The girl who greeted her wore an old cheerleader style outfit - a mixture of grey and red that mingled with the blood from the multiple lacerations along her face and torso. While she smiled and acted like she was in perfect health she continued to bleed sluggishly. She said the town they were in was called Merishire and had a population of 105 ("106 now that you're here!").
She didn't know how she got here, wherever "here" was in relation to the highway she'd been driving down but it certainly wasn't the last place she remembered being. There'd been so many bright lights all around her, they'd just appeared out of nowhere. A carnival maybe or just heavy traffic passing her by? But they'd been flashing, car lights didn't flash like that unless it was an emergency and she felt fine.
The cheerleader knew she was bleeding, knew how bad her injuries looked but she said she felt no pain. Said the ones on her face matched the new girl's. As she looked down she saw that her arms were also bloodied, the right one jutted out at an unnatural angle and refused to bend. How had she not noticed this before? The cheerleader laughed and said they'd all been through that phase before, every last one of them. All one hundred and five.
Her name was Sarah or Deborah ("Something like that, it's been a while since I thought about it and we don't really use our names here.") and she'd been living in Merishire ever since she woke up, bleeding on the same street where the new girl was found. They were all found on that street, slumped in a bus stop that was never used.
There were no cars about anywhere, the new girl noted, not a single one on the roads or parked at any houses. Sarah ("Or was it Lorraine?") confirmed that there were no cars in all of Merishire, said they'd done their damage already and were of no further use as she took the new girl to a diner called Better Days, Brighter Days. Inside were several other girls, all bloodied and bleeding but otherwise perfectly happy to just be.
They greeted the new girl warmly, offering her a seat amongst them and asking how her trip there had been. The new girl replied she hadn't been heading for here, she was heading for... heading for somewhere. Definitely somewhere up north... probably. They all nodded sympathetically like they'd been in her exact position of not knowing a damn thing and becoming more and more worried by the minute.
She asked if there was a phone around so she could call her family who might be worried about her. This made the girls look at each other with worry and pity, they said without words who'd going to tell her the bad news here, because I don't want to. Sarah ("Someone called me Susie once, I think"), who was the most helpful so far, showed her to an old landline in the back of the kitchen and left her to it.
The new girl had dialled in her parent's number before she quite realised what she was doing, the familiar sounds of ringing were comforting amongst the rest of the confusion. A woman answered the phone, she wasn't sure if it was her mother. Come to think of it, what did her mother even sound like? The woman on the other end of the line didn't seem to be able to hear her either way, swearing and snarling out for her husband to come and take the line to "tell this joker they should know better".
The man who took the phone sounded more familiar, the way he yelled brought something back to her. Sounds of long, breathless gulps of drink, like he could never get enough and the smell of oil while he worked on a DAF 44 that he swore he'd get working in time for her prom. He couldn't hear her either and loudly hung up the phone.
She left the kitchen feeling a little shaken, jokingly saying their headset was bust because nobody seemed to be able to hear her, why couldn't they hear her, what was going on, she needed answers. A quieter girl whose hockey jumper clad body was crushed all along her left side stood up with heavy swaying and said simply "We're not with them any more, we've got to move on but we can't. you know that just as much as we do Jerrie and it's time you admitted it."
Was Jerrie her name? It didn't sound right, didn't feel right, none of this felt right. It was like she was stuck somewhere she couldn't get out like her car.
Like her car. Like the truck that hit her car it all came flooding back, for now.
It was late and she was heading back to her parent's from a rugby tournament- her team had won and she was slightly tipsy with the remnants of their celebratory beer. She hadn't seen the lorry swerving about on the highway, heading right for her, until it was too late. Everything spun and hurt and went in and out of darkness as somebody cut her car door off, blue and red lights flashing everywhere until somebody said "we're losing her".
She found she was crying, looking around all the girls seemed to be in the same state. Scared, shocked and desperately trying to figure out why they were there and not somewhere else. She said something they'd all been thinking but never voiced.
"What if there's nowhere else for us?"
She didn't know how she got here, wherever "here" was in relation to the highway she'd been driving down but it certainly wasn't the last place she remembered being. There'd been so many bright lights all around her, they'd just appeared out of nowhere. A carnival maybe or just heavy traffic passing her by? But they'd been flashing, car lights didn't flash like that unless it was an emergency and she felt fine.
The cheerleader knew she was bleeding, knew how bad her injuries looked but she said she felt no pain. Said the ones on her face matched the new girl's. As she looked down she saw that her arms were also bloodied, the right one jutted out at an unnatural angle and refused to bend. How had she not noticed this before? The cheerleader laughed and said they'd all been through that phase before, every last one of them. All one hundred and five.
Her name was Sarah or Deborah ("Something like that, it's been a while since I thought about it and we don't really use our names here.") and she'd been living in Merishire ever since she woke up, bleeding on the same street where the new girl was found. They were all found on that street, slumped in a bus stop that was never used.
There were no cars about anywhere, the new girl noted, not a single one on the roads or parked at any houses. Sarah ("Or was it Lorraine?") confirmed that there were no cars in all of Merishire, said they'd done their damage already and were of no further use as she took the new girl to a diner called Better Days, Brighter Days. Inside were several other girls, all bloodied and bleeding but otherwise perfectly happy to just be.
They greeted the new girl warmly, offering her a seat amongst them and asking how her trip there had been. The new girl replied she hadn't been heading for here, she was heading for... heading for somewhere. Definitely somewhere up north... probably. They all nodded sympathetically like they'd been in her exact position of not knowing a damn thing and becoming more and more worried by the minute.
She asked if there was a phone around so she could call her family who might be worried about her. This made the girls look at each other with worry and pity, they said without words who'd going to tell her the bad news here, because I don't want to. Sarah ("Someone called me Susie once, I think"), who was the most helpful so far, showed her to an old landline in the back of the kitchen and left her to it.
The new girl had dialled in her parent's number before she quite realised what she was doing, the familiar sounds of ringing were comforting amongst the rest of the confusion. A woman answered the phone, she wasn't sure if it was her mother. Come to think of it, what did her mother even sound like? The woman on the other end of the line didn't seem to be able to hear her either way, swearing and snarling out for her husband to come and take the line to "tell this joker they should know better".
The man who took the phone sounded more familiar, the way he yelled brought something back to her. Sounds of long, breathless gulps of drink, like he could never get enough and the smell of oil while he worked on a DAF 44 that he swore he'd get working in time for her prom. He couldn't hear her either and loudly hung up the phone.
She left the kitchen feeling a little shaken, jokingly saying their headset was bust because nobody seemed to be able to hear her, why couldn't they hear her, what was going on, she needed answers. A quieter girl whose hockey jumper clad body was crushed all along her left side stood up with heavy swaying and said simply "We're not with them any more, we've got to move on but we can't. you know that just as much as we do Jerrie and it's time you admitted it."
Was Jerrie her name? It didn't sound right, didn't feel right, none of this felt right. It was like she was stuck somewhere she couldn't get out like her car.
Like her car. Like the truck that hit her car it all came flooding back, for now.
It was late and she was heading back to her parent's from a rugby tournament- her team had won and she was slightly tipsy with the remnants of their celebratory beer. She hadn't seen the lorry swerving about on the highway, heading right for her, until it was too late. Everything spun and hurt and went in and out of darkness as somebody cut her car door off, blue and red lights flashing everywhere until somebody said "we're losing her".
She found she was crying, looking around all the girls seemed to be in the same state. Scared, shocked and desperately trying to figure out why they were there and not somewhere else. She said something they'd all been thinking but never voiced.
"What if there's nowhere else for us?"
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