Mila rushes into the book club, a book tucked under her arm as she catches her breath. it’s only me, Ryan and Ella here today, the rest of our group were more occupied with other events to attend.

“hey, how’d that little trip go?” Ryan smiles at Mila as she sits down at our table, a large grin smeared on her face. “i found a book—from the abandoned library!” Mila tells us with pure child-like excitement in her voice and face, “what is it?” Ella tilts her head, all our eyes seem to move in sync to the book she’s hiding.

Mila puts it down, turning it around so we can read the title, “…Decay?” i read, confused. “and what’s with the symbols??” Ella asks, her finger brushing over the symbols where the author’s name should be. Mila ignores our questions and opens the first page, the language is so messy and unreadable. even for us. “i can read it,” Mila adds. “you’d have to be an absolute foul to believe that you can read this crap.” Ryan scoffs with a teasing grin.

“if you can, read this,” Ryan leans forward, flicking to page six and points at the first sentence at the top.

it takes Mila a few seconds before she responds, “scientists are unable to perform procedures as law enforcement begged, i am under investigation of the circumstances that include Sir Skizo Mitchelle’s murder. i am guilty. but thy scum shalln’t put me in cuffs.” Mila reads slowly, in her own time.

all three of us sit in shock, our eyes wide and mouths agape. “how did you do that?…” I ask, “i don’t know.” Mila replies. we all look at each other, speechless.

“what the hell is this book?”

two hobbies of mine include reading old books, and exploring buildings that’ve been left behind. things from the past give me a reason to constantly be out in secluded spaces or have my head stuck in-between library books. today, i traveled over 50 miles just to explore an ancient library from the year 1879, somehow still standing. no tourists. no silly teenagers graffiti. it’s just… old. covered in vines and green moss, trees fallen on it, weathered.

“what a beauty you are,” i mutter, step onto the still damp soil from my car and shut the door, locking it. it looks like any ordinary library, but there are carvings in the walls, symbols that make no sense but look so beautiful at the same time. my feet travel around, the book shelves are almost empty.

until i find one shelf.

a book, dusty, somehow completely untouched. i reach out and blow off the dust with my breath, not inhaling it. i step outside where the sun shines through the light grey clouds, the front says ‘DECAY’ and the author’s name has been written in strange symbols i don’t understand quite yet, but i plan to try and read this new… language, i would call it.

i flick through the pages, everything is written in a mixture of latin, russian, and mexican. strange. my eyes fixate on the first few words in the book, ‘through my findings, passing my visions, i sense the end is near and my legacy will burn in rage.’ is all i can translate at the moment, it takes a few seconds for me to realise i can read this.

“they’ll never believe me.” i chuckle, tucking the book underneath my armpit and rushing into my car, turning on the engine and immediately pulling onto the road, heading to my book club to tell the other members about this discovery.

I gasp for air, the violent waves of the sea flood my lungs and muffle my hearing. my body is thrown against the rocky shore, i’m soaked and my skin is ice cold to the touch. my vision blurs in and out of focus, eyes pacing around for some sign of life. A hill comes to my attention, ‘i could climb that’, i think to myself. Crawling, sharp rocks and glass dig against my knees and hands, I ignore it and firmly place my hands to the bottom. It took a lot to climb, but I pushed back against the agonising pain in my body and finally reached the top. Grass. I can feel it between my fingers. i lift myself up, and jolt my hip over and lay back. my breathing is hitched, holding back chocked sobs of relief and longing. i knew my place in the world. i also knew that this betrayal would lead to a bloody scene. “How the fuck are you still alive?” I hear her voice. my head turns and looks up, my eyes lay upon the bitch that forced me into the ocean. i can still remember her laughter when she watched me struggle to keep afloat. she looks annoyed, her face washes with worry. “Christ, how do i kill you?” she mutters to herself, I regain my strength and stand, almost towering over her. I’m not scared, neither is she.

“you can’t kill a man whose already dead.”

he was the first guy—the very first guy, that saw who she truly was. you could say it was a curse, but his acceptance was a blessing. she tried living up to expectations, but they weren’t his. because he had none, and sometimes that was good. there were times where she’d go off, and he’d sit and accept it all. eventually, he started retaliating, and her anger grew like a hurricane. then he found someone else, and she was left alone. it wouldn’t take long to heal, to make herself better and to see that a man can’t fix you, that was the only lesson she ever needed learned.

she, is me.

growing up, I always did things for myself. I bathed myself, fed myself, took myself to school, and sometimes even washed my own clothes if I tried hard enough. I had my mum. But she was never… there. like she should’ve been. She was in the house, but her priorities got messed up and suddenly I wasn’t one of them. I was so scared she’d forget about me. That one day when I was walking home, I’d get to the door and it would be locked because she forgot about me. And she slept—a lot, so I was scared if that ever happened, I would be stuck outside the door for the night. I was scared of being forgotten. And… i still am.

The victim’s skull was broken in two, some sort of blunt force trauma to the head. His lungs were filled with a sticky, blue substance that burns the bare human skin. We found poison injected into the bloodstream, and also in the saliva of the mouth. The crime was almost a fantasy. Being a highly skilled investigator, means no one would suspect me.

and I can cover up my mistakes as I work on the case.

I walk through the park alone, but soon am stopped by the sound of crying, when I turn I see a young face, salty tears cloud up her beauty. It feels strange to interrupt, but I feel as if I need too.

“Miss?” I speak, she wipes her eyes, “yes?” her voice is shaky, something must’ve happened. “May I sit?” I ask, she nods, and I sit beside her.

we both stare at the sunset, the exotic explosion of colours in the sky, a sight for sore eyes.

“I was you, once.” she looks at me, confused. “crying on this bench, over a guy.” I tell her, she stays silent. “he cheated. didn’t he?” she nods, biting her lower lip.

I take her hand and hold it gently, giving her a friendly smile. “you’ll get through it. i did, its your turn.”

she returns the smile.

“remember—i was you, once, too.”

The game begins with four players. A revolver sits in the centre of the table, Two bullets inside the cylinder. The four players have seven cards, One has eight, placing down card to start. The game is rummy, but the winner takes a risk.

Player Three is first to get a win, Taking the revolver in their hands, Spinning the cylinder, Placing it to the side of their head.

“Fuck!” Player Two shouts, the blood splattering on them. Player One exhales sharply, their hands shake. “This game is fucked!” Player Four groans, wiping the blood and flesh off themselves.

Player Three has been eliminated.

“Feeling dangerous? Come play The Card Roulette.”

<<DISCLAIMER:: this work is based off my own experiences with a sensitive topic that not a lot of people may be comfortable reading.>>

I can feel his hands on me, even after the damage is done. but my mind still remembers, my body frozen in fear. I couldn’t scream, or make a small squeal. there was no noise, just a ringing in my ears. a part of me died in that room, I can’t remove that part of me now. sometimes I wake in sweat, with tears trickling down my face. the moment I stopped fighting, was the moment I began to feel lost. my body didn’t feel like mine, my body was no longer my temple. it is a reminder, to a question I ask myself.

“who’s there left to trust?”

How do I tell a troubled couple their baby died?

I stand speechless, two other nurses stand with me, silently mourning the death of this baby. The baby who never got to take a single breath. The mother and father are waiting, I have to tell him their baby is a stillborn. I prepare myself. Wiping the small tears from my face. As I walk into the room, I can see the worry and hope in their eyes, it almost breaks me to have to do this. But I do anyway. It’s my job. When I tell them, I see the expressions drop, the mother begins to wail and cry into her lover’s arms. “I’m sorry for your loss.” I muster the words, it doesn’t even come close to how I really feel. I know the loss they feel.

“I’m sorry for your loss.” Doesn’t even cover half of it.