Jake C. Wallace: Wednesday Briefs #3: The Hollow: Soul Seekers

Each Week a group of authors participate weekly in Wednesday Briefs Flash Fiction. Each installment is 500-1000 words long and is posted to our blogs each week. After you read the latest in my story, click on the link at the end to visit the other flashers.

Welcome my new weekly flash story The Hollow: Soul Seekers #1 . My previous story Diventando: Becoming has been pulled so I can prep it for publication. I will let you know in the future a date of publication.

“Hey,” Logan said, finally breaking the silence. “Over?”

Unable to stall any longer, Levi slowly rose until he was almost sitting erect and nodded. Wisps of dizziness still spun in his brain. The heavy weight of the upper half of his body almost knocked him back over. He rested his elbows on his knees and nestled his head in his hands. His legs shook under the weight.

Logan’s gently touched Levi’s shoulder and the shock waves reverberated into the core of his chest. Damned over-developed startle response.

“Levi.” A noiseless pause. “Say something.”

A simple request but his mouth felt as though it had been welded shut. Prying his tongue from the roof of his mouth, Levi managed a dry, hoarse, “Thirsty.”

Before his words made their way around the room, Logan had leapt from the bed rushing to Levi’s bathroom and quickly returning with a paper cup of water. A relieved smile replaced the harsh line that had been Logan’s mouth only minutes earlier. A spark lightened his blue eyes beneath the darkness cast from the lid of his favorite ball cap. Curls of dark blonde hair – a bit darker than Levi’s – peaked from under the back of the cap. The scar from an accident a few years ago came from beneath the ball cap and ended just beneath Logan’s left eye. Still pronounced, the scar always made Levi gasp quietly when he really focused on the deep red jagged line.

“Here.” Logan pushed the cup into Levi’s weakened hand.

Levi grabbed at the cup awkwardly with both hands and juggled the lip of the cup to his mouth, slopping some of the clear liquid onto his shirt. At first, he sipped the water then, after the first cool drop hit his parched tongue, he emptied the cup of every drop.

“Whoa,” Logan said with a chuckle. “More?”

Levi nodded and emptied another cup when Logan had returned. Logan trashed the cup and settled onto the bed next to Levi. Logan’s weight displaced Levi and he had to steady himself. Fatigue was turning into exhaustion, overtaking Levi’s mind with a ferocity that equaled the fear. Sleep would be his refuge but not yet.

“I’m sorry, Logan.” The words were barely audible.

“For what?” There was a hint of surprise in Logan’s question.

For being a man reduced to the fears and functioning of a toddler.

“I’m not the one who just battled the demon,” Logan said, failing to lighten the mood. He punctuated this sentence with a light punch in Levi’s arm.

Levi straightened up a bit. Recognition brought a bit of a sneer to his lip. “You hit me.”

“What? Can’t take a little punch from your big brother?” he teased. Teasing Levi was one of Logan’s favorite past times.

He raised his hand to his left cheek and tried not to glare too harshly at his brother. “You. Hit. Me.”

Logan flinched as if he had felt the slap against his own face. Anguish colored his eyes and he averted his stare. Silence. Logan’s eyes scanned the room as if searching for the words or possibly an escape. When he returned his gaze to Levi, his eyes swam with so many emotions, too many to pin them all down. Levi was sure fear was one of them.

Logan straightened where he sat, a move definitely to increase his courage.

“You were so...” He paused before blurting out, “gone. It was like you weren’t even there no matter what I said or did.” He pulled off his ball cap and held it in one hand and raked the other hand nervously, through his golden mane, setting his curls free. “The fear on your face was sheer panic.” He stared pointedly at Levi probably intent on getting his point across. “I was scared Levi - about two minutes from waking Mom and Dad or calling 911.”

His shoulder rounded and Levi could see this attack had taken a toll on his protector as well. Logan’s reaction reiterated how bad Levi’s panic attack had been. More times than he could count, Logan had sat with Levi, talking him through the panic and mind-altering fear. As long as Levi could remember, Logan had done whatever was necessary to assure Levi felt safe and connected to the real world. Logan’s world wasn’t Levi’s world. Levi’s world had been created within the real world. An invisible barrier prevented him from truly living life as others knew it, always an arm’s lengths away. He dwelled in a realm built on anxiety, dread, feelings of unreality, and invisible threats from a faceless enemy. Dulled emotions, the need to feel something - anything – had dominated his nineteen years. He was different from his family and friends, and had always known that fact to be true.

He nodded, ignoring the imminent shut down of his weary brain. “Yeah. It was bad.”

“Why didn’t you come and get me earlier? And why this one was so bad? I can’t remember the last time you had a full blown panic attack?” Logan’s questions rolled out one after another then the one question Levi had been dreading. “Did you forget your meds today or something?”

Out of the corner of his eye, Levi glanced at the small black zippered bag that rested on his nightstand next to his bed. Even at school earlier in the day, the contents of that bag had reached out to him, calling with promises of relief. Logan’s eyes searched Levi’s face for any answer other than the one he had.

He’d quit taking his meds over a week ago.

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