Page 95 of Am I the Only One

When she turns to me, her face is drenched in a savage wrath I’ve never seen in anyone before, and it strikes a fear unlike I’ve ever known.

“I want my money,” she demands in an eerie low tone.

“I-I don’t have it.” My words stammer out of me as fear wilts my brave façade.

Glaring at me from under her furious brows, she grits out, “I’m going to ruin you.”

“Fine!” I shout. “I’ll go inside and grab my checkbook, and then you have to leave.”

She rights her spine and takes a step toward me, but her foot lands on a patch of ice. All too quickly, she loses her balance and falls off the edge of the dock. There’s a loudcrackfollowed by a splash, and when I run to the edge, she’s trapped under the ice. Shock cleaves its way right through to my core, and everything inside me paralyzes as I watch in horror.

Her hands push against the ice as she fights, finally finding the edge of the hole. She gasps, and it’s so loud that I shift back an inch.

“Help me!” she shrieks, flailing her arms and clawing along the edge of the ice, but she can’t get any grip. Her hands slip all over the ice while she continues to cry, wailing for my help through her chattering teeth, but I can’t move.

“Please!” she screeches before she chokes on a mouthful of saltwater, gargling and coughing as she slips beneath the surface for a second before popping back up. “Help me, please!”

But I can’t. All I can do is stare at the woman who holds my future in her hands. She has the power to destroy me entirely—destroy my whole world, and there isn’t anything I can do to stop her. I never would’ve guessed her to be the virulent girl she turned out to be.

Attempt after attempt, she flails wildly, trying to pull herself up, but the ice only snaps beneath the pressure. The water must feel like a million razors slicing into her flesh, stabbing her over and over and over. I step back as her blood-curdling cries of terror cut through the night, and I just need her to stop. I can’t take it anymore as she begs for her life.

Stammering back a step or two, I can’t think around the noise she’s making and wish that she would simply give up on her fight because her fate is sealed.

As if in a trance, I bend and grab the thick fibrous rope that’s connected to the massive crab trap that’s on the dock.

This is it; this is the ending to my nightmare.

I pull it toward me, allowing the wiry cage to scrape along the dock. Slipping my fingers through the metal wires, I pick it up and step back to the edge. Her screams quiet as she gargles and chokes, barely able to keep herself above the surface, her lungs taking in more water than air. When her head bobs back up, I take back control and save my life by slamming the crab cage down on top of her with every ounce of force in me, grunting loudly as I do.

The night goes still.

I’ve put her out of her misery.

Aside from an owl hooting in the distance, there’s no sound, no movement, nothing.

After a moment, I step forward and find that I can barely see her floating under the shell of ice. The force of the blow must have shoved her back under, and in the corner of my mind, I wonder how long it will take her to sink.

I’m not me, stuck in an alternate world that isn’t real, I’m not sure how to even find myself.

I simply stand, with no feeling, no thought, no conscience, and I watch. For what? I don’t know, but I can’t tear my eyes away from her frozen body, the splintered ice, and the crab trap.

A gust of wind howls through the bare trees, stirring my hair, and something inside me snaps. My eyes blink, and suddenly, I’m able to move, taking a step back as the scene sinks into me, waking me up.

Oh my God.

Terror breeds inside me; its unrelenting fangs biting into my very soul and flooding it with its poison.

I killed her.

Holy shit! I killed her!

My hands cup around my mouth as I stumble back. I can’t even process what I’m looking at or what just happened. The only thing I can grasp on to is the fear rumbling inside me. Every part of my body shakes beyond my control, and I flee.

Sprinting as fast as I can, the tears streaming down my face turn to icicles carving into my flesh. Revolting adrenaline races through me as I take the porch steps two at a time. As soon as I’m inside the house, I collapse to my knees and wail so loudly it deafens me.

What have I done?

I’m too scared to look outside, too scared of the gruesome scene out there. I could’ve helped her, could’ve reached out my hand and pulled her out, but I didn’t. No, what I did was abominable. If I had just left it as her drowning, I might have been okay. I might have been able to spin it as her having slipped and fallen in without my knowledge and been done with it.

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