The gradual beeping sound chimed in my ears and ricocheted from invisible objects in the dark void surrounding me. I turned to run from the approaching ghostly form that had overtaken the beautiful naked body of the man I once loved, but before I could take a proper step, he had my forearm in his grip.

"You can't have me," I growled. "I was never yours to begin with and that's not changing now." I pulled my arm from his hold, the dark red blood on his palms acting in my favor. Even though he tried digging the tips of his fingers into my flesh, the pain didn't stop me from evading him.

I ran forward through the spacious blackness, following the vague beeping in the distance. I knew where the sound was leading me and had the urge to do nothing more than get there. A feeling in my gut told me once I reached the hospital room where my body lay, I would be safe even if respite would be brief.

Finally, the pinprick of light grew larger the closer I got and lit up the familiar scene. This time, my unconscious body wasn't alone in the bright hospital room.

The thinning red hair of the woman who stood over my body ushered in that sense of comfort I knew would meet me here. Her hair in a beat bun. Her broad shoulders resembled mine although they slumped with grief, and even so, I wanted to bury myself within those arms and rest on the nurturing shoulder.

"Mom?" I called. "Mama, it's me."

Of course, she didn't turn around. She couldn't hear me. She probably had no idea I was nearby, witnessing her eyes well up with tears and her lips tremble as she tried to get words out. "I'm so sorry, baby. I won't sleep until I do all that I can to find the person who just left you on the side of the road."

"What? No." I shook my head, trying to step foot over the threshold and enter the room. For some reason, no matter how much I walked or moved forward, the room evaded me, keeping me at arm's length. "No. A car didn't do that to me. It was Nolan, Mom. Nolan is at fault. He did this."

Why did her words seem so much like a goodbye?

She placed her warm hand on the forearm of my body, and I melded into her warmth, the softness of her fingers, the pressure of her grip. Tears blurred my vision as they fell over my lids like water from a broken dam.

I brought my arm up to confirm that I had indeed sensed her touch and was startled to see her standing at the bedside through my flesh. How could I forget I was fading and fast?

The light went out leaving me in darkness. "No!" I screamed, not ready to let the vision go. Only my sobs and sniffles were heard. The disappointment that darkness and not her arms enveloped me settled in. "Mama," I cried. "Don't leave me, Mama."

Suddenly, a feeling I had yet to experience washed over me. Defeat. I didn't want to do this anymore. I couldn't stand the fog, the dark, the loneliness. Maybe I fought so hard for nothing. Maybe Nolan was right, and all my efforts were pointless. Fate had a plan and that plan had been put in motion and there was nothing I could do about it.

The proof was in the fact that this wasn't the first cycle I had encountered, yet I had made the same choices that led me to the same outcome.

I dropped to my knees, awaiting the inevitable to happen. Either Nolan would come swoop me up into his grotesques embrace or I'd simply fade away to be replaced by another phantom of me that would remain in this space with Nolan for eternity.

Then without warning, the light came back on, flooding me in utter whiteness until my sights adjusted to the large pool of blood and the trail smeared across the white tile floors of the photography studio. Throbbing in my temple increased and I whimpered in pain.

There, Rhea lay in a puddle of fresh blood, weak but barely conscious. Another spectral doppelgänger struggled to emerge from her back as she lay on her stomach, having collapsed during her attempt to crawl. From the looks of it, she was heading toward the door that led to the exit of the building.

To witness how hard she fought to get from the bedroom to the center of the spacious studio put a fire under me. How could I give up if she refused?

I stood making my way onto the scene with ease. When at her side I got down onto her level. "Rhea?" I waved my hand before her glazed over eyes as she stared through me and into space. She blinked slowly, bringing relief to my heart. Once fully aware, the struggling ghost at her back vanished, even if it was only temporarily. "Rhea, you can do this." I looked into her vacant eyes. "You need to keep going. Get to the door, that's all you have to do." I waved my hand in front of her again, burning my gaze into her until her eyes finally settled on me.

"Help me," she whispered and brought her palm to the horrid wound on her head. "I'm—I'm dying."

"No." I shook my head. "Not if I have anything to do with it."

She dismissed my doubt and sighed. "I'm bleeding out. Not gonna make it."

Right. What was I thinking? I had been too wrapped up in my own grievances to remember that we still had a chance. It might be slim, but Rhea still had a chance.

I got up to carefully make my way over and around the smeared and puddled blood that turned the once pristine room into a bloodbath. Although it probably couldn't affect me, being I was on a separate plane, subconsciously I tried to avoid it.

When I had to make my way past Nolan's lifeless body, I cautiously moved around him as he slumped in a pool of his own red liquid. Each step was calculated as I couldn't imagine walking through the stickiness. In my mind, I anticipated one of my careful steps being interrupted with a sudden grasp as he or his ghost reached out to stop me.

Thankfully the powers that be allowed me to move beyond his final resting spot and through the bedroom toward the bathroom. As I went into the claustrophobic space, I questioned why I was able to react with this scene and not the one with my body lying in the hospital bed.

There I was, in the bathroom. My aim was to search for a first aid kit with gauze or a hand towel I could take back to Rhea to help her stop the bleeding, but instead I was stuck looking into the mirror.

At first, nothing was there to greet me. The reflection I assumed would always be there was nowhere to be seen, but the more I focused the more I made out the recognizable eerie figures. Multiple images of me appeared, facing me but standing slightly behind the other. The visible parts of them and their wounds varied slightly.

When I shook my head in utter shock, they did too, mimicking me and my actions just as a reflection would.

I couldn't take anymore. I couldn't study the various injuries, bruises, and blood spatter on their faces and bodies. The thought of what it meant was too much for me to digest. I pivoted, placing my back to the mirror, and meeting the used hand towel hanging from the towel bar.

Reaching out to grasp it only brought my attention to my fading form and jumpstarted my sense of urgency. I lay my hand upon the white cloth, and just like the times before where I tried to interact with anything physical, my hand went straight through it.

"Damn it," I huffed in frustration. I remembered how I pushed the glass trophy, making it teeter on its base, and I took a deep breath. "Come on. I can do this. I need to do this for her. For me." Again, I placed my hand on the towel, feeling the soft fibers tickle my palm. "Yes, yes, yes." I pulled the cloth, and it slid over the metal rod and flopped onto the floor.

If I could perfect this and bring the towel to Rhea, maybe I could bring her the phone Nolan had hidden so she could call for help. If I gathered my strength soon, I could probably even open the front door and drag Rhea to the exit myself.

An optimism suddenly bubbled inside me. I crouched to get closer to the cloth and placed my fingers over it, preparing to pick it up. When a sound of a door latching, or unlatching stopped me in my tracks. I stood and turned to look behind me, fully anticipating ghost Nolan to be standing there.

When only the apartment and its contents were there, I frowned suspiciously. Although my heartrate had risen, I was left questioning. What had happened? I tried ignoring the searing throbbing in my skull, but it took far more effort than I could muster. I placed my hand to my temple, giving in to the pain and made my way back toward Nolan's body.

When I approached, I realized the sound I had heard was someone fumbling with the front door lock.

I rushed back into the studio where Rhea lay in same spot I had left her. When the front door finally opened, a relief washed over me when the bright light of the sun illuminated Joselyn in the doorway.

Euphoric excitement washed over me like a wave of warm water in the winter. "It's you, Jos! Yes, yes!"

She took only two steps inside before the door closed behind her. She gasped when her sights landed on the scene and dropped the bag from her hand, spilling its contents at her feet. "Rhea?!" Her high heels click-clacked as she rushed to Rhea's body. "Oh, my sweet Jesus. What happened to you, girlie?"

My heart raced in anticipation. "You gotta stop her bleeding, Jos." The words slipped out as if she could hear me, but I knew she didn't even know I was there.

Rhea removed her hand from her head wound and Jos gasped at the trauma of it. "What in the world happened to you? I need something. Uh, let me get you some kind of bandage." She kicked off her heels and rushed toward the back room. I stayed at Rhea's side as she struggled to push herself up with wobbly arms.

When a bloodcurdling scream came from the hall, I knew Jos had encountered Nolan's body. The way her screams tore through the space rattled the air around me and I covered my ears with my palm.

"What the hell, Rhea," she cried. "What the hell?"

It was silent for nearly a minute before Jos returned with the washcloth and a bottle of water her hand. This time, a shocked and vacant look nestled in her eyes. She slipped on a spot of blood, nearly falling but caught herself successfully. "What in god's bloody hell happened here?" She crouched, helping Rhea flip over to apply the cloth to her head to slow the bleeding.

After Jos assisted Rhea with a much-needed drink of water, she instructed Rhea to hold the cloth to her head. Some strands of her blond hair hung the back of her head instead of her loose ponytail, indicating she had moved quickly when gathering it up. I studied the contents that fell from her purse, as the makeup bottles and lip gloss littered the entry way but took note of the blank look in Jos's blue eyes.

An immediate question plagued me. Why hadn't she picked up her cell phone from among the litter of makeup to call for help?

~~~

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