"I meant to say, 'I'm on the verge of a
breakdown, and I want to die." But it
came out as, 'I'm tired.'"
~ anonymous

_______________

[f o u r]

"IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT, SHINEDOWN," the dead man harshly whispered, his foul breath seeping into my sinuses. I felt a lone tear stream down my left cheek as I just stood there, taking it all in.

"You killed me, Shinedown. You're the reason why I'm dead." His disgusting, rotting grey orbs stared intently into mine, persistency written in his features.

"Shut up," I sobbed, clenching my bare, blue hands.

"You're a monster, Shinedown," he let out a sickening laugh as clumps of his hair fell off his scalp, his teeth turning into rotten pieces of what resembled unpopped popcorn kernels. I felt the sudden throbbing sensation return in my wrists as a fresh batch of tears flowed down my cheeks like a river. Sobs shook out of my trembling mouth like a salt shaker, just tumbling out until the storage ran dry.

"S-stop," I cried in desperation. With the sense of dread pooling in my stomach, I glanced down at my hands to be greeted with the same haunting image that seemed almost tattooed to my eyelids. The exact same midnight pigment that had flooded my skin the night I killed the man standing before me began to blotch my peachy skin, racing up my arm despite my frantic attempts to shut up the dead spirit and calm down.

"No one will ever love you. Your parents never did. Your Daddy pushed you out of his life for alcohol and gambling, correct? How could he leave his own precious little monster?" He began to pace in circles around my trembling, changing figure, shooting out colorful insults and disses at me, leaving behind a lot of scratches and bruises on the sensitive topics.

"You're a monster."

"Who do you think you are?"

"Do you honestly think that anyone could ever love a monster like you?"

As a giant herd of flashbacks shot me like a sledgehammer, the midnight pigment had successfully covered my entire body as a loud growl erupted from my blue mouth.

"I said, shut up!"

.......................

"Shut up!" I screamed at the top of my lungs, lurching forward in my bed. The realization that I had been dreaming only nudged my shoulder when I noticed the bed sheets sticking to my skin and the excess hair dangling over my face like it was sitting on a bunk bed.

I let out a soft sigh of relief, which I immediately regretted for the throbbing sensation in my wrists came arose once more, only this time, it was much more intense.

Stella came around the corner, both hands up to her right ear as she was attempting to twist a dangling earring in without a mirror (a/n: in the last chapter they were both 18, but now it's been about one and a half years so they're both almost 20 now and living in Oxford, England). When she saw my stressed figure, a look of concern spread across her features as she raced to my bedside after getting her earring in.

"Shinedown," she said in a serious tone, "did you have another nightmare again?"

I nodded my head rapidly, sensing my pulse that never seemed to slow down pound against my temples. "He was there," I croaked in a voice I didn't recognize. "He was there, Stella. He wouldn't shut up. He wouldn't shut up."

That's when the loud ringing clashed against my eardrums, and my head started throbbing with a pain so immense it felt like someone had drawn a knife slowly over my scalp. Clutching both sides of my head, I let out a low moan of agony.

You killed me, Shinedown.

You're a monster.

"Shut up!" I tried to scream, but it got muffled by the ringing that seemed to be like a broken record.

It's all your fault.

"Shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up!" I felt two hands grip my shoulders and shake my frail figure in attempts to snap me out of this pure torture. Their attempts succeeded as the ringing slowly faded and warm tears began to pool in the bottom of my eyelids.

"Shinedown," Stella called with wide eyes.

"I-I'm okay," I spoke clearly, gripping onto her forearms. Incidents like these happened to me more than they should for a normal mutant. Sometimes the voices show up in my dreams, or they show up in the middle of the day. Sometimes even more than once. One time I nearly got hit by a car because of it, but luckily Stella was there to grab some ladies cane and pull me out of the way.

Taking a deep breath, I climbed out of bed and stalked over to our shared wardrobe, but I failed to hide the trembles and muscle spasms that awoke each time I tried to move.

Stella immediately ran to my side as I reached a shaky gloved hand up to the handle of the closet. Dizziness filtered in my mind, clogging up my thought process and my sense of being. I hated that feeling more than anything; dizziness. It made you feel like everything was resembling a comic book, nothing was truly real.

I was about to yank open the door when Stella rested her hand on top of my gloved one. I felt the warmth of her palm press against the fabric of my burdened glove.

"Shinedown," she spoke with concern. "I don't know how much more of this you can take."

"I'm fine," I snapped harshly, moving out of her grasp and pulling open the door to reveal an array of clothes varying from all sorts of types, colors, and brands. I moved to grab a long sleeved, black shirt that had a purple and dark blue guitar design on the far left. The excess part of the gloves that rested above the tip of my finger brushed against the robin's egg blue hanger as I pulled the shirt off. I stood there for a moment, just staring at my gloved hands for a moment while Stella watched me with a slightly confused expression.

After a few short minutes, I shook my head and ripped a pair of skinny jeans with small tears varying across the thighs off the hanger.

Taking Stella's moment of silence for granted, I ran into the bathroom and closed the door behind me before she could utter another excuse about how I should see a shrink. It was stupid, really. Me, possibly the most messed up girl in the history of messed up girls, should go see a shrink for nightmares, migraines, voices, and ringing phases. Setting my clothes on the counter, I began to get dressed mindlessly while I talked to myself in my mind.

If I ever did agree to a shrink, I would end up having to spill about what I did and I'd get locked up for homicide. But that would be the least case scenario, I figured. What would people say if they heard on the early morning news that a girl in her late teens got thrown in jail because she killed a man with a lightning bolt?

Wow, wouldn't the public just love that idea?

It wasn't like I ever asked for this, I thought as I brought a purple brush to my green and dirty blonde hair. I never asked to get plucked off the streets and meet those horrifying people who ruined my life with this burden. My own parents hated what had become of me so much that they locked me up from the outside world. I killed an innocent person because of this. My eyes fluttered from my steady gaze in the mirror to look down at my gloved hands with fear filling the cracks in my mind.

I didn't even know what I was fully capable of, let alone what the consequences would be. I set down the hairbrush and threw my nightclothes into the hamper, unlocking the bathroom door to step out into an empty bedroom. Figuring that Stella had went into the kitchen, I stalked almost robotically through the short halls into the kitchen, which also held our jumbo sized living room to the left. Sure enough, Stella was in the middle of the kitchen, holding the milk jug to her mouth.

I furrowed my brow in disgust and rested my elbows on the small island in the middle of the kitchen. "You know," I lectured. "I kind of still need to use that, but I don't think that would be the best concept. It's too busy working as your kissing practice dummy."

Stella whipped her brunette head with a small patch of cornrows towards me in shock, not noticing the red lipstick smear she left on the cap of the jug.

Letting out a small laugh, she quickly tossed the jug back into the refrigerator and grabbed her small, faux snakeskin clutch from the counter. "You ready?" She asked, grabbing the car keys to the truck from their post on the bolt locking the door (a/n: Stella can be very bubbly and sometimes mentally retarded, but please don't judge her character unless you don't want to have another ship to sail).

I looked at her in confusion, the realization of how formal she had dressed just now hitting me. "Where are we going?"

"Did you already forget?" She sighed, throwing open the door.

I gave her a I-thought-you-knew-me look as I made my way towards my shoes.

"We're going to that bar down the street for a job interview," Stella explained, leaning against the wooden doorframe as I slipped on my black Vans. I let out a small groan at my recall of the said bar. Last time I'd been there, a heavy drinker was trying to get in my pants by shoving a pool ball down my cup of wine. Next thing he knew, he got a panty liner stuck to his forehead and I was trotting my way down Pride Lane. Needless to say, that disgrace of a bar never held hands with me before and I'm positive it wasn't about to start now.

"Does it have to be The Eagle?" I asked in despair. Stella grabbed my forearm, steering clear of my gloved hand, and dragged me out the door and down our driveway to the deserted sidewalk.

"Yes. Yes it does," she stated. I let out a small groan, letting the conversation level fall to a comfortable silence as I snuck a hard, merciless stare at my gloved hand dangling from Stella's firm grip.

You better keep your act together for this, I mentally sneered at the cursed pigments that lay hidden beneath the fabric. Just this once, keep your top screwed on.

The only reason I was doing this was for Stella. She was the one who handled most of the bills with her unexplained fortune and was always there when I was sick. Over the years, we'd grown close since the incident with the police and I relied on her for most everything. Back then, I was worse than I had ever been. I was depressed, tired, sick, and, most of all, waiting for something that I knew wasn't going to happen.

A few weeks ago, the dreams and incidents that have been going on were higher than usual during that time. So high that while I was in the shower, the voices came back and hit me so hard I blacked out. Stella got me help by taking me to the hospital, but she ordered the doctors to not take off my gloves. When she left the room, though, one of the doctors was forced to take off a glove to check my pulse. Long story short, she ended up screaming about a giant hairdryer, blue fingers, and the sink bursting all from the voices raising in my head.

After I gave Stella a big talking to, she still wouldn't stop enunciating her thoughts on me finding a shrink for the voic-

"We're here," Stella grinned, gazing up at the large building. I watched her with a confused expression as she tugged me along with her inside and through the front foyer, leading us to the main bar. There was a tall man behind the counter polishing a shot glass, eyeing both of us up as if we were free for the night.

"And what can I do for you two fine ladies?" He asked, setting down the alcohol filled cloth.

Stella leaned her right side against the bar counter and gently ran her finger along her cornrows, and shot the employee a wink.

"We're here for the job offer," she spoke in a light voice, the type you would use when speaking to a child. Her arm wrapped around my shoulders and pulled me closer to the guy behind the counter. I wrinkled my nose in disgust as the foul smell of body odor filled my sinuses. He smelled as if though he hadn't bathed in weeks.

The guy took this moment to inspect us both, causing a sense of worry to go shivering down my spine when he asked about my gloves.

"What, are they some sort of fashion statement?" He asked in a rude, nosy manner.

Stella shot me a worried glance but managed to keep her flirtatious smile from faltering.  "U-uh, yeah," I stuttered stupidly. "A fashion statement. I'm in a protest against... Uh, bare hands?"

I expected the guy to send us right back out on the streets, but instead, he looked right into Stella's eyes and said, "yeah, okay. You're both hired."

Secret revealed: Stella flirted her way into getting us both that job. And there was no way in hell I was going to let that unwashed scruff into our home if them being together was the only hope to save the universe.

..................

Sorry if all of these time skips have your heads spinning! There will be one more in the next chapter and then we're done with the time skips. I hope you're all enjoying this fanfic and please, don't be a silent reader and let me know what you think!

I love all you guys and I'll see you in the next chapter!

Bye!

~ Danalpswolf ❤️