The Emptiness Inside

The Emptiness Inside




She stood alone, snow falling gently around her, and watched as the car slowly pulled away and faded into the cold night. She used to stand there for hours, long into the early hours of the morning, hoping they would come back again soon. But now she knew better, and slowly began to make her way back up the steps into the apartment. After an eternity, she finally made it back to a battered old door, the faded brass number 7 hanging by itself. She pushed open the door into a cold dark room, and made her way around, lighting candles placed throughout. The light the candles gave seemed dim, oppressed by the darkness that encased the room, a hopeless battle the dark always wins after the last candle flickers out.

“Water.” A voice croaked from the corner, where the light seemed shy to illuminate. It croaked again, more feeble this time, and the shadowy mound seemed to stretch forth a hand. The girl pulled a bottle of water from a cupboard, one of the last, and carried it over. She pulled back the blankets that covered the man’s face, and gently poured small amounts of water inot his mouth, careful not to spill any. He coughed and spluttered, but drank earnestly like a man in drought, reaching for more every time she stopped.
She placed a hand to the man’s forehead, and recoiled from the touch.

“How is it?” The man wheezed.

“Fine, you’re going to be fine” The girl lied.

It hurt not to tell him the truth, but sometimes the truth should not be told. She reached for a cloth and dampened it with some of their precious water, placing it over his head. She knew he was dying, every doctor told her the same thing. “He won’t survive for much longer. He is a goner. Get out while you can, leave him. It’s not safe for you here. There is nothing you can do.” They were right, there was nothing that could be done. But she couldn’t leave him, her own father, not like this.
She lay with him every night, calming him in his night terrors, quenching his thirst for water. He grew weaker by the day, fading like a ghost. Some days he couldn’t remember her, and others he could remember everything. Bombs began to drop every night now, always closer, always over them. But blessedly, none fell on them. Or maybe it would be better if one did, and ended them both right now. She considered it on those darker days, they still had a gun with just one bullet. She could end his suffering, end his pain. But always, she could never do it. He was her father.


One night, as the bombs fell in the distance, men raided the apartment. Not soldiers, but thugs, preying on the weak. They stole all the little they had left, including their water and gun. They tried to take her father’s blankets also, and had beaten her as she tried to stop them, leaving her immobile for hours. She wept for a long time after they left, a silent cry of hopeless from which no tears were left to fall to.


Another day and night passed, sometimes fast and sometimes slow, and she felt her father’s pulse grew weaker and weaker, and felt her own heart stop each time she lost it. But he was there, still alive, still with her in this world, still murmuring for the water she could not give him. She still stroked his head and soothed him, but felt herself growing weak also, and knew her time would be over soon too. But she was not afraid. Her father would be right there beside her, and together they would leave the suffering and pain behind forever. Finding comfort in death, she closed her eyes and began to sleep.


Loud noises below awoke her, crashing from below and orders being called out in a foreign language. She could hear them marching up the stairs, and felt the building shutter from the bombs in the distance. She curled up tighter beside her father, knowing what was to come, and closed her eyes.

“Go” Said a clear, calm voice. “Go” Her father said again, standing up against the wall. “Leave, quickly, before they get here!”

The girl stood slowly and clutched her father. “No! I won’t leave you. You’re all I have.”

He held her tight as the soldiers climbed higher towards them. “I know. And I am sorry.” He quickly picked her up and carried her to the window.

“No! “ She screamed, kicking wildly.

“I’m so sorry.” Her father whispered, and threw her out into the cold night.


She landed in the snow with a muffled thud, knocking the wind out of her. She screamed at the wind as she saw the flashes of gunfire through the window, and faintly heard the sounds of bullets firing. She got up quickly and started to run towards the building, but stopped and with a sob, turned back away and ran. The ground shuddered as she ran, bombs falling in the background with great flashes of light, but she felt nothing. She was empty, hollow, a ghost running away, lifeless. If only she had died, if only she was still with him. She thought the pain of losing him would be the worst, but she was wrong. It was the emptiness inside, a hole, something she could never fill again. And all around her, the world fell silent.



Word count - 927