promised you wouldn’t leave me until my day came. You promised me. You promised.” I have nothing to say to him. Words are mixed up in my head and I can’t conjure up a solid thought. I only know I’m covered in someone else’s blood and he died because of us.
Without a word, Sin pulls me toward the front door, opening it slowly before peeking out into the hall. “It’s clear.” I don’t want to decide which way will be safe because I can only assume the patrols will be coming up in both directions at any moment. It has been less than five minutes since we stepped into this building but we’re only on the sixth floor.
“Do you think there’s another fire escape on the other side of the building?” I ask Sin.
Seemingly enlightened by my question, he pulls me across the hall, trying the knob on the door. It doesn’t turn. We walk down to the next door and try that one as well, but still no luck. We make it down three more doors before one opens. Scared of what we’ll find in here, I instinctively close my eyes as we step inside. Sin locks the door behind us. His hand slips from mine and the sound of something being dragged along the floor forces my eyes back open. “It’s okay,” he says.
Sin places a coffee table up against the door, followed by a sofa. Looking around the room, I’m a little surprised at what I see. We’re in a fully furnished apartment, decorated with modern decor. The peacefulness of my surroundings brings me in further until I step into the kitchen where I find a small four-person table with the chairs neatly tucked into place. However, there are plates sitting in the center of four navy blue woven placemats with white linen napkins placed evenly next to each setting. As I continue observing the scene, I notice that the forks and knives are scattered on each plate as if dropped there in a hurry. The silverware lies on top of what looks like disintegrated food—black crumbs. With another step closer, a slight rotting odor reaches my nose, but it’s nothing compared to what I’ve been forced to inhale over the past day. It’s as if a family picked up and left right in the middle of a meal. But why?
