I woke to the incessant sound of birdsong, the melodies only slightly muffled by my bolted window. My eyelids fluttered open rapidly, then immediately flinched by habit. I expected to see their dark disapproving faces staring blankly at me when I woke, but one again, there was no one. I didn’t know whether to jump for joy or shut myself in my little room and never come out. I started to rise from the ground shakily, only to be knocked down after a ferocious wave of nausea and pain hit me. My hand instinctively reached up to the back of my head. A strangled gurgling noise came out of my mouth as I felt the wet congealing blood matted in my hair. I don’t like blood. There was blood all over the floor. After the nausea and dizziness passed I got up from the floor and stumbled to the bathroom. I didn’t want to look in the mirror, but I knew I had to. I winced as I saw my pale face, streaked with blood and tears from the previous night. Was it just last night? Oh god. Last night. The door. The knocking. The begging. I was violently and repeatedly sick in the toilet for a few minutes, after which I brushed my teeth and began running a bath. Normally, this complete and utter lack of routine would have me in an absolute frenzy, but not today. Because today was not normal. I washed the blood out of my hair, staining the water a deep shade of pink. I was careful to avoid the tender cut on the back of my scalp. I padded around my house, sopping wet and dripping all over the floor. But I simply didn’t care. No matter how much I tried, I couldn’t keep pushing the thoughts of last night out of my mind. They kept creeping back into my mind, the awful memories just wanting to swallow me whole. Was I a murderer? What if that child really needed help, and I just listened as she begged for me to help her. I’m a murderer. I really am just like her.
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Paranoiac
Mystery / ThrillerAnna is a young woman with a dark past and a disorder that makes a normal life close to impossible. Having trauma induced Paranoid Schizophrenia makes going to the grocery store an insurmountable obstacle. So when someone starts knocking on her door...