A Home of Mothers

Escape

"Wait!" I exclaim as he forces me forwards, "You don't get it! I need to find-"

And then I go silent, clenching my teeth together in an instant. I can't tell him about Anna. Can't let him know that I know. But, suddenly, I remember something Olivia did, something I did, and as a smile slowly forms on my face, I do what she did very well.

I kick.

My foot goes soaring back and up to hit the guard right in the groin, and as he stumbles, groaning and bending over, I rush into the crowd. And as soon as I'm immersed far enough in the confusion, I duck down, waiting for Baldie to start to walk again.

I hear him moan, far back, and wince. I might have overdone it, but if they're against me...

Splash. Someone's ale lands on my back, and even though I was already soaked, I shiver. Come on, Baldie, go away! Go so I can get up...

Finally, I hear him walk away- towards the kitchen, towards ice packs- and as his footsteps get far away, I rise to my feet. But a cold ring of iron plants on the back of my head before I can fully rise, and I go perfectly still. Somehow, I know who it is. The man with the glasses.

"Don't move," he whispers quietly, "Don't turn around. Don't nod. Just sit. In a moment, I will tell you to get up, and when I do, do it slowly. And walk towards the stairs."

I hear a passing of footsteps, and Glasses tenses, but then the steps are gone and he speaks again.

"Now get up. Go to the stairs. Do not look back. And when you reach the top, wait for my signal. Do not go further."

Somehow, his calm authority makes me nod, and as the cold metal lowers from my head, I walk at a slow, easy pace towards the stairs. But I am not easy. I am very uneasy. For after all of this, the gun was the worst. That means someone else has the power to kill me. Nothing has yet.

I shudder, cold sweat on my forehead and the dimly lit room swimming, and carefully start up the stairs. I cough roughly, and looking back, I make my mistake.

I see Glasses.

Staring me right in the eyes.

As he frowns in disgust and raises his gun, aiming it straight at my chest, I go still for a moment, shivering, and then run as fast as I can.

The stairs rush by my feet like a slide going up to doom, and the rain-pelted window flashes by faster than the cold air rushing on my skin. In my mind I'm swearing, strings of swears and regrets and worries, and my mind goes overload, paired with my inexplicable coughing.

Ineedtogetoutofhere!

Cracka-BOOM. Lightning flashes through the unlit staircase, and I stumble, something rough in my chest. Hacking wildly, I fling up the second turn of stairs with one hand on the bannister and one on my stomach-

CRACK! BOOOOOM. Lightning shoots into the back-yard, sending out an explosion of noise, and I hear screams of surprise downstairs. The floor beneath me vibrates, and I run even faster, coughing wilder and wilder every second.

And when I reach the top of the steps an unseen force flings me forward, and then I'm flying, flying through the hallway, into my old room, and through the window-

And then I open my eyes and collapse to the floor back in the hallway, hacking and coughing, and the world flashes into a memory as my mother.

Brother is running in the frigid night, rushing through the cornfields ever faster and ever farther, and somehow, I know he's heading towards the well. And as I chase after him, I'm screaming not only his name but my parents' too, and when I catch him he trips, me holding him tight by the scruff of his shirt. And then he fumbles around and stares at me with round, under-bagged eyes, in the deep of night. His shirt is dirt-scathed and torn. For once, he looks sane.

"Go," he says regretfully, forcefully, whispery, and sadly all at once, and then I'm flung into the air, screaming, then landing painfully on my back. When I get back up, sobbing, and reach the clearing, he's already gone, one shoe in the muck and the other shoe on the rim of the well. And then I hear a thump, then sobbing, run in the other direction. He jumped. The voices made him.

I don't tell my parents. They never find out. First come the missing posters, then the funeral.

But I never tell. And the guilt lives on.

Forever more.

I wake up with a gasp on the floor of the spa room, the tubs flowing over and the doors still closed. My throat is calmer, my lungs breathing easier.

How did I get in here...?

The room is dark and flooding, the gaping hole in the floor the only draining point. A huge bucket looms far below it, and the sounds of the party drift up from below, mixed with the woosh of the water pouring down. The tubs are slippery and brimming, and as I frown, stumbling over to one, I trip over something rough on the floor. And as I squint at it, I rub my throat. The rasp is gone. And then my vision focuses and I nearly fall over.

On the floor is the branch, the wooden branch, and as I gulp it slides up my leg, around my waist, and then around my arm once more. I shudder, wipe my forehead, and glance at the tub, and then at the branch. The tape recorder still runs inside the tub, but it's drenched completely...

I frown. That makes no sense- it should have died by now. I dip a hand into the water, and as it's immersed in unnatural cold, I gasp as I'm tugged into the frigid liquid-

-and I emerge through the mirror in my old room, liquid silver splattering everywhere, the windows and doors slamming shut and the car's noises rumbling outside. The car with the man in the fedora.

What is going on?

And then the door creaks open behind me. Glasses steps in. And before I can fully turn, the sound of a shot rings out through the room. I choke inwardly as I stare at the fog clouding his shining spectacles.

And the bullet hits its target, my body erupting in pain.