Five Seconds

(This story is by me let me know what you think!)

The sun was starting to set as Nina stepped onto the balcony. The wind was cold, pierced her skin but she stayed anyway. She knew she was supposed to be somewhere else but couldn’t remember so she pushed the idea to the back of her mind. Rubbing her hands together, she looked to the street below. Three children were playing and as she looked closely, the children began to resemble her and her friends, Carol and Jin, and as she leaned down, it looked like her and her siblings. Oh! Once they were like those children, having all the time in the world for fun, and games but then the minutes turned to hours, to days, to months, to years and brought with it change. Yes, change, the double-edged sword that could bring about either joy or sorrow. Nina looked to the distant mountains, mountains she didn’t even know that were there, the sun was midway setting on the horizon. A chill wind wafted her thin gown against her thin frame and with it the smell of dinner being cooked from the surrounding houses. She swore she could still hear her mother calling her to come in and get ready for dinner. Below, the children have gone, hopefully back to their warm, comfy homes. Nina walked back into the house and closed the glass door. Sitting on her couch, her eyes swept through the room and lingered onto something sticking out of her shelf. The impulse to be tidy overpowered her and she got up to push that something back in. She grasped the bind. It was an album. Instead of putting it back, she pulled it out and settled herself on the bed. It was thinly covered with dust but she wiped it away with her hand. Chocolate-brown leather with brass spiral designs on the cover. She couldn’t remember this album, never knew she even had one. She flipped the cover. “Ah!” she said herself. She saw her picture with her mom and dad. “I was probably 4 years old” she thought. She remembered how tall she felt sitting on her father’s shoulders, and the way her mom always brushed her hair and tucked her into bed. Her favorite bedtime story was The Lion King. She would fall asleep in the middle of the story but her mother never forgot where she left off. The next page brought three sets of eyes smiling at her from the page. She was around 7 years old at that time, in grade school and with her new friends. The page started to blur. Drops of tears spotted the picture. She surely missed them; they had a fight and have hardly talked for about a year now. Another page and it was her 10th birthday. She could still remember how the cake tasted. The sweet baked icing that crunched with every bite, the flower-shaped candy that lined the edges, and her picture in the middle. She could still feel the warm embrace everyone gave her that day, the mountains of presents, and the lovely dress she loved to show off. Her twin siblings, Jonas and Jazz were also born at that time and as she thought it, their picture appeared beside hers. She loved them so much, wanted to kill them at times but loved them nonetheless. Then the picture changed. She couldn’t recall flipping the page but thought she probably did. It was high school. Jin, Carol and she were still in the same school. Nina could remember those late nights of talking to them. Summer was her favorite season for hanging out with her friends. She could still remember the beach and the sunburns, the gossip they huddled to, and the cat fights with other girls at school. Nina smiled, remembering the time they had a food fight in the cafeteria and she was the one who started it. It was her first real trip to the principal’s office but it was worth it at that time, hitting their class president straight in the face with spaghetti and meatballs. It was precious, she hated the guy. Then there was Sweet 16, a party she would rather forget but didn’t. Frustrated finding it in the album, she quickly moved to the next. “Oh!” said Nina as she saw the next set of pictures. Suddenly she realized her Sweet 16 wasn’t so bad at all. Junior year in high school, Nina learned to drink and enjoy the alcohol and that’s the image she saw now. Her. Drinking. Puking. She couldn’t remember someone taking her picture that time, probably because she was drunk. She loved tequilas the most. She found the ritual amusing. She was in a house party when she first got drunk. That one she couldn’t remember but her friends told her that she ran around the house, yelling, laughing and crying at the same time. She wondered now, why she even drank the stuff. It embarrassed her in front of strangers and made her feel dizzy and sick the morning after. She was with a boy in the next picture. “Taylor” she whispered his name. He was her first love. She was with someone new now, Oliver. The feeling of being in love washed over her. She knew she was blushing, she could feel her face grow warm, and she just couldn’t help but smile. Her heart began pounding hard against her chest. She remembered, that long ago she asked her mother what those feelings meant, her blushing, her heart as if to jump out of its chest. Her mother said that she probably liked someone very much. “Do you?” her mother asked. Nina could only nod her head. She did like someone and later on she realized that you could grow out of it. And much later on, she also realized that how many times you let go of it, it would still hurt the same as the first time. The next picture was with her roomies back in college. Carol and Jin were gone, off to their own schools, following their own dreams. College was where she found Oliver, his lab partner while studying Biology. They both wanted to be doctors someday but so did half of the class. She didn’t know how it happened. It’s as if a switch was flicked and their story began. They were in their third year now. One more year and they would be to apply for a medical degree. She touched the picture then a wave of sadness came over her. Why was she feeling sad? They were still together weren’t they? She recalled the way he would call her name and make it sound so sweet, the time they would study together for an important exam, the way he could hug her when she was feeling down, and most of all, the way he would sing on stage with his band and look at her as if she alone was the only one listening. She looked at the picture again. Fear covered her and she didn’t know why. She closed her eyes, trying to relax.
When she opened her eyes she was no longer in her room. She was outside. The chill autumn wind reminded her of that. She remembered now, she was on her way to the grocery store to buy dinner. But what was she doing now? She looked around. She was in the middle of the street in the middle of the night at least she thought it was. It was very bright, so bright that she had to squint. She couldn’t see anything but it was growing, or rather coming nearer and nearer to where she stood. She then heard a car’s honk…5 and knew what was going to happen…4. Unable to move, maybe out of fear or maybe just because, she stood there…3, closed her eyes…2 and with one last breath…1, thought to herself, “I just saw my life flash before my eyes”