Maria felt numb. She felt a feeling of dread over her, like a dark cloud was hung over her head and was never planning on leaving. For it has decided to make her it's humble abode and she actually welcomed it with open arms.
Hearing that the man that you were set to marry, was dead is more than enough to make anybody feel numb. However, for some reason unbeknownst to her, she didn't shed a tear.
Even when she saw his dead lifeless body laying on the Autopsy room bed, she didn't even cry.
His burial was scheduled and everything was being prepared by Jeffery's family, they even came to visit her countless amount of times to check up on her to see if she was doing well. She was grateful for it.
She told her parents that Jeffery was dead, and they both send their condolences to her, they even wish that they were there to console her–they were currently in Brazil for the holidays.
She told them not to worry themselves over it, that she was doing fine. She was not.
She could barely even get a wink of sleep, without her having dreams of him being attacked by a wild animal and she just stands in the corner without the ability to move a muscle.
Every single day since his death, she always wish that it was a prank, and he would walk through the front door, yelling 'SIKE!' and she would run and give him a big hug, while nagging him for making her worried sick.
But it wasn't a prank, it was real. She was worried about him going to take hike but she just wasn't worried enough. If she only she had put in pressure for him not to go, he would have still been alive.
She has been blaming herself for not putting in pressure for him not to go, she shouldn't have been so nonchalant about the whole thing.
The weather on the day of his burial was just how Jeffery was as a person. Warm, bright, and sunny. A complete contrast to how the mood and atmosphere of the church was, which was sad, dull and gloomy.
The Priest stood on the pulpit, speaking about how God was the giver and taker of life, and for some reason the whole preaching was pissing her off so badly, but she held it back. There was a reason she stopped going to church despite coming from a strong christian background.
Even though Jeffery always goes to church every Sunday and was a devoted Christian, he never for once coerce her into following him to church. He respects her decision not to attend church, and she loved him for that.
It was time for his family and loved ones to give a speech on how much of a good person that Jeffery was, Maria didn't prepare a speech. She was still delusional enough to think that he would come through those doors and say that it was a prank, and the body in the coffin was just a double and not his real body.
When it was time for her to give her speech, she climbed the podium, and stared at the small crowd seated on the chairs.
Then reality hit her, Jeffery was dead. It was like as if a dam broke and the tears came gushing out of her eyes, as soon as she started crying, Jeffery's mother came to her side to hold her close.
She whispered into her ear, that it was ok, that everything was ok.
"You don't have to give the speech if you don't want too." Jeffery's mom said, but Maria insisted on giving the speech either ways.
She went back to the podium once more, she took in a shaky breath and let it out. The speech she gave felt almost bitter sweet to the ears of the people listening.
She talked about so many things about Jeffery and how much of an amazing person that he was, cause he is.
She just wished that she had stopped him from going to that goddamn hike.
After she was done giving her speech, she went back to her sit, playing with engagement ring that he gave to her. It felt as if it weighed heavily on not just her fingers but her heart as well.
Jeffery's coffin was carried to the burial ground, each of his family poured sand onto the coffin, Maria said that she doesn't wish to pour sand onto his coffin. That she couldn't bring herself to do it.
She watched with a heavy heart as they buried him, she didn't know if there was anything that she could do at that point in time anymore. But just watch.
****
When Maria got home from the funeral, she sat down on the couch in her living room, suddenly a memory came to her mind almost as if it was something that happened just that moment.
It was of her and Jeffery lounging around eating a bag of potato chips, and drinking a can of soda, while they watch a random documentary that was being aired on TV at that moment. No words were being spoken, it was just them enjoying each other's company.
She felt tears roll down her eyes, as she covered her face with her hands. She kept on crying, it felt so lonely this past one week without him, and it looks like she couldn't move on. She didn't have the passion for anything anymore.
She sometimes wish that she could just roll herself into a duvet and hide away in her room for the rest of her life. Sadly, she was an adult that needed money, so there's nothing that she can do but suck it up and head to work.
But now that she thinks about her, since when Jeffery's death was announced to her. Her gut has been saying to her that it wasn't just a random wild animal attack.
She stood up from the couch in the sitting room and went to her study. She sat behind the desk where her laptop was charging and open it up. She entered the search bar for wild animals and their teeth/jaw.
While at the same time looking for references of them biting onto human flesh, she took her time to observe the details of the bite size of the animal, while staring at the picture of Jeffery's body at the autopsy room.
She spent the whole weekend trying to find any form of animal that could possibly have the same jaw/bite size as the one that Jeffery has on his body. However it ended up being futile.
She took a sip of her coffee, even though she hated coffee without sugar and cream, she needed it to keep her awake through out the night.
She hadn't showered since Saturday morning, and it was currently Sunday evening. She needed to sleep and most definitely get some shut eye, but she couldn't bring herself to be bothered with it.
She let a groan of frustration as her investigation was not producing any result, it was just nothing but a dead end.
She felt like giving up, she would never find whatever it was that killed Jeffrey, maybe it was just some random wild animal that killed Jeffery.
Then a thought came to her head, maybe it was a being that shouldn't even exist, like maybe a werewolf, or a vampire.
She search the internet once more to see if she could find anything, there was just random articles that lead to nowhere that were displayed on her laptop screen.
When it seemed once again that her search was futile, an article from years ago that she hadn't clicked caught her attention.
She checked it out, and the article was dated to five years ago, it talked about the death of Patricia Andrews, a college student that went hiking into the woods only to go missing, her dead body was found days later with a lot of her body parts removed.
There was another similar article with the same issue about the death of someone under the same circumstance.
As Maria kept on reading each article, she realized that it was all linked under the same thing that happened to Jeffery.
But what could this thing be? A werewolf? A vampire? She couldn't tell. All she know is that that thing most definitely had a hunger for human flesh.