Amber

Chapter 1

Hailey

November 3, 2015

She's been buried six months now, but I see her face beside mine. Does that mean I'm dead too?

No.

He didn't kill you, Hailey. He just stunned you. You're alive—for now.

Alive.

For now.

But for how long?

For as long as I stay breathing.

Focus on that for now. Focus on breathing.

But the air isn't getting through. Not like normal. Not as much as it should be. The more I focus on it, the more I realize what's happening. I'm running out of oxygen in here.

Where is here? Somewhere lightless and empty. I think it's his trunk because that's the last thing I remember—feeling a surge of sparkling pain and underlying numbness followed by the motion of him dragging and lifting and carelessly placing me into this tiny section of hell.

I couldn't see him grab me because he snuck up from behind once I turned away. I was aware of him at first in the same way you're aware of your shadow even when you're not searching for it. A chill of air grabbed me right before his hands.

He looked menacing in the way he walked—or, shuffled, really—all labored and leaning as if the air meant to push him away. He stayed at a distance for a while, watching me from the line of once-green trees bleeding into red and orange. The silent shadow against a backdrop of color and light and sound.

I'm not dead. So then why is she here? I've seen her in my dreams—nightmares too. But this is different. She's not a projection or some faded reflection of a memory. It's really her, my Hannah, all pixie-haired, dimple-chinned, and eyes colored in the madness between green and gray. Punched out of the darkness by way of her radiance.

God, even in death she's the better-looking one.

Her mouth is open, forming words I can't hear because the ringing hasn't stopped yet.

I strain to move my head closer to hers. It hurts to move, but it also hurts to think, to breathe, to blink ... to do anything.

Gone is her simple sideways smile. Her big-sister grin. Her lips are moving, forming instructions to me. Just one word, repeated.

Run.

It seems so simple. Run away from the monster. Run so that he can't catch you. But running requires lungs. Lungs require oxygen. Oxygen I don't have.

I'm suffocating in here. I have to slow my breathing. I have to focus on preserving every breath.

Don't panic, Hailey. Just breathe. No, not like that, spaz girl. Breathe normally. That's better.

I push against the trunk, knowing it won't open, knowing I have to try anyway. The ringing is softening but still exists as a voyage of sound starting in my ears, traveling in a spiral toward my forehead and ending down near the back of my neck where the pain is most severe.

The pain. God. Don't focus on it. Block it out. Ignore it. It's not even there.

We're definitely moving. The car is unsettled, and the uneven sections of road cause me to position my head against my arm so that it doesn't bump the trunk floor. Once my eyes start to adjust, I strain enough to search the back of the trunk.

There's nothing. Only me. And her.

Somehow, her.

"Why are you here?" I ask. At least I think so. I still can't hear beyond the ringing.