Darkness falls - English version

Kidnapped

>> Cosmic Castaway by Nigel Nisbet + Face in the crowd by Freya Ridings + Now by Staind <<

A small town in England - almost 6 weeks later

I sighed with relief as the clock chimed for shift change. I had been working on the assembly line in an assembly company for four weeks now and was grateful for every day that I had put behind me. As soon as I got home, I would grab the newspaper and sift through the job ads until I found a better job to apply for.

It had taken the local police and Scotland Yard two weeks to get me a new identity and papers. Two weeks of holed up with nothing to do but renovate the small apartment they got me. It was ridiculous compared to my house in Pontypandy. Could the real estate agent have been able to sell it in the meantime? I hoped not.

Deep down, I still harbored hope that one day I would be able to return, even though a little over five weeks ago the media revealed the true identity of Penny Morris and her connection to Snider to broadcast her tragic fate live from her funeral to report.

I had watched it with mixed feelings. It hurt so bad to see all my friends grieving for me and yet it hurt me even more to see Sam. To see how much he mourned and yet so obviously refused to pay the last respect to me.

While Ellie, Arnold, Steele and Elvis had appeared in their uniforms and Elvis and Arnold had even lowered my coffin into the grave along with Malcolm, Tom, Moose and Ben, Sam had only stood a little to the side in his suit and even at the vicar's speech he starts to leave the graveyard. He hadn't gotten very far before Charly stopped him and probably tried to reason with him. I stopped looking at the actual funeral and stopped listening to what the vicar said. I only had eyes for Sam, who could be seen in the background trying to explain something to his brother, until Charly finally hugged him. Did he mourn for me or could he not admit that I was dead?Would Sam be able to forgive me if I came back one day? Would he have gotten over me by then and found a woman who could give him what I had to deny him? Tears welled up in my eyes again, as they did every time I thought of him. No one could understand how much I missed him.

"Hey, are you thinking about your ex again?" I jerked around and quickly wiped my tears when Cynthia spoke to me. She had become my colleague and a dear friend to me. I would definitely miss her if I threw everything here.

"It was just a weak moment. Everything is fine."

"You've felt those weak moments more and more often if you ask me."

"It's a good thing I didn't ask you, right?" I teased her back with a fake smile as I made my way to the dressing room hoping she would drop the subject. Like every day, I would be glad to get out of my work shoes. They weren't nearly as comfortable as my firefighter boots. But the fire brigade also invested much better than my new boss.

"Why do you still miss him so much? There must have been a reason why you broke up," she then asked me when I had already changed and was just putting on my more comfortable sneakers. I was now terrified of jogging somewhere in the dark on forest or field paths, so I had got used to doing that in the mornings and afternoons on my way to work or back home. At home I could only get bored because I had nothing else to do apart from cleaning, watching TV or reading. So many times I turned on the computer and checked what was new in Pontypandy. The children had set up a memorial page for me on their website with an obituary that was more than beautiful considering it was written by children. They had displayed there all the videos they had made with me from rescue operations, excursions or exercises. Sometimes it cheered me up to see pictures from the old days, to hear the children's boisterous sayings and quarrels, and for a moment I was just as happy as I was then. Until Sam showed up somewhere, I heard his voice and saw his happy disposition. He too had been happy then. Was it all really just 10 weeks ago? It seemed like an eternity to me.