I breathed in the fresh, crisp air. Another jolt of lightning pain pulsed through my body like electricity filling the empty space around me with the sound of panting.
I felt for my backpack. Inside I found my wallet with stiff fingers.
Inside: my Ohio state driver’s license, credit cards. It is possible no one will ever find me. I frowned at the photo of myself. No one will find you, April DuWitt, 5’4” eyes BRO.
Silence is maddening. I began looking at the things I kept behind my identification. These things, if it were possible, seemed to say more about me than my government issued ID card.
A movie stub and Walden’s member card. A phone number jotted down on a piece of ripped notebook paper with no name. Twenty eight dollars…
My heart sank. A group picture from my Junior Prom. I looked at all of the familiar faces; familiar but strange. Everyone seemed young, even though the photo was from only three years ago. I look at face after face, remembering, laughing, crying, regretting every single moment I carried with me.
Now I was sinking, almost comfortably, into numbness and became unable to move.
Gazing upward I stare at the diamonds of my tomb, treasures innumerable shimmering magically above. I hold remnants of an expired life, my life, in frostbitten hands. My breathing is slow, drawing in each empty, cold taste.
I know no one will find me. I relive happier, warmer days as ice crystals overcome me. Frost offers one last kiss. My lips and every lie they ever told are silently and eternally preserved in this case, forever.
