Returning home was difficult. Enid was grounded, for starters, and this meant no hanging out after school, or taking mid-day trips to the record store, or strolling through downtown. It also meant her time with Peter was limited to school hours, which sucked exponentially.

Her frustrations were buttressed by deep-rooted anxiety upon realizing whose barn she had sought sanctuary in. He was much older, and so worn she almost didn't recognize him. But his eyes, big and piercing blue, were unmistakable.

"Wake up, Enid!" Mama hit the door with a bandaged fist. "School starts eight o'clock, you going to be late....again!"

Enid mumbled under her pillow, pulling her blankets tighter to her body. For the first time in a long time, Enid felt cold. She had been fighting for warmth all night, rolling around her bed engaged in a futile dance with her sheets. Even now, as the sun crept over the trees and peered through her window, she shivered.

Another round of knocking from Mama, then a sigh as she left the hallway. The clock on Enid's bedside table ticked away, declaring the time as '7:38' in blocky neon lights. A defeated groan later, Enid was shuffling out of her door with mismatched socks, dirty jeans, and her old leather jacket. She hadn't bothered running a brush through her frizzy curls, deeming the weather too tough a combatant.

"You look like crazy person," Mama frowned, holding a cup of tea in one hand and staring at her daughter with eyes of stone.

"Maybe I am crazy," Enid retorted, grabbing her backpack from the hall and slinging it over one shoulder. Then, without so much as a goodbye, she was out the door.

The morning air was too cold. It pierced her jacket, skin prickling at the touch. When the sudden burst of wind shot up behind her, she shivered even though she knew who it was. "Hey, Peter," she said, not bothering to turn around. The boy in question smiled, then matched pace with her.

"So you're doing better, then," he said. "Nice to have you back."

Enid barely gave him a reply. Words required too much energy. Peter frowned. She'd never acted like this before. Even when she was tired, exhausted out of her goddamn mind, she always talked to him. At least shone him that beautiful smile of hers. But today: nothing.

He wanted to ask, to say something, anything, but that seemed stupid in the moment. Instead, he pulled  out his walkman, put one earbud in, and held the other out to Enid. She didn't seem to notice, so he took initiative and put the thing right next to her ear so she could hear the music.

It was Billy Joel. Some sappy, piano-heavy tune he'd fallen in love with. It reminded him of the girl he liked more than he ought. Somehow, the music made the corners of Enid's mouth furl deeper.

"Peter...." She sighed, running two fingers over the bridge of her nose. Her head hurt. So did everything else, but the pounding behind her eyes stung worse when he was around. "I need some space right now, is that okay?"

Peter stopped walking. His face darkened. For a moment, a singular beat of time, the two stared at each other from across the world. Peter was the one to pull away. It made Enid sick seeing the look in his eyes. She knew it was the right decision because it hurt. "Yeah....yeah, of course," he murmured. Before Enid could say anything, he disappeared in a blue-grey haze.

That day hurt more than anything in the world. More than the poison flooding her veins, more than the needles breaking skin, more than any memory burned into her eyelids could ever inflict.

It took a lot of strength to make it through school. Enid's body felt heavy, every step was laborious. She didn't know if it was lingering sickness, or the doctor's aged face, but whatever it was needed to stop, because a girl could only take so much before she popped.  

It happened during P.E.

Everyone piled onto the track, sweaty and miserable even in the fine weather. Three laps in, Enid couldn't feel her feet anymore. Am I even breathing? As soon as it became a conscious action, her throat closed up and she coughed. Detouring away from the steady flow of teenagers, Enid keeled over.

Someone she didn't know stopped to ask if she was okay. "Maybe you should get some water or something, you don't look good," they said, placing a ginger hand to her shoulder.

A hand on the shoulder. 'It's going to be okay.'
A hand on the shoulder. 'Do you want a lollipop?'
A hand on the shoulder. And then it disappeared. Faraway, something slammed.

Enid's eyes defocused as she breathed in and out, so rapidly she couldn't tell where one ended and the next began, just a steady stream of noise and air.

Something slammed.

She started counting sets of four in her head. She needed to control herself. She needed control.

SOMETHING SLAMMED

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Enid stared at the vaporized hand still clinging to her shoulder. The fingers were charcoal brickettes digging into fleshy skin. She pried the fingers from her skin and they snapped, crumbled to dust. They left marks. What was left of the body tumbled to the ground and shattered. Enid remembered her mother telling her that some spiders shatter when you drop them. She had been amazed. She wasn't amazed now.

Backing away from what was left of the corpse, Enid's hands trembled. It was bad. It was so bad. A plume of rich, black smoke rose to the heavens, carrying with it the shattered remains of her classmates.

From behind her, faraway, came screams. Students and teachers crowded the windows of their classrooms to better see the carnage. The explosion lasted maybe five seconds, but that was enough to decimate the entire track. The tarmac melted and burned into the bottoms of Enid's feet but she couldn't feel it.

"What did I do?" She repeated it over and over, whole body trembling as tears flowed freely down her cheeks. "What did I do?"

Smoke swallowed her. She couldn't breathe, didn't want to breathe. The smell of charred flesh and rubber made her nauseous. 'If I stop breathing, it'll go away. I'll go away and this will never happen again.'

So she decided to stop.

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Somewhere in New York,

                        Charles gasped.