Beware the Jabberwock

With the World Gone Up In Flames

Amalee was in that tiny room for days. At least, she thought so. She could only go by the light under the door to tell if it was day or night - even if she did have a digital clock next to the little cot she slept on.

Emma got hurt. Amalee could hear her scream and bang on their apartment door. She had a key, just in case the eight year old got locked out and... and Emma must have let herself in. What Amalee could hear when she came face to face with what must have been her daddy was...

Well... It kept her up long after her silent sobs had stopped, replaying over and over until she covered her ears. Doing so had done nothing.

The sound was all in her head.

Yet still it echoed and echoed.

When the little girl awoke again, she knew Emma was sick too; there were two sets of feet shuffling around the apartment.

It must have been three or four days, at least. Amalee had finished a whole box of Teddy grahams and was, admittedly, growing tired of them. It had taken her an hour to open the box without a sound, and it wasn't even worth the effort anymore. She'd scratched up her hands opening water bottles, and even gave herself blisters until she finally gave up and stabbed a hole in the plastic cap with safety scissors.

It was cold, too.

It always got cold in September and there wasn't a heating vent in the pantry, as she learned the hard way when she had to double wrap herself in the scratchy old hospital blanket that her daddy left for her. He could have at least let her have her comforter before he shut her in the stupid box of a pantry.

Tears of frustration had welled in her eyes at the thought, and she bit the blanket as hard as she could to let some of that frustration out. It wasn't very hard for her to stay quiet. After the screaming and sirens had died down outside, she could pretend that she was in a cave somewhere, adventuring.

She wanted to be one of those people who went places - who made brochures.

Daddy thought it was a silly thing to want, but Ethan said she could do anything she set her mind to. Ethan got yelled at for that. He was told not to give her stupid ideals, and that Amalee was too smart to waste her life away on making brochures.

Her daddy wanted her to be a scientist, like him. Amalee didn't like to be around sick people though. They smelled like vomit and hospitals and, occasionally, death. They looked like ghosts. Like monsters, and demons, and she hated seeing them.

It made her feel like they would eat her, or steal her away.

That was also why she had let him give her shots.

Now? Now she was stuck in a pantry, locked in and hidden in the dark with monsters just outside the door. And she had to be quiet? Why? If they could open the doors, they would have already.

What did it matter if she yelled, or cried or screamed or broke things?

Amalee was curled up furiously debating these things in silence when she froze in place. She heard something... it sounded like...

... quiet thunks. A bunch of them.

Like the sound of boots in the hall.

Faintly she heard the apartment door creak as it opened - only to be accompanied by the frenzied groans of Emma and Daddy. Then, there were two separate POP sounds, and two thumps.

Briefly, there was nothing left but silence.

For days, she'd fallen asleep to the groans of her sick father, and now there was nothing. Suddenly, Amalee's vision wobbled and she shifted her weight, blinking hard.