Extraits

Raindrops keep falling on my head . . .

There’s no reason why a song should play over and over in your head when something horrific is happening to you. No reason, yet they do. Songs from your life, songs about the moment, songs that are there for no reason at all, except to torture you. From that moment on for the rest of your life, every time you hear the song that plagued you in your time of terror, you will always be taken right back, as if you never left. Forced to relive it all over again.

I don’t know why it was that particular song. Maybe it was the beat of the rain falling outside. Maybe it was the timing of the blood dripping onto my face. Maybe it was playing on the radio. I didn’t know. I knew I was in a car—that’s what I knew. A car that was twisted so badly I could no longer see my parents in the front.

I was so terrified. My mother was screaming. The rain was pounding down on the roof, making a horrible roaring sound that blended with her deafening yells to create a noise I’ll never forget.

I remember my body being squashed in an angry position, my legs twisted, my head tilted back, my arms stuck between pieces of bent metal. My sister, who was beside me, seconds before, laughing and giggling over a silly joke my father had made, was suddenly dead quiet. I cried out, so many times, but whatever voice I had was stuck in my throat. Even when desperation took over, and I became frantic, the silence remained.

“Please, wake up.” I’ll never forget my mother screaming. “Jayden! Milly! Aria! Please.”

There was so much blood. It was on my face, on my body, sticking my fingers together when I tried to move them. Panic was something I became all too familiar with in those terrifying moments. Then there was my sister. What I saw will forever be implanted into my memory for every day to come. It will never leave. She was twisted, so twisted—I knew there was no way it was natural. Her head was turned to the side, facing me, and her eyes were wide and open, lifeless.

I screamed for her, but once again my voice let me down. Instead I was left staring at the life that was no longer present in the blue eyes I adored so much. My sister was dead. It didn’t matter that I was young and shouldn’t have known. It didn’t matter. I knew.