Everything seemed to move in slow motion, and the sky looked grey, and everything else appeared to be black or white. When you watch movies and dramatic scenes where everything dims like this, you never know just how accurate the images really are, and then something happens and you know - and just like that, you're starring in your own movie. Except, this time, it's not like when you normally fantasize. There are no fairytale endings, no luxury and swimming in rolls of cash, and there's no prince to save the day. The only thing that resembles anything you dreamed of is the constant ringing of sirens, and the image of police cars. The difference? This time, in reality, you're the one behind the car door, tinted so that you can see the damned world, but it can't see you.

You hear the muffled sound of walkie-talkies, police sending messages back and forth, trying to keep away from the fallen debris, broken on the floor. One man looks at you sitting inside his car, the sirens still sounding, and shakes his head as you stare off into space, dazed, and closes the door on you as you sit inside on the cold, leather seats. Dry sweat stains your forehead, and your palms are hot. The handcuffs that frame your wrists are cool and almost comforting in comparison, though they cut into your skin where the edges are jagged. You don't move. Your body is stiff, your back slightly arched, elbows on your knees. Your hands are frozen, your fingers still in the position they were when you held the gun in your hands and pulled the trigger, even though it was confiscated from your possession merely seconds after you fired the shot.

You weren't a thief, and you were most certainly not a killer. The only thing you'd ever harmed was the common housefly, and maybe a flower or two, neglected from a lack of being watered and cared for. Sometimes, when you found a butterfly or even some other insect or creature dead outside your front porch, you started to tear up. That's what he loved about you when you first met, wasn't it? The way you cussed at the cruel world for giving life, then taking it away so abruptly, and the emotion that you let show so clearly.

Then how could he have lead to this? The same freckle-faced boy who held the door for you, and bought you dinner last night? Those same eyes, deep blue, that seemed to look right through you, straight into your soul? The same arms that held you last December when your grandmother passed away - how could he lead to all of this?

You recall the way he kissed your forehead before he left your small apartment earlier tonight, the way he told you goodbye, the way it felt like he was implying the possibility of forever. You remember that unsettling feeling, knowing something was wrong. You had even seen signs, but you decided to ignore them, hoping that acting oblivious to them would somehow make them fade away. Like that scent on his t-shirts when he came over late, in the middle of the night, and those bruises you found on his body as you kissed his chest, and the way he carried that goddamn gun of his that you hated so much every time the two of you headed to a bar, or when you insisted on going to the casino.

In that instant though, you knew something was very wrong, and that's why, the minute he stepped out the door, and you heard his heavy footsteps walking towards the elevator, you reached under the bed and pulled out the black case, unlocking it with the spare key you kept on a chain around your neck, close to your heart - the one he'd given to you last Christmas - and removed the gun, taking it in your own two hands.

It makes you sick to the stomach to think that you couldn't find it in your heart to trust him, and you're disgusted with yourself for following him. You started up your car seconds after he left on his motorcycle, staggering yourself in with the traffic, hiding in his blind-spots. You follow him to a hotel - you can't remember the name anymore, those types of details have become a blur - but you do remember that strong, familiar scent of perfume that you used to find lingering on his clothes, coming from down the hallway you had traced his steps to. You knew instantly he was behind the door of where the smell was coming from. Your heart dropped as you crept quietly towards the door, pressing you ear against it, just in time to hear the loud and sudden firing of a gun, followed by a heavy thud.

You didn't hesitate. Only moments later, you slammed the door open to find him on the floor, a hole in his chest, obvious due to the blood seeping through his white dress-shirt. In his pulseless hands, he held a phone, and it remained ringing as you pointed your gun at a woman, who had only just dropped her own at the sight of you. She had blonde hair that was tied up, a few loose curls falling across the side of her face. She wore skin-tight jeans, and her wine-red tank top hugged her in all the right places, showing off her curves as she stood, startle as you moved closer, inching towards her slowly, blood rushing to your face as your body grew warm and your eyes flooded with hot tears of rage and hurt. You saw her eyeing something in the corner of the room. Following her gaze, you noticed a brown sack, full of green bills spilling out from it. You quickly peaked at him, lifeless on the floor, and realized that he held a wad of cash in his hands. You screamed out in fury as you understood the situation, recalling his blood-shot eyes those nights when he arrived late to your dinners and late-night encounters, remembering how he used to shrug your questions off, blaming his allergies. The reality of the situation had finally set in, and sunk into your mind. Before you realized what you were about to do, you positioned the gun and pulled the trigger, hitting the woman with the blond curls straight in the heart.

In the next few minutes, everything started to slow down, and yet move all too fast. Tears poured down your face - of anger and shock. You had just killed someone, and you stood, frozen as her body fell to the ground with a thump. In a few mere moments the hotel was surrounded by police cars. You could hear them from inside. Two policemen rushed into the room, one searching the room, examining the dead bodies on the floor of the woman you had only just shot, as well as the body of the man you used to love. The other cop cuffed your wrists, leading you out the door, forcefully. You didn't resist.
You were escorted to the car, and only then did you notice the thunder outside, how it had struck trees, splitting them in two. They must have come crashing down on the opposite side of the hotel that you were in only moments before, as you saw all the broken glass on the floor.

You were pushed into the back of the car, and one man asked for your name. You gave it to him, monotonously, and without stuttering, staring into the distance. Everything seemed to stop. The world seemed to stop turning. Everything stood still, except the car that drove you away, and you didn't try to escape. You didn't try to stop it. The world always took lives abruptly, leaving all else behind - it even damned beautiful butterflies - so you didn't stop the car from taking you away; you were no exception.