Ember X (Death Collectors) - By Jessica Sorensen Page 0,77
gasp for air.
She leans over me, watching me expectantly, like she’s waiting for something miraculous to happen. “I’m sorry, my sweet baby, but he made me do it. Death is more powerful than the mind.” She brushes my hair back.
Blood floods my throat and pours out of my mouth as I yank the scissors out of my chest. “Mom…”
She places her hand over my heart. “Go ahead, take it. I know you can. You did it with your grandma.”
Blood continues to stream out the hole in my chest and runs like a river over her hand. I look into her eyes, wondering if it’s really her in there or if tonight her mind finally took the final flight.
Thump, thump, thump, thump. My heart sings a song as it dies.
“Take it, Ember,” she begs, her eyes wide. “Before it’s too late.”
My eyes close as my heart sings the last lyric, my veins hollow out, and my lungs shrivel. I start to let myself drift to sleep—or death—when I sense someone else’s presence in the room and I force my eyelids open.
The Grim Reaper lurks behind my mother, concealed under his hood, his dark eyes on me. He whispers something in her ear and then steps back.
“It’s time,” she tells me with her hand extended toward me. “Please, Emmy. It’s time. The grains of sand have expired and my hourglass is empty.”
“Take it, Ember,” the Grim Reaper tempts with an unnerving grin. “Take her life.”
I feel the thunder of her heart attack with the silence of mine. Her blood mixes in my veins and fills my lungs back up. I gasp for air and watch in horror as her skin wrinkles to a lady twice her age.
“Mommy.” I throw her hand off my chest and she collapses to the floor. I hover above her, checking her wrist for a pulse. She looks so old and frail… so… lifeless.
The Reaper watches me from the corner of the room, leaning against the wall, seeming pleased.
I throw a shoe at him. “I hate you! You ruined my fucking life!”
“What the hell?” someone says from behind me.
I glance back and Ian is standing right behind me. His eyes are opened wide and are filled with helplessness as he stares at our mother, lying dead on the floor.
The Grim Reaper’s laugh echoes through my head as he sinks away through the bedroom wall.
“Call a damn ambulance!” I yell at Ian and start CPR on my mom, pushing on her chest, pleading for her heart to beat.
He blinks dazedly and quickly takes his phone out of his pocket. Tears pool in my eyes as I pump my mom’s chest and breathe for her. I keep going, refusing to stop until the paramedics arrive and take over. But even when they roll her away on the stretcher, she still isn’t breathing on her own. And she is still so aged.
They wheel her out into the ambulance and speed off to the hospital with their lights flashing. Ian and I hop in his car and he hands me his jacket. I slip it on and cover up the blood on my shirt. But I can’t hide the blood on my hands.
That will be there forever.
Chapter 17
Ian and I return home later that night after my mom was stabilized and heavily sedated. She had taken a high dosage of her medication, plus there were traces of street drugs and alcohol in her system. By the time the doctors got her breathing again, the sudden aging had subsided. But there were a few extra wrinkles around her eyes and a little more grey in her hair
She is under observation and we can’t see her until a full mental analysis is completed. We hardly speak to each other and Ian heads straight up to his studio. He doesn’t know what really happened, which is good because he can’t handle what he does know: that my mom overdosed and that she cut up her forehead and wrists.
“If you need anything,” I call out as he trudges up the stairs. “Please come get me.”
“Sure,” he mutters, slipping off his shoes at the top of the stairs. “I’m just gonna go paint for a while.”
I doubt he’s going to paint. He’ll probably lock himself up in his room and smoke himself into a stupor. As soon as he is upstairs, I collapse on the sofa with my feet kicked up over the back. “All I want to do is sleep forever. Please just let me sleep