Minutes To Midnight [2]

[misa]

Misa didn't know where she was going but, she really didn't care. If she kept walking perhaps she could just walk away from the entire situation. Just maybe, she could walk away from her past, her mistakes; herself.

She'd only been in the Sanatorium for nine days. 'Observation', Mme. Gornray had called it. Of course, civilised folk would never admit it to be what it was – suicide watch. After being confined to a hospital bed for a whole nine days; too tired to move, too frightened to sleep, Misa had been closer to stir crazy than she'd even reckoned was possible.

Walking away from the hospital had been one of the greatest feelings in the world. Nine days of healing...Two minutes to destroy it all. Yes, she'd come down from that cloud faster than the time it took to straighten her legs for landing. And what was it that had done that? Dylan not being there.

Apparently nowadays, she didn't even need someone to huff and puff to blow her house down. All it took was Dylan not showing up. It made her so angry at herself that she could feel Tyuosa vibrating lightly against her ribcage. Or perhaps that was her heart doing the same idiotic flip it did every time she thought of Dylan.

She clenched her hands into fists by her sides, telling her heart to pipe the hell down. How had she fallen so fast? She had promised herself once upon a time that she would never become dependant on anyone ever again. She nearly laughed at how d@*n fairy tale the whole thing was.

Once upon a time there was a girl and she was sad. Then she fell in love with a handsome prince and he fell deeply in love with her too. He made her happy, and they all lived happily ever after.

Trouble was in all those stories; the girl was always secretly beautiful; the prince was there at the right moment; and the princess was never allergic to horses. The prince always rode a horse in those stories, and he would sweep his princess up onto the saddle with him and they would ride off into the sunset. No, Misa definitely wasn't a princess. She wasn't going to get a happy ever after.

Dylan had obviously realised what a heap of problems she was, just how much baggage she carried, and had jumped from the pages of this story sharp. Misa couldn't blame him for coming to his senses, she just wished her heart didn't thump quite so painfully when she thought of him leaving her like that.

[misa]

The shine of the moonlight bounced in the window, brightened ten fold by the sheet of pure untouched snow. Misa felt guilty stopping by the window to look at it - as though she were contaminating the breathtaking view with her absurd eyes.

It was funny, she had been getting use to them, even liking, the uniqueness of her eyes lately. It had been an individuality that affected nothing – it couldn't hurt anyone.

Now suddenly, she felt she would like nothing more than to rip them out of her own head. There wasn't even a reason behind it apart from the fact that she wanted to wipe herself clean of anything that could make her different, that made her Misa Shiori Matsuyama. That wasn't her name - it couldn't be. It was all wrong. Beautiful bloom of poetic justice. There was nothing beautiful or poetic or just about her or her life. It was all unfair and ugly and straight-laced. That was why she shouldn't have such exciting eyes. Her world was black and white and all the greys in between but, it sure as hell wasn't colourful. She didn't deserve them, after trying to cover them for so many years.

She didn't really deserve any of this, Misa thought sadly as she walked on, tearing her gaze from the beautiful night. Not Madeleine's kindness, or Dylan's affection, or the school's acceptance. None of it was meant for her. This world wasn't hers for the taking...

When she'd left the ---- Tribe, she had felt sure, so sure, that this was meant for her - that this was what she needed. How had she gotten it so wrong? She wasn't sure of anything, anymore.

At least when she had been on the run everything had been under her control. She had slept when she'd needed to, gone where she needed to go, and most importantly; she'd had a purpose.

But now...now, she was afraid to breathe in case it brought on one of her attacks. Now, she was drifting through each day in a tiring daze, they were all blending together in a sickening blur. NOW, she couldn't even control her dreams! And as for purpose? Her only purpose at the moment was to not collapse from exhaustion or something worse in any place too embarrassing.

How was it a person changed from one extreme to the next so d**n fast, too fast, for even her to catch it? But, perhaps it wasn't she who had changed...it was her situation or, more importantly, her surroundings.

It was this place! It was changing her, and not for the better. Far from it. The walls just felt too close, she couldn't breathe her. She had to run, she had to just breathe...

A staircase at the very end of the corridor provided her with a quick exit and surprisingly Misa soon found herself out on the rooftop gasping with something that wasn't tiredness, but hurt like hell and surveying Orchid Hill and the land beyond it, listening to the Cardsdale town bells ringing in the new year - but not for her.