Hidden

Cleanse

My eyes flutter open as I try to take in my surroundings and remember where I am. "Good morning!" a cheery voice greets me and I look up to find the boy who saved me standing there. "Here, you must be hungry," he says, pushing a tray laden with food towards me. His dark brown, almost black, eyes look into my green ones and they reassure me somehow. He has shortcut baby blue hair and he his tall and well built. I just blink before grabbing the tray and digging in. The food is nothing special, rice and plain chicken, but I would've eaten anything at that point.

"Don't choke yourself there," he jokes as I scoff down the food and I glare at him, I am too hungry to care right now. "Alright, alright," he says, backing off "you've been asleep for almost two days." I hadn't known I was that tired. He continues to talk as I eat and I let him, he seems happy to talk for hours.

"My name's Caleb Myer," he says but continues knowing he won't get an answer out of me and he doesn't make a fuss out of it which I'm glad for "and I'm fast," he winks at me cheekily and in the blink of an eye he is at the door grinning his hair slightly bluer than before. "I'll get Sissy," he says reassuringly before turning on the spot and he's gone.

I lay on the makeshift bed and stare up at the ceiling counting the notches in the rock. 1,2,3,4......45,46... I hear the door open again and see Caleb standing there with a small girl behind. the girl is young, no more than 10 years old with large doleful looking blue eyes and hair that is slightly too yellow to be classified as blonde. When she sees me her face splits into a grin, realising I'm not a threat. She emerges from her hiding spot behind Caleb and makes her way towards me.

"Hi," she stays brightly "I'm Elizabeth but you can call me Sissy." I snails slightly, or at least my appropriation of it, I'm not sure if I can smile anymore I haven't done so in so long. "Oh that feels painful," she says glancing towards the cut in my leg. I have to agree it has become swollen and infected from no being cleaned. Wait....feels? I don't understand how that's possible and she can tell from the confused look on my face but she doesn't answer my question. Instead she places both of her small hands over the cut. I wince in pain as she applies pressure and close my eyes to try combat the pain.

Just as I am about to try hit her hands off a soothing feeling starts to spread through my leg and I relax with a sigh of relief. The soothing feeling spreads from my leg up along my chest and I hear a crack as my rib pops back into place. Soon my whole body is covered in this relaxing feeling and I haven't felt anything this good in a long time. All too soon it's gone. The feeling is gone in an instant as she lifts her hands.

I open my eyes and smile at her, properly this time, to thank her. She nods and skips out of the room. "You alright?" Caleb asks me concern clearly laced through his voice. I jump having forgotten he was there. I nod at him and gather all my courage. "Tessa," I say quietly. "What?" he asks me, clearly confused. "My name's Tessa, Tessa Montgomery," I repeat. "Ah," he teases "she speaks." I roll my eyes at him before asking "so, anywhere I can clean off around here?" He looks me over and I am thankful he doesn't comment on my appearance. Even I admit that I stink and I am covered in a mixture of dirt blood and sweat. instead he just says "follow me," and walks out the door.

As I follow him through hallway after hallway I find myself getting completely and utterly lost. Everything is on one floor but corridors branch off and curve around making my head spin. I give up trying to figure out which way we are going and how to get back. I follow Caleb closely afraid that if I lose sight of him I'll be lost. My wanders and I allow myself to think of the one thing I haven't allowed myself to think of in forever, or at least it seems like that to me. I allow myself to think of home.

As my mind wanders off I am caught in the memories. I can picture my mother standing at the stove in our small kitchen cooking up some concoction that filled the house with and aroma of freshly baked bread and soup. My mothers eyes would catch me lurking in the doorway and she would rush over, grabbing my arm and giving me a spoonful of soup to taste test. I always said the same thing, "simply scrumptious soup mom," and we'd both giggle away. It may have been my mothers superb cooling or else I was slightly biased considering that was my favourite meal, potato and leek soup with brown bread. I felt a small tear at the corner of my eye as the memories swarmed me making me miss my mother more than usual.

Suddenly I bumped into something, or more accurately someone. I had been too wrapped up in myself to notice him coming to a stop. "Sorry," I mumbled blushing as I stumbled backwards a few steps, off balance. He reached out a hand and grabbed my arm to steady me, a smirk plastered on his face. "Showers are in there," he said nodding toward da door on the left of the hallway " towels on the right when you go in." I smiled at him and nodded my appreciation before entering the room.

The floor was stone, as were the walls, with drains plotted on the ground at even intervals. Along the walls hung rusted rails with shower curtains hanging on them. The bottom of the shower curtains were slightly mouldy from use. I didn't even care about these slight imperfections at this point in time I believed these showers could be fit for royalty it had been so long since I last had one. I grabbed a fraying towel before quickly stripping and hopping into one of the showers. I turned on the shower allowing the lukewarm water to wash over me. I closed my eyes revealing in the feeling of the water lapping over me. Cleansing my body of dirt. Cleansing my soul of dirt.