Chain Reaction 3.59: Dripping

A/N: Warning: I don't know what I was thinking while doing the Photoshop work in this. /shrug
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Alex

     "HELP!" A gunshot echos in the still air. Graham has lost his mind!

     Scared, I make a run for it only to take a few steps and realize I feel no pain. I stop and turn to find Graham slumped over, holding his chest.

     "Graham?" I face the house. "HELP!"

     "Alex." Graham coughs, and he practically vomits blood. "How?" He slumps on his side.

     I run around him. "No no no no no no." Emily loves her father. "Graham!" Where is everyone?! "HELP!"

     Did the gun misfire? I pick it up and look at it, also trying to stop the blood flow coming out of Graham's wound. "Graham, don't die on me!"

    "Bri," he breathes and coughs again, and more of his blood splatters the grass.

    I hear the door behind me open. People are yelling, asking what's going on, but the light in Graham's eyes has gone out.

    "Noooo!" Ethan yells. "Alex! What have you done?!"

    "What?" I look at him in shock. "I didn't do it!" I put the gun down.

    He shoves me aside, and as he does, movement catches out of the corner of my eye. "Someone's in the woods!"

     Ethan is still yelling at me while I dash in the direction of the movement I saw. I hear women crying.

     I run all over the small wooded area around my house, but I find no one. It's too dark! Was I imagining things?

     Ethan catches up to me and shoves me, hard.

     "My dad's dead! Are you happy now, you bastard?!"

     "I didn't kill him! There's someone out here!"

     "You were holding the gun when I came running outside!"

     "Ethan! I'm telling you the truth! It wasn't me!"

     "Oh, right," he replies, dripping with sarcasm. "Shut up. You two have hated each other for longer than I've been alive. You have blood on your hands, Alex. I've already called my buddies at the station."

     "If I did it, why would I be yelling for help, Ethan? He was about to shoot me!"

     "So that's your excuse? Self defense? You sonofabitch!"

     Has the world gone mad?

     I do what I can to defend myself from Ethan, but he wins the fight.

     "Here he is, fellas!" Ethan has my hands behind my back when the police get here. However, the officer in charge directs us all back into the house, where we're questioned individually.

     They won't let me speak to Emily! Surely she doesn't think I did it, does she? And where is Alaric? I just want to hold my family close and reassure them that I didn't do it, no matter what Ethan thinks. I want to apologize to Brielle--just because I couldn't do anything to help save Graham.

    They take me to the station, letting me know that it might be safer for me there. They question me again and act frustrated that I give them the same answers I gave them at the house. I didn't kill him!

     I spend the night in a jail cell.

     The next morning, someone posted my bail.

     When I walk out into the waiting room, I see my wife's stoic face looking back at me.