Page 85Uncanny pain

There were sirens all around me it seems. Police, ambulance. Their echoes over the city might as well have been right next to me. I didn't know where go to, who to see. Esmeralda came to mind, but not like this. My hands were so hurt. I had to do something about it, but it's not like I carried tools with me to do precision work like pulling shards from a skin...

But I did, didn't I?

The small pins and tools I had for locks should be useful as well for this.

With trembling fingers I pulled the backpack off my back. Taking care not to bleed over the contents, the bleeding had mostly stopped anyway, I managed to open it with my fingertips. I spend a few minutes just trying to get my tools out of the backpack. Every movements with my hands and fingers was painful. How did I not faint when they pierced my skin.

Probably adrenaline.

Then, when I finally had the two tools I wanted (a small pair of pliers and a pin) I started my work. It was ironically similar to picking locks. First I gently manoeuvred the pin inside, trying to get behind a lodged piece of glass, then slowly moved till I was in the right position to lift it out. The pliers didn't come in use much until I finally had my fingers free. I could bend them again.

It looked terrible.

Though the wounds were already healing, I had dents along my fingers that just looked very unpleasant. With the palm of my hand, now that I could use my fingers better, I could use the pliers to just grab them and lift them out. Still painful, but at least I didn't have to pierce my skin much more.

Twenty five and twenty three little shards of glass per hand.

And my shoes were ruined too. Such a pity.

Just for now, I removed the shards from the soles of my shoes. I knew I had to buy new ones, but it wasn't going to happen tonight. And of course I didn't have spares. Stupid. But I suppose I should consider myself lucky that the shoes at least stopped the shards from entering my feet.

I couldn't even remember the moment of impact exactly. I knew it happened, in a mechanical and logical kind of way. But it was impossible to remember the feeling of them piercing my skin exactly. It kept eluding me. Maybe it was too painful for that. My mind protecting myself against the horror. It annoyed me immensely. Imagine being able to remember almost everything for months exactly. Going back to whenever you want. And then one piece missing.

But there was no time for this. I'd dropped the glass shards on the roof, but something told me that it was bad luck to keep them here. Better throw them away neatly somewhere to arouse less odd suspicion. My hands were... okay... trying to gather them all and hold them. I had no idea where to keep them other than in my own hand. Having them all together made me feel so weird.

It was hardly anything. Not enough glass to fill even a window the size of my hand. Unless it's unrealistically thin glass of course. But... This was the glass my father fell through. I sighed deeply.

I'd done all I could.

I really had.

Even jumping after him, which was doing a little more than I actually could.

And his death had been quick. No suffering. Not in physical pain at least. Would my mother be happy or sad when she heard he was gone. Would she hear from the news or another way? I could call her...

Of course I still knew the phone number by heart.

But I shouldn't.

It was a very, very bad idea to tell her this when the world didn't even know. It was a bad idea to give such a strong evidence of me knowing it happened. Tracing the phone back, no matter what Seriph had done to it, would probably get me in big, big trouble as well.

After I packed my backpack again, I managed to climb down with one hand. It felt okay now. Not pleasant, definitely not good. But I could move my hands fully again and the dents in my skin were slowly fading. Blood had dried up and just flaked away. Sometimes it was very nice to be a vampire. My skin was so easy to clean. A brush against where the blood was on my hands, and it looked clean again. Mostly.

Finally down, the sirens appeared to have stopped as well. I wasn't sure when exactly, but it was quiet now. The city went back to sleep. There was a garbage bin standing invitingly open when I walked towards the ocean. I was still in an alley, so it didn't surprise me that much. And it wasn't fully open, just a gap large enough for me to deposit the glass. Convenient.

When I walked through the crowds, the odd feeling of Jason's death weighed heavily on me. Here were people getting drunk, having fun. A terrible contrast to my own turmoil. But I wanted to talk to someone, but where was Esmeralda?

I hoped I would not have to go into the bars. It was a crowd I couldn't exactly handle now. How did I look anyway? It felt like I got less looks than normal. People shunning away perhaps. But when I looked in reflective windows, I saw nothing that could possibly warrant that. I wasn't smelly either, as far as I knew. of course it was all just perception, but at the time it felt so real.

Esmeralda, however, was nowhere to be seen outside.

A little lost and defeated I sat down somewhere randomly. A bench not too far from the ocean, not too close to all the bars. Just to sit and calm down. The wood of the bench wasn't too bad. And my hands were feeling better and better. But my mind didn't.

I still felt alone.

Still felt guilty.

Poor girl.