Waiting for my five pills to kick in didn't feel as long as when I needed one to sleep. I wasn't sitting on the couch, impatiently tapping my feet and watching what few channels weren't blurred with static. I didn't drink warm milk or take a hot shower to speed up the process. If there was one thing I could control, I wanted—no, demanded—it to be how much time I had left in the apartment.

I took out my journal, and my eyes lingered on each tear-stained page full of sloppy, often incoherent entries. Writing in my journal felt more therapeutic than on my computer, but I preferred to transfer my thoughts from paper to my floppy disk.

I didn't feel anything. I think I was suffering alone for so long that it was like I couldn't feel anything anymore. That made it easy to write a letter to my parents.

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷

Dear Mom and Dad,

If you're reading this, I guess it means I'm gone.

I just want you both to know that none of this is on you. All of it was from something none of us could fight, but I'll be honest...I needed to, at least, hear that you understood my feelings.

I think this all started after Kristin died.

'What?' You may ask. These hauntings. I told you something was after me, and you didn't believe nor listen to me. I tried talking to Ms. Morris about switching to a different apartment, but she kept saying she didn't have any available. I know she's lying because the one across the hall has been empty for weeks.

Also, I tried staying at a motel room. When you accused me of blowing through my savings and being irresponsible, after you hung up, I was forced to come back to this apartment. If you saw what I see every single day, you'd understand why I went that route.

I spoke to my doctor. The meds aren't working anymore. He knows it too, but I don't think he knows how to help me. Mom, I sleep 2 hours just about every night and no, it's not because of me picking up extra hours at Saint Ann's. It's because every night, I dream about that night at Kristin's house. It's been five years, but no one wants to talk about it or ask me how I've been feeling since then. Even after it happened, you all were so quick to get me past it instead of through it.

I need someone to actually listen to me and maybe help me finish grieving my best friend. I want to hear and believe that her death wasn't my fault. I wnt to hear ad beive tht you and Dad are proud me even I didnt finish college don't want to be compared to lauren and cole

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷

I dreamed of Kristin.

She was wearing a long, sheer pink dress that made her look like one of her older sister's porcelain dolls from the '80s. Her updo wasn't as tight and strict as the girls around her, dancing under disco lighting. She had colorful elastics, butterfly clips, and bobby pins. She stood there like a statue, smiling at me like Mona Lisa, with one hand on her hip and the other dangling by her side, yet those lilac and sunflower-colored bangles stayed on her wrist.

She didn't look like herself. She looked better. Older.

Judging by the balloons, streamers, and matching colored flowers, we were at prom, which I interpret as her showing me what could've been.

That emotional kick in the chest didn't affect me until I was woken up by an EMT.

He had the back of my head cradled in the crook of his arm like it was a newborn, while the other hand pressed a stethoscope to different parts of my chest. The room was whirling, his face was bending like sheet metal, and I imagined the sink doing laps around us before settling to his left.

"Looks like she's coming to," I heard someone else say. It was a feminine but stern voice and when I turned to the sound, I saw a woman leaning against the door frame with her fairly muscular arms crossed. Another EMT. A pale woman with blonde hair tied into a low sock bun and blue latex gloves that match her dark blue uniform.

"Yeah. Go get that fella from the living room and get Eric to bring up the stretcher." When she left us, I returned my eyes to the man holding me, caring for me without a hint of feeling inconvenienced. He had short black hair spilling out of the sides of his backward baseball cap; gentle, dark brown eyes that finally met mine and made me feel just as secure as the pitiful grin he gave me. "We thought we'd lost you, Helen."

How did he know my name?

If my face weren't so numb, I'm sure I would've worn my confusion. I brushed it off, assuming he went through either my purse for my ID or the stack of unopened mail I left on the kitchen counter. Then my answer walked to the door they left hanging off its hinges: Jay. His hair was combed into a mohawk with bangs, all doused in hairspray you could smell from miles away. I thought to myself, 'These people took the time to wake me up, and here he comes to knock me back out.'

But looking at his face, I wouldn't have teased him even if I had my strength. His eyes were puffy and red like he'd been crying nonstop, and when he said, "Thank God you're alive," his voice cracking confirmed that for me.

I brought one trembling hand to the tub's edge, then the other. I know I looked like an old woman who slipped, fell, and pressed her Life Alert until she passed out, and Jay staring at me with teary eyes made him seem like he was my grandson.

I pulled myself in an attempt to stand, but my legs weren't steady, and I was barely awake. That much sent my heart into overdrive, pounding like the Energizer Bunny. The EMT had to lift me the rest of the way with his hands under my arms before they repositioned. He placed one on my stomach and wrapped the other arm around my back.

"What," I started, taking exhausted breaths. "What're you—doing—here?"

My knees buckled and my eyes rolled back as, for a moment, everything around me faded to black. I was jerked awake when the EMT stood me upright, but my body was hunched against him as it pleaded to return to the cold tiles.

Jay licked his lips and said, "I saw your message yesterday." Finally, I could furrow my eyebrows, and when I did, he elaborated, "The message titled Entry Six." My heart skipped a beat as my face relaxed, my jaw dropping slightly. After writing each entry, I'd type it into Microsoft Word, but I was so out of my head last night that I must've sent it to him instead.

'That's fine,' I thought. 'It's just one entry. It's not like I sent him every single one.'

"So, I came down here to check on you." Just then, the female EMT returned, pulling a gurney, and Jay glanced at her before stepping over the debris into the bathroom. "Um, I knocked, but you wouldn't answer, so I took the spare key from inside the little plant next to the door." I look at her, then at Jay. "I walked to your room to look for you, and," he paused, but his mouth was open a little as if he didn't want to finish his sentence. "I saw your journal on your bed."

The EMT began walking me to the stretcher, and my eyes looked straight ahead. I felt like Claire and her thousand-yard stare. I hadn't picked up my jaw, and the more he shared, the less inclined I was to do so.

"Maybe we should put this conversation on hold until we can get her evaluated at the hospital," the woman said as the first male EMT helped me lay down, and I could see Jay nod. He ran his dark brown hand down his face with the other hand on his hip.

"Are you riding in the back or following behind us," the second male, Eric, asked Jay. He walked alongside me and the first guy.

"Um, I guess I'll take my car." Eric nodded before turning his attention behind himself, leaving Jay to stare at me with a sad expression

As we stepped into my apartment hallway, I felt like a spotlight was on me. I was right about the place across from me being empty, but nothing could prepare me for the number of people crowding the walkway as they stared from their thresholds. Just about every single one was either in their pajamas or casual clothes, and one woman in a robe and plaid pajama bottoms sipped from her mug.

These people, whom I'd never met and who knew nothing about me, watched me get carted away like it was better entertainment than the show ER.

⌦ .｡.:*♡

A.N. Maybe I was really young, but I don't remember floppy disks being all that popular back then. Then again, we only had a computer for maybe a year before we eventually got a laptop. I do remember the old phones with the spiral chords and my first time using a rotary (it was a toy, but it taught me how to use the one at my grandma's house.)