Chapter 3

•Evangeline•

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The first thing I saw was multiple bloody shoeprints, my chin trembled and I inhaled deeply. I wiped my tears and moved further into our home.

Blood...

There was blood everywhere. As I got close to our living room I saw someone lying on the ground. By his uniform, I could tell that he was one of the household's help.

Then I saw it, for the first time in my life I saw a dead body with a hole in his chest, the blood still oozing out of it. Fear became a tangible, living force that crept over me like some hungry beast, immobilizing me; my brain, holding me captive.

I covered my mouth with both of my hands to muffle my loud cries. No, please, this can't be happening, please.

I took two small steps backward. Terror sucked the very breath from my mouth. Pulse beating in my ears, blocking out all other sounds even my own.

Panicking, I ran inside the living room, stepping over the bodies that were lying in my way. Bodies... bodies... so many dead bodies. I could not find the ones I was looking for. I hoped they were not among all these dead people. I hoped they were alive but I couldn't find them, I couldn't see them.

And then I tripped over something, landing on all fours. I looked up and saw my mother's dead eyes staring back at me. I couldn’t scream. I could only open my mouth to find that even words had deserted me. I immediately shuffled closer to my mother's body.

Everything I ever knew and everyone I ever knew was laying right in front of me, in the pools of their own blood. I mumbled incoherent things through my hands and choked on my sobs.

With trembling and gentle hands, I held up my mother's head and put it on my lap. There were several bloodied holes in her chest and abdomen. I softly touched her cheek, a few hours ago, she had kissed me good night and now she was pale and so damn cold.

"Mom? Mom, please, talk to me! MOM! MOM, PLEASE!"

I screamed for her at the top of my lungs, but no matter how much I tried to talk to her, to wake her up, to let her know that here I was out of my room but she didn't listen. She didn't scold me or gave a reaction. She kept looking at the ceiling with her empty, dead eyes and her skin and lips were turning bluish-purple with each passing second.

Tears streamed down my face profusely and I made no effort to wipe them. My tears rained down on my mother's face but nothing seemed to bother her. I can't believe it, I refuse to believe that my mother had died. She can't! She just can't.

A streak of blood trailed down from the corner of her lips, I screamed, sobbed, and wailed but to no avail.

I need to save her, I need to save my mom. I gently placed her head down on the ground and ripped my dress from the bottom. I placed the piece of my dress over the giant gunshot wound over my mother's heart and it didn't help, instead, it got drenched in her blood as well.

I cried for help but no one was there to listen to my agonizing pleas. I had never seen this much blood before. I didn't know what to do.

This can't happen to me. I need them, I need my parents. I don't know about anything without them. They are my whole life. This can't happen.

I stubbornly cried out for help but I didn't know who to call. I didn't even know where my parent's cellphones were or how to use them.

"Mom, wake up, please, mom. I'll die without you. I don't know what to do. Tell me, please, tell me what to do! How to bring you back! There hasn't been a single day in my life when you weren't there for me! I don't want to see the light of day without you. Take me with you. You promised you'll be there for me, you promised, mom, PLEASE, WAKE UP!" I sobbed miserably.

My tear-stricken face was burning now. My voice had turned rough from all the screaming. The sound of my wailing and suffering echoed throughout the house.

I kept caressing my mother's lifeless face but then a pain-stricken cough resonated in the living room. My head shot in its direction as I stood up.

Someone was alive and he was here. I prayed, I prayed, please don't let it be my dad, please, don't be a dad. I hoped that dad would be fine, he is fine, and he will be fine.

I can not lose both of them. I will die, I just can't lose both of my parents. I slowly walked towards the sound and saw my dad trying to get up, all bloodied and injured. There were bruises on his face and blood was trickling down his forehead. He looked up and saw me standing in front of him. My mind blanked and suddenly, I didn't know what to do. I ran to my father's aid and engulfed him in my arms.

He was losing consciousness, his eyes were on the verge of closing.

"Dad, please, dad, no, I can't lose you too, please, dad!"

He coughed out blood. "Are you hurt, Evangeline? Did they hurt you?" he asked as he gave me a pained look.

"I'm fine, Dad, please, stay alive, stay with me... I'm so scared"

"I'm always with you, Evie, but you have to be strong now." he breathed out with difficulty.

"No, dad!"

"You have to get out of here, run as fast as you can, and never come back, you hear me, never come back here. Go!" he was breathing heavily.

"I'm not leaving without you, Dad. Please stay with me." I begged desperately.

I was losing him too, I just know. I could see the life draining out of his body. I'm going to be alone. When the realization dawned upon me, thinking of being out there... alone. I suddenly wanted it all to be a bad dream.

This is what I always wanted, to go out there and have a normal life but not like this, not alone. All of a sudden, I didn't want to have a normal life. I just wanted to have my old life back. The life in which I was happy and I was with my parents. The life in which, I wasn't alone.

I suddenly loathed the idea of the world out there. My parents were right, there were bad people everywhere. I will stay inside this house my whole life if it meant my parents would come back to life.

I felt a soft hand on my cheek that wiped my tears away, I opened my eyes and saw my dad looking at me with tear-filled eyes.

Dad smiled through the pain. "Goodbye, my precious little girl." saying that the warmth of his soft hand left me as it fell to the ground. With a sharp intake of breath, he left. He left me alone...

As the realization that I had lost both of my parents dawned upon me, I completely lost it. I screamed so painfully loud, enough to make me lose my voice. I cried out again but no sound came out of her mouth. I screamed and wailed and screeched but nothing came out of my throat. I lost my voice with anguish. I felt like someone was stabbing my heart again and again and I was unable to do anything about it.

I swiped at my eyes but the tears came anyway. I had wiped my eyes so much that they were red and swollen. My head hurt, my eyes hurt, and my whole body started to hurt but the pain in my heart was the harshest of them all. I tried calling for my dad again, hoping he will wake up and tell me that it was all a joke and that they were just playing a stupid prank on me.

No! No! No!

I need my family back! I need my parents back!

I stood up and walked to where my mother was. All I want is for my family to be back! I gripped my mother's cold legs and dragged her to where dad was laying. Her body had left a trail of blood behind but I chose to ignore it. I pretended I didn't see it because I just want my family back! With every last sliver of my strength, I dragged her body across the room and stopped when she was just beside my father. I placed her perfectly next to dad.

Perfect! Now they are together.

All I need to do now is hide the imperfections, so they look normal so that they look alive.

They are alive, just sleeping.

I ran to my parent's room and picked up their pillows and the sheets. I made my way back to my parents and gently placed their heads on their respective pillows leaving a little space between them. I then covered them with the sheets up to their necks so, no one could see the gunshot wounds.

They look better now but I still need to get rid of the blood from their faces.

I ran to the kitchen and saw all the maids and house help butchered, their bodies towered over one another as if someone had deliberately piled them over one another. Their bodies made some kind of a symbol, they were placed in a very specific manner and it scared me even more.

I placed my fist in my mouth to conceal the loud cries, I bit down hard on my hand. I just wanted this night to be over.

I took out the washcloth from one of the cabinets and doused it in hot water. I came back to my parent's side and cleaned off all the traces of blood from their faces.

Now they looked normal, perfect, just asleep. A loud sob bubbles up from my throat as I could hold the heartbreak no longer. I fell to the floor in a disheveled heap as my grief poured out in a flood of uncontrollable tears. I cried so much that no tears were left in my eyes.

I crawled in between my parent's bodies and lay there looking towards the ceiling. Everything is fine, we are fine. We are just going to sleep. It's night, it's late. We are sleeping, nothing else. I pulled my mother's arm over myself and then placed my dad's arm under my head, using his arm as my pillow.

I felt safe, I felt normal, I felt fine.

This is exactly how we used to lay together as a family, whenever I had a nightmare. My parents would come to my room and lay on either side of me. My mom would hold me while dad would use his arm as my pillow. Now I was laying here, wishing that when I would wake up this nightmare would be over and my parents are going to be fine and alive.

I looked at both of their faces with tears in my eyes, their stony, emotionless eyes, stuck in one place. Coldness radiated from their bodies. A bluish-purple shade appeared on their skin losing its previous pinkness and warmth.

"Dad, we are going to have so much fun moving, right? We will do all the stuff we never got to do. We will go to the beach and I'll go to a college. We'll go watch movies in the cinema as normal people do" I kept rambling mindlessly in an empty room with only my voice resonating throughout it with the occasional chirping of the crickets.

I lay between them, I could feel thick blood seeping into my clothes from under the sheets, I didn't even know if it belonged to mom or dad but I chose to ignore it.

It's a nightmare, Evangeline.

Tomorrow everything will be fine.

"Good night, mom and dad" I closed their eyes with the palm of my hand gently.

I closed my eyes. I needed to sleep, so, I could get out of this nightmare. I need to sleep, so, I could wake up. Tomorrow we will live another day like a normal family. We will move, buy a new house, and live our life just the way we thought that we will do.

And if not.

If for any reason, when I'll wake up tomorrow and this nightmare isn't over. I will kill myself, so, I could be with them. So, I could be with my parents.