The Case of Amelia Kearney

Prologue [REWRITTEN]

🥀
Prologue-
————————————————
Shouting could be heard from downstairs. It echoed through the vents and the sound bled to each room in the house, from the first floor to the second. It was late at night, and definitely not a time that anyone should be shouting.

There was a girl upstairs. She'd been just dozing off when the shouting had started. The girl upstairs sighed upon hearing the sound, knowing that it was because her parents were fighting again.

She didn't know what the fight was about this time. And to be fair, she didn't want to know.

It wasn't her business what her poor excuses of "parents" were fighting about this time. All she knew was that it would be dangerous for her to go downstairs at that moment, for fear of agitating her parents with her mere presence and having to deal with the consequences that would certainly come from that.

This girl's home life was substandard, to say the least. Her mother was a diagnosed narcissist who dabbled in hard drugs, and she felt no care for her own child, proven by the mistreatment she went through every time the two interacted. The girl's father, similar to her mother, was bad. He was an egotistical, overly prideful man who couldn't be bothered to care about anyone but himself. In shorter, simpler terms, they were both self-centered pieces of human filth.

The girl was Amelia Kearney.

Amelia couldn't remember exactly when things got bad. All she knew was that her parents blamed her for their shattered relationship, and that they would never forgive her for "destroying their marriage". Them putting their blame on her, in her opinion, was incredibly foolish and wasn't something founded on fact. They'd just chosen to blame her for something she had no control over.

And after years and years of the same mistreatment for no reason, Amelia was tired. Tired of all the yelling, all the screaming. Even if she wasn't the one being screamed at, she still despised all the loudness. She was not only tired of the yelling, but she was also tired of nothing ever working out for her. Quite frankly, all she wanted at the moment was to sleep. She wanted to sleep and never wake up. Or, perhaps she did want to wake up. Perhaps she wanted to wake up in a different place, with different parents, and to have all of this be just some sick, awful nightmare.

Listening to all the yelling, however, she realized that wasn't an option. There wasn't any way she'd be able to fall asleep with all the yelling, as it put her mind in "fight mode".

Maybe I can leave. Sneak out. I could stay out for hours, and sneak back in when they're done having their fit. Maybe then I can sleep.

She decided that she'd just leave. Not permanently, of course. Just temporarily. She'd snuck out before, and every time previously that Amelia would leave the house, even just to run small errands or whatnot, she felt just a small breath of freedom.

And so, she decided to leave. She'd be gone for an hour at most, her parents wouldn't even realize that she'd slipped away to begin with. They'd be far too busy arguing to realize she'd left to begin with.

This wouldn't be the first time she'd done something like this. She didn't sneak out all the time, but she snuck out often enough that she'd even made a small routine.

First, she'd get out of the house. Whether that be by sneaking past her constantly arguing parents, or sneaking out of her bedroom window, she'd find a way out.

Secondly, she'd go to any store open late at night and buy things. Food, usually. Like chips or drinks, stuff she could eat just to pass the time.

And then lastly, she would make her way to an old treehouse that her dad had built for her before he'd become terrible. She'd stay there for a while, sometimes even hours, and she'd chill out and listen to the night birds. Like the owls or nightingales. With her plan laid perfectly down in her mind, she set off to get ready to leave.

So, grabbing her battered phone and wallet, she crept downstairs.

Sneaking around the corners and avoiding each creaky floorboard, Amelia was finally at the front door. Her parents were too busy screaming at each other to notice their child sneaking out.

Once she was outside, she breathed a sigh of relief. She hated being in that terrible, stuffy house, with her screechy, terrible parents.

She wondered where to go now that she had a measly amount of freedom. Maybe I could go to a gas station. Or a late-night grocery store.

...Or a nearby chain corner store.

There was a 7-11 a block or so away, and Amelia decided that it wouldn't hurt to go there. Maybe I could get a slushie. And some chips on the side. That would be nice.

With thoughts of her favourite processed foods in mind, she began the short, one-block walk to the 7-11.

It was a foggy night. The air was moist and cool, and the sidewalk was dampened by the fog.

Amelia often looked back on this moment.

She could have turned back. In the back of her mind, she screamed at herself, saying I should have turned back, despite knowing that there was no way she could've known what would happen in the future. Or maybe it was her parent's fault. Perhaps maybe – just maybe, if Amelia's parents hadn't been fighting in the first place, Amelia would've been sleeping.

And perhaps if she'd been sleeping —

Perhaps if she'd been sleeping, nothing would've gone wrong. Perhaps if she'd been sleeping, she wouldn't have been taken. Wouldn't have been put through all the trials and tribulations that she had yet to know she'd see in the future.