Chapter 5 - Amri

Chapter 5 - Amr i

Eight months – that's how long Melford Mental Institution is making me stay for the ‘little stunt I pulled'. Seven days – that's how long I'm in solitary. Six minutes – that's how long I've been out of said solitary. Five guards – that's how many surrounds me as I walk the long hallway to the cafeteria. Four nurses – that's how many it took to hold me down and sedate me after I was caught. Three doctors – that's how many saw to me when Damion drug me back to my room after he thought I died. Two doors – standing in between me and him now. One messy friendship – that's what Damion is offering me, or maybe something more, by standing at the cafeteria doorway waiting on me.

His eyes roam over my body. I no longer feel self-conscious in the gray scrubs that are the Melford patient uniform. I guess ten days is the limit for that. I see him clench his fists at his sides and it makes me tilt my head in curiosity. I wonder what's made him angry. Is it the bruises that mar my arm where I landed on it after Reaper threw me in the ditch? Is it the fact that he has to accept that something, or someone, did in fact move me after he saw me about to get hit by a speeding truck? Is it the fact that I've refused meals so many times this week that my scrubs hang loose off my body? I internally shrug. Who knows.

My gang of guards stop in front of the doors, and one steps forward to open them for me. They don't follow me when I go in, probably because there's a few guards in the cafeteria already. Thank God. I thought I would have guards following me all the time now.

Instead of walking to Damion, I walk straight to my table by the window and sit down, looking outside into the forest. I hear him approach but I don't turn. He brought me back here and refused to even try and acknowledge that I wasn't crazy. I don't want to talk to him.

"Amri." He whispers, sitting down in front of me and reaching for my hand.

I snatch my hand back when I feel his touch, not wanting to feel his skin on mine.

"Amri, talk to me, please. I just want to make sure you're okay."

I look over at him, head tilting as I take in his features. He looks almost as bad as I do. It looks like he's barely been able to sleep - or eat. His scrubs look looser, and his eyes have dark patches underneath them. As I'm looking him over, he uses his fingers to rub some sleep from his eyes.

I suddenly change my mind about wanting to speak to him. "You look tired."

He scoffs. "That's all I get?"

I sigh, rolling my shoulders back and softly laughing. "What more do you want, Damion?"

"How about an explanation, Amri? I saw you about to get hit by that truck. There's no way you made it all the way to me that quickly. "

"I gave you an explanation." My voice raises, but I quickly quiet it down when I see the guards near the door shoot us a look.

"That doesn't make sense, Amri. The Grim Reaper saved you? There's so much wrong with that statement."

Now his voice is raised. The guards are definitely looking suspicious now. One even takes a step toward us.

"Ugh. Come on." I grab Damion's hand in mine and lead him out of the cafeteria and down the same hallway I chased Reaper through last week. Huh. Has it only been a week?

We go out the same door, and I lead him to the garden where I had Reaper pinned to the ground. I sit in the dead grass, shivering when the wind picks up and blows around us, and watch as Damion sits beside me.

"I'm not lying, Damion. The Grim Reaper did save me."

He shakes his head. "That doesn't make any sense, Amri."

"How does…"

He waves his hand, effectively stopping me. "I'm not saying nothing happened. Obviously, something did happen, but it doesn't make sense on why the Grim Reaper would save you."

I sigh. This is my chance. Do I tell him the truth? Would he believe me if I did?

He leans in, grabbing my hand and rubbing his thumb up and down my wrist. "What's going on, Amri?"

I look down at our hands, watching his thumb move back and forth across a little scar I got when I was eight from handling my dad's pocketknife wrong. I can feel the tension in the air rising. He wants an answer and I have one – I just don't know if he'll believe it. There's a small chance he will, but there's an even bigger chance he'll laugh at me, call me crazy and have me locked back up in solitary. It's so much like what Timothy did to me, calling me crazy, but Damion could do so much worse. He has the authority to keep me at Melford even longer, to have me analyzed and doped up on meds until I can't think straight. Or maybe he really doesn't and I'm overthinking things.

"Amri. I promise, I won't think you're crazy."

His whisper brings my eyes up to his and I see nothing but truth in his bright blues. It makes me confused, to want to trust him after I felt so betrayed when he brought me back here when I tried to run.

"You thought I was before." My bottom lip trembles as I voice my fear.

He shakes his head. "I didn't think you were crazy, Ree. I was worried about you. I didn't see what you did. All I saw was the girl I'm getting feelings for go pale white like she saw a ghost before she started running like a bat out of hell. I started chasing you immediately, wondering what the hell was happening and wanting to protect you from whatever the hell gave you that haunted look in your eyes, but you're a hell of a runner, Ree. By the time me and the other guys got to the door, it was locked, and the windows were frosted over so bad we couldn't see out of them."

He lets out a shaky breath and squeezes my hand. "But I could hear you screaming. Asking why he would do that to you. You saying you wanted to die. I was pounding on the door with everything I had."

I don't remember hearing any pounding, but I guess I was a little too absorbed in what I was doing to notice any background noise. His hand turns in mine, and I see where the side of it is blue and purple in bruises from the tip of his pinky down to his wrist.

"Oh my God…Dee." I shake my head. "I never meant for you to hurt yourself."

"I don't care about that. Tell me what happened. Please."

I take a deep breath, deciding to trust him, trust him like I haven't trusted anyone since I was a little girl when I didn't understand who to trust. "Promise me you won't laugh."

He holds up his hand in the middle of us, pinky out. "Pinky swear."

I smile at his antics, loving his light in the middle of my darkness. I wrap my pinky around his, kissing the end of my hand and smiling even wider when he does the same to his.

"I started having these dreams about ten months ago. At first, I thought they were harmless, weird lucid dreams since I've been able to lucid dream for as long as I could remember, but I quickly realized they weren't normal dreams. They felt so real, and I remembered every single detail, down to the smell of the air and feel of the sun on my skin. The dreams would be in different places, sometimes in my bedroom or in my living room, other times it would be somewhere I've never been before, like a small town in Portugal. There was no rhythm to it. Except for him – the Grim Reaper. He only spoke once, and that was to introduce himself, but he would interact in other ways. He would bring me different foods from around the world and bring me gifts, and I always woke up with those gifts in my hand the next morning. Every night for months he visited me."

Damion listens without interruption, except for the movement of his thumb across my hand he started up again once I started talking. If he's not running for the hills yet, it's a good sign.

"About four months ago, my fiancé kicked me out. I've been living in my car and living paycheck to paycheck trying to save up any money I could. I couldn't afford my medication anymore and my depression got worse, along with the mood swings that come with being bipolar, and I realized that if the Grim Reaper liked me so much, he wanted to visit me every night, then surely, he wouldn't mind if I joined him. So, the night I got sent here, I drove out to Misery Bridge and jumped."

"Amri! That water is below freezing right now!" His voice sounds so loud compared to the whisper I've been speaking in, and it makes me jump back. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you."

"It's fine. And you're right. It was fucking cold. But it didn't matter much anyway because someone saved me. I was under long enough to lose consciousness and then I woke up soaking wet on the riverbank with a stranger calling my name. When he saw I was awake and lucid, he left. I was pissed that he saved me and dipped so I looked for him but could never find him, but he showed back up in time to see me pass out in front of the cops. Eight days ago, that man was here."

"Here? Was it one of the staff?" Poor Damion looks so confused. I can't say anything, though, because the pieces of the puzzle were sitting right in front of my face, and I still didn't put them together.

"No, not staff. Turns out, it was Reaper. That's why you heard me screaming and asking why, that's why I was so mad, and that's why you heard me say I wanted to die. He acted like he wanted me and then went and saved me instead of letting me be with him."

Damion sits in silence for a few minutes, taking everything in and chewing on his bottom lip as I watch different thoughts and emotions flit across his face.

"And he saved you again?"

"Yes."

"I still don't understand why. If he visited your dreams for almost a year…" His voice trails off.

"He said there was something I needed to do before he collected my soul. And…and he said I needed to be stronger." My voice breaks, upset at the thought of my Reaper thinking of me as weak.

"Stronger? Amri, you've got to be one of the strongest people I know. I don't think I'd be able to survive what you have, and not just the stuff you've told me about your ex or your living situation."

His mouth snaps shut, like he said something he shouldn't have, and it makes me wonder what else he knows to make him think that I'm so strong.

"Damion, what do you mean?" I ask, steel lacing my voice.

"Please don't get mad."

"I can't promise anything, but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt since you did the same for me." It's the least I could do, I guess.

"After everything that happened, I…I kind of broke into your therapist's office and read your file." He has the decency to look sheepish, but I don't exactly blame him. If the roles were reversed, then I would have done the same thing.

"I'm not mad. "

"You're not?" He looks surprised, now. I guess I don't have the reaction most people would when they learn you read their personal information.

"No. You'll come to realize I'm generally a very open person when I can trust the people around me. I just hadn't fully decided if I could trust you yet."

"And now?" He smiles, looking adorable in a cute, boyish way I usually wouldn't find endearing but for some reason I do now.

"I haven't decided yet."

"That's fair." He shrugs his shoulders, taking my words in as gracefully as he can. "If it's possible, I would like to gain your trust. I really do like you, Ree. More than I should, really, considering staff-patient relationships are completely off-limits, but I can't help it. You're this irresistible flame in the darkness and you continue to pull me in with every glance you shoot my way. It's impossible for me to not fall for you."

His words shoot butterflies inside my stomach. Old-school, corny, butterflies - and I can't help but smile. "You don't know what you're saying, Dee, or what you're in for."

"But I do. I read your file remember?" There goes that boyish smile again.

"And what did you learn?" I ask, half curious and half scared to know the answer.

"I learned that you're diagnosed mildly depressed and bipolar, that you recently got out of a long-term relationship with your high school sweetheart and have been living on the street for the past few months. You had a miscarriage a few years ago and now you aren't sure if you even want kids because it was so traumatic but you say it may be a good thing because you wouldn't even know how to parent due to your mother dying when you were a baby and you having a shitty father that, honestly, I wish I could beat the shit out of for the shit he took from you. I know you have dreams about the Grim Reaper and that you've tried to take your own life. That you're fast as hell, sarcastic and witty and tough as nails but also emotional in all of the best ways. I know that I could give you my entire heart and you would wrap it in those soft hands of yours and protect it with your life because even if you don't give a damn about yourself, you would protect those you love with everything you are. That's what I learned. That's what I know. But you know what?"

"What?" I ask, my voice soft and my heart beating so fast I'm sure he can hear it through the word.

"All of that only makes me want you more."

I let out a breathless laugh, biting my lip at the utter sweetness of his words and the meaning behind them. Reaper may have my dreams but Damion, he's who I know I can count on in the daytime. Reaper may want my soul, but Damion wants my heart, and I don't know which is stronger.

He leans in, wrapping a strong hand around the back of my neck and bringing me closer until his lips touch mine in the softest kiss I've ever experienced in my life. His lips caress mine, roaming over them as if we have all the time in the world, as if he doesn't know about all the broken, damaged pieces of me. Or more like he does know, and he accepts them anyway. His tongue flicks out across my bottom lip, asking for access that I immediately grant as I slide my tongue across his.

We lay there kissing until his radio beeps at his side. " Blide to intake. I repeat, Blide to intake."

Damion groans, pulling away from me and grabbing his radio. "Ten-four. Blide responding."

"Your last name is Blide?" I ask.

"Yep, and yours is Glass." He stands up, holding out a hand to help me up after him.

"How did you…oh, my files." I laugh and then shake my head. "I guess I missed the news that we were getting someone new when I was in solitary."

"Yeah, his name is Zain…something. Apparently, he's a real piece of work so they're getting a large team of us together down there to be ready for him."

We start walking back in the way we came, hand in hand, and I smile when I realize how normal it feels to have him touch me like this. Damion uses his key card to open the door and then holds it open for me, pressing a kiss to my temple as I pass by him.

"Well, I'll see you later then." I say, sad that our time together got cut short by this new arrival. I don't even know him yet and already I don't like him. I start walking down the hall toward my room.

"Oh, you will." I hear from behind me. I turn in time to see Damion wink before turning and heading back toward the cafeteria.