I'm fine

''I can't even put in words how relieved I am that you are fine!'' I gaze at Avery who is sitting next to me and smile widely while the mysterious girl I have never seen before is watching us suspiciously.

''I know. Me neither,'' Avery smirks back at me and starts to get up, pulling me with him. ''The others probably already worry.''

''Wow. What a sentence.'' I chuckle and he slaps my arm playfully as respond before my view changes to the girl again.

''And you are...who?'' I rise my left eyebrow and the girl groans, rolling her blue eyes in annoyance about my question.

''Doesn't matter. I chose to be alone and it will stay that way,'' She walks up to me until our faces are only a few inches apart. ''But this is my territory. So piss off or I will let you die the next time.''

For such a young looking girl, she seems to be really tough.

''Okay okay, Pocahontas. We'll leave you your freedom in your empire.'' I joke and laugh as she narrows her ice blue eyes and glares at me hatefully.

''You can call me Captrix. You won't get any more informations.'' Captrix steps away from me and jumps up a small rock before nodding at us politely and disappearing in the field behind the holes.

''That was weird.'' I frowns and shake my head slightly before looking back at Avery who seems to be in thoughts.

I try to find out how bad my clothes condition is with looking down on me but immediately get the feeling that I have to puke as soon as I see the dried blood on the half of my shirt.

''Anyway, let's head back.'' I swallow down the disgusting feeling in my throat and start walking. Waiting for Avery to follow me, the boy stares at the ground.

''You okay?''

''Hm? Yeah, I'm fine.'' Av shows me a wide smile, but I know it is fake.

Not bothering to ask on our road what is wrong, I begin to look around.

The landscape seems orange under the sunset.

Here also is a series of lakes with several hills, like the creator of this planned to amaze our minds with this. Yesterday's fantasy is today's reality. An odd reality.

We pass the big pines and leave them behind fastly. Where we walk now should be the right route for arriving safely in our ''City''.

The birch trees are each one so thin it seems to me that it might make kindling by itself.

It's incredible.

Ignoring the grain fields, we hurry faster along our way until we arrive at the clearing in the forest where we were when we got here the first time.

''It's so weird to see this.'' I mutter more to myself than to Avery, but he frowns at me.

''What do you mean?'' Avery tiltes his head a little and glances at me in confusion.

''We arrived here with two Van's.'' I explain shortly and look fastly back to the ground in front of me before my mind would get stuck here.

''Oh.''

Another ten minutes later, we finally arrive at the houses and immediately see Carmen who runs up to us with an incredible mad look on her face.

Jeez.

''Avery! What did you do?! You look like you were swimming and rolling in dirt!'' Carmen starts to rant and Avery smirks a little.

''That's actually exactly what I did.'' He laughs and I chuckle awkwardly, glancing away.

''Wh- urgh.'' She gets quiet and rolls her eyes while ignoring my entire presence.

Girl? I'm still here? Heeeeello?

''Yeah I better change now-.'' Avery points to our house and Carmen nods agreeingly.

''I got you something. You'll probably want it.'' The girl smiles slightly as we make our way towards the entrance and I frown.

''How can she be your cousin?'' I ask him quietly and he shrugs, snickering a little about what I said.

We walk inside and I sit down on the sofa while Avery is changing upstairs in his room.

How long has it's been since I thought about my life before this? Days? Weeks? Even months? I honestly don't know. I am trying to forget, so that the pain doesn't seem as big as it actually is.

I spent so long in that first stage of grief, in denial that you could be so cruel. And so, I assumed it wouldn't get better any longer. Yet not so.

The emptiness in my heart, the numbness pounding my brain, the salty tears that flowed unchecked from my eyes, the shear nothingness that now took hold of my soul threatened to engulf me entirely. That's what I did every single day.

I think I was in denial that it really happened not for days, but a couple of weeks or more, sometimes the anger would attempt to come but I can't sustain it. Now that I can say I that I deserve a good life, I can move on. I have learned to stop thinking about it and instead make plans for my future. I can say that I need something to hope for. I wasn't able to go through the five stages as others do, but I made it anyway, through the grief of loosing them, and in that process I found parts of me I didn't know existed.

I just hope I can try to not be as rude as I normally am.

Slowly, I scan the livingroom.

The room is uncomfortably large. It reminds me of a hotel foyer. I scan for a personal touch, something that has some of my life but I find nothing. The floor is polished concrete, the walls white, but the name escapes me for the moment. It is a perfect place, but cold in its tranquility. The empty pictures at the walls just make it even less personal.

With a sigh, I get up from the white sofa and make my way into the kitchen where I look out of the window and see several people sitting on the fireplace we made a few days ago.

If I see it right, it is Diana, Carmen, Kaitlyn and Leah.

I miss being able to have parties while my parents are gone for a business trip and I get into trouble for it.

I miss the sound of their voices.

I miss my parents and mine old, modern, but pretty set up house.

In my head, I retract all the bad things I ever said to them they were never a reflection on them to be honest. They worked hard and I only saw what they could not do. In my misplaced entitlement I gave them only passive aggressive rage, I withdrew to punish them and became self-absorbed. Now they're gone. I wish they were still by my side, that I could remember the feeling when I was a small child and snuggled myself closer to them after dark. I've grown, I've learnt about what really matters, but not soon enough for that. It is too late for everything.

My life was sweet like sugar and comfortable like like a nice sofa, but now there's a cookie cutter hole right in the centre. My parents are gone and the gap they left behind just can't be filled by another, by work or distractions. I should have died with them. I work around it as if it were a ball of razor wire in my living room, it takes effort to ignore it and just a glancing blow will cut deeply. I know it's my fault. Why am I even here.

Gosh my condition is becoming something terrible.

Whatever. Let's wait for the others to get here soon too.