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Her head flops, her body a deadweight against mine.
“Not yet,” I beg, trembling and crying. Feeling a grief so overwhelming I can’t breathe.
“You did this,” a voice whispers in my ear. A croaky, whispered voice that echoes from somewhere not in this room. “You did this to me.”
“No,” I sob, holding her away from me so that I can tell her that she’s wrong. “I didn’t. I love you. You know I do.”
She sits upright suddenly, bones clicking and cracking, her jaw hanging open, maggots feasting on her tongue, eyes rotting, hair falling from her scalp. A scream gets stuck in my throat when her hands wrap around my neck and squeeze.
I kick, thrash, and claw at her face, fighting for a breath so I can scream.
“You did this!” she shrieks, showing black teeth only an inch from my face.
I dig my nails into the flesh of her cheek and her skin melts over my nails. She laughs in my face, a demonic sound that hurts my ears.
“WAKE UP!” she yells, different to before. “WAKE THE FUCK UP, LILITH!”
A new light reaches my eyes and my sister’s demon fades from existence, bringing Nokosi into view. But not just Nokosi, his father and Nash too.
Nokosi’s handsome cheek has nail-deep gouges in it, blood trickles from his jaw.
“Did I do that?” I whisper, feeling tears spring to my eyes.
“It’s okay, you didn’t know what you were doing,” he says gently. “Are you okay? You were screaming.”
I look at Dasan and Nash. I shouldn’t even be here. Nokosi snuck me in. Dasan is going to be so angry.
“Is it just me or is the room spinning?” I ask, trying to climb from the bed. “I need a water or something.” As soon as my foot hits the floor and I try to put weight on it my body buckles. I hit the deck, smacking my head on the side of the floor.
My body seizes with pain, every muscle cramps and freezes.
“She’s having a seizure!” Nash yells.
It’s the last thing I hear before that dreaded darkness takes me again.
Lilith
I’ve never felt so groggy in my entire life. My head is pounding so hard I daren’t open my eyes. My mouth is so dry, and oxygen is being pumped into my nose.
“Nok?” I whisper, feeling the sunlight on my eyes. I’m not in the darkness anymore. Thank God.
“I’m here,” he replies, squeezing my hand.
Opening my eyes, I finally see him, his front a shadow, the sunlight casting a warming glow on his back giving him such an angelic aura.
“Hey,” I say, reaching up to cup his cheek. There’s an IV sticking out of my wrist. He has white gauze on his face and I have blood under my fingernails. I let my hand drop. “I’m so sorry, baby. I swear I didn’t know it was you.”
“I know,” he whispers, bringing my hand to his mouth and kissing it. “I know you didn’t.” He rests his forehead against the space he just kissed. “I thought you were dying, Lilith.”
“What happened?”
“You had a seizure,” he replies, looking up at me again with tears in his eyes. “You collapsed and just started bleeding from your nose, your eyes, your mouth… it was fucking horrific.”
I touch my upper lip but find nothing there. “Why?”
“That’s for me to explain.” It’s the kind doctor that gave me the CT scan after my accident in Nok’s truck. He looks at Nokosi. “You should step outside now.”
I grab Nok’s hand, I don’t want him to leave.
“We need to talk, in private, Lilith.”
I sigh and nod. “Go on.”
Nokosi grumbles his way out of the room, muttering about getting a coffee.
“I’ve been trying to contact you for weeks,” the doctor states gently. “You haven’t answered your phone. I even called the schools in the area, but you’ve hardly been attending.”
“I’m sorry, I’ve been busy looking after my sister and getting laid,” I jest despite the fact this is not a time to be joking. “What’s wrong with me, Doc?”
He sits on the side of my bed as I pull myself further up, feeling sick and dizzy.
He places his hand on my knee as his calming blue eyes make me feel at ease. “When we gave you the scan before, it showed something alarming. A mass on your frontal lobe and deeper into your brain, as though your brain had simply grown around it.”
My lips part and my already dry mouth becomes lead. “That can’t be right.”
“I know, I checked, I thought maybe there was something wrong with the machine because I can’t fathom how you’re still alive with something so huge and dominating beyond your skull.” He gives my knee a squeeze and wets his lips before reaching for something on the table beside the bed. I sip water that he offers, trying to wrap my head around this… no pun intended. “I didn’t want to take any chances that I could be wrong so the moment you arrived I did some more tests. A more in-depth scan of your brain.”
