Free Unhinged by Shelley R. Pickens Page A

back to our
car when we hear it. The scream echoing through the night and
reverberating off my soul.
    I take off running towards the house, my
heart beating out of my chest. Panic fills me as my heart races
from fear and exertion. My breath comes faster and faster, I can’t
seem to catch it. My imagination runs rampant. With all that has
happened, I can’t even fathom what kind of wrong is going on inside
Dejana’s house right now. Whatever it is, it can’t be good.
    I yell, “No!” and dig my heels deeper into
the ground, willing my tired body to go faster. Just as I reach the
door, Logan overtakes me and lunges at the door with his shoulder,
breaking the locked door off its hinges. He flies through, his
stance ready for danger.
    “Dejana!” I scream, desperate to find the
reason for her distress. “Dejana, where are you?” I plead.
    We’re met with an eerie silence filled with
foreboding. I turn to Logan. “You search the kitchen. I’ll go to
her room. Please, Logan, we have to find her,” I implore, the
desperation clear in my voice.
    Logan turns right towards the kitchen as I
run left to the staircase adjacent to the foyer entrance. I run up
the stairs two at a time, the exhaustion I felt just minutes ago
completely gone. A mix of adrenaline and fear pulse through my
veins, fueling me now. At the top of the stairs, I don’t even slow
my pace as I turn right and make a beeline for Dejana’s room. I
burst through the door, slamming it against the wall in my
desperation to find my friend. I make a precursory look about the
room, my eyes flying left and right, looking for her brown
highlighted hair, but I don’t see her.
    I’m just about to give up on her bedroom when
I see her favorite pair of black boots poking out from behind her
bed. I run to the other side of the big four-poster king sized bed
and there I find Dejana, lying on the floor of her room face up,
eyes closed, and in the same clothes she wore earlier to school. I
fall down to my knees and shake her.
    “Dejana!” I cry. “Are you okay? Please answer
me!” I implore as I shake her shoulders, desperate for her eyes to
open and tell me to get the hell off her.
    Yet nothing happens.
    I put my gloved finger on her neck and feel
for a pulse. I am finally able to breathe again when I feel a
strong heartbeat. Logan calls my name from Dejana’s bedroom
door.
    “Over here by the bed,” I tell him.
    Within seconds, he is on the floor beside
Dejana, cradling her head in his lap. He checks her pulse just as I
did and whispers, “Thank God,” when he finds it. Logan looks up at
me, his face full of confusion. “What happened to her?” he
asks.
    How should I know? But I don’t blame him for
asking; it’s the exact same question I have been asking myself.
    “She seems to be unconscious. I’m not sure
what happened. I don’t see any blood or injuries, but I can’t wake
her up. Should we take her to the hospital? I can call her parents.
I think I have her mom’s number in my phone…” I say as I pull my
phone out of my back jeans pocket, but Logan doesn’t let me
finish.
    “No, Aimee,” he says in curt strong voice.
“We have to know what happened to her. And you are the only one
that can tell us.”
    Somehow, I knew that’s what he was going to
say. I’d be lying if I didn’t tell him that I had thought the exact
same thing the second I found her. I'm just not sure that I can
actually do it.
    “I know you feel this is the only way, but
maybe she’ll wake up soon and can tell us what happened?” I ask
hopefully, but Logan is already shaking his head.
    “Enough is enough. You are the only one that
may be able to figure out what this is and how to stop it. You are
the only one that can see exactly what happened to her. Please,
Aim,” he implores, “what if the next person this happens to is you ? I can’t let that happen; I won’t let that happen,” he
finishes, determination chiseled in every feature of his face.
    “I get it, I