Red Riding Hood: The Ruby and The Shadow

Chapter Six: Busy Day

"Never again." I sighed as I looked up the the night sky. The stars shined beautifully as they twinkled in their rightful place. A shooting star had caught my eye as it danced across the sky. I smiled to myself as I watched the beauty of the night summer sky. A warm, fuzzy feeling filled me as I was left breathless watching the stars.

And then suddenly a dark figure had caught my attention from the corner of my eye.

My head snapped immediately up to the gate with tall forest trees towering above them, and I gasped as I saw a shadowy figure standing in top of the gate, hanging onto the side of a thick rough bark covered tree.

My eyes never left the figure as I watched it intensely with a sudden fear-like feeling filling me like a chilly cold liquid, running all over my body with goosebumps. My skin crawled as I continued to stare at it, and it at me.

I couldn't see the figure very well, the trees shaded it from the moonlight, but still the outline of the figure could be barely but surely seen. It had a human-like outline to it, and it was impossible to tell who, or what, it really was.

Suddenly only one thought managed to squirm it's way into my mind and scream loudly. 'Run.'

So that's what I did. With one single bound, I turned my body like lightning and my legs immediately carried me like the wind would a leaf. They moved with such ease and quickness that I felt I had run a mile within 10 seconds. And I didn't stop.

I continued to run like mad until I had finally gotten home. I didn't have time to open the fence, so I prepared to jump completely over it. I lifted the front of my dress to the length of my knees, and leaped over the small white fence. After I was halfway over, I felt a strong tug on the back of my dress, and the loud sound of a rip filled the empty air.

I gasped as I saw the back of my dress had torn into a huge slit in the middle. But that didn't matter for long. I still didn't have any time to stop and fawn over my dress, I just ran to the first door, swung it open and dashed inside, slamming it shut behind me and locking it. I breathed heavily as I backed away from the door, my heart beat a nervous wreck.

"Oh God..." I breathed out, putting a hand to my chest while trying to calm myself down and steady my breathing. "My dress..." I suddenly remembered as I looked down behind me and saw the dress completely split into two. "I worked so many months on it..." I felt my heart almost break in two as I examined the back of my dress. "Not even I can fix it..."

I turned to look at my Mother who was still in the chair, looking out the window. She hadn't moved in over three hours, and I sighed as I looked at her. "Mother, I'm surprised you're still awake." I went over to her and helped her up by the hand. "Let's go to bed... I don't know if its you or I who needs it more."

My hands shook slightly as I helped my Mother upstairs and into her room, and helped her lie down on the bed. I pulled the blankets over her, and made sure to adjust her pillows comfortably. "Goodnight Mother..." I whispered to her as I left the room and closed the door quietly behind me.

My heart still pounded wildly as I walked back downstairs and paced back and forth nervously, finding random things to fix and clean to take my mind off flowing thoughts of the shadow I had seen earlier. The image and thought of the dark outline of a manly figure still lingered in my mind, and left my fingers trembling.

I think the most frightening aspect of the shadow is not knowing who or what it was, and what it wanted. Or maybe perhaps the possibility that the shadow didn't even exist at all, and perhaps I was slowly becoming like my Mother.

I did know which was worse. Imagining the whole thing and being mentally crazy, or actually bring followed, STALKED, by something I couldn't even fully grasp of understanding.