Middle School Miniature

Chapter 5, The orange cave

All I could see was a mass of skin and the orange cloth of the jacket all around me. It is a similar orange to the complementary color of a particular app or website that people read and write books on. Odd.

The pocket was stuffy like when you pull the covers of your bed over your head, and I was feeling like breathing was getting difficult even with the small open space his hands let through. Also, on top of that, the jacket was always moving, constantly nocking me off my feet and swinging me into the 'walls' more like if you were wrapped in a large hammock being tossed about in a wind storm. I could tell that he was running by the increase in soft thuds and the frantic increase of the tossing.

Within the jostling and bracing myself in place, my only coherent thought was one of spite. 'Huh, sounds like he almost missed his bus,' I thought smugly. 'Serves him right.'

The deep rumbling of the bus as me neared gave my poor ears an ache and only receded once my captor got into the bus. I can only imagine how loud it would have been outside of this horrid pocket.

However, inside the bus, the noise of chattering kids filled my ears. The boy sat down and the pocket finally came to a rest against the metal side of the bus. The metal was bumpy and surprisingly cold even through the orange fabric, the chill seeping into the jacket gave me goose bumps.

I tried pushing away from the wall, but I just pushed myself into the boy's side. I was probably just lucky that I wasn't being squished and that I could breath. So I curled up, tucking my head and knees away from the cold trying to keep warm in the corner of the pocket.

The hand blocking my exit suddenly moved, letting light in and, after lifting my head a bit, giving an unremarkable view of the brown leather bus seat. Frankly I'm glad it wasn't orange.

I untangled myself and lunged for the opening. Grabbing the outer seam, I pulled myself partially out of the pocket, only to have the huge hand descend over me, push down my grasping arms, and rain on my short-lived freedom. Darnit!

I struggled kicking my legs at the fabric and fruitlessly elbowing the hand around my arms as the digits softly forced me back into the pocket, but it was a pointless attempt as I was engulfed in a mocking orange once more.

I was gently but firmly pushed to the back and released. I sat back in the pocket, half cold half warm. I considered getting closer to the hand for heat, because it was slightly warmer, but then again I want to be as far away from that thing as possible. So I sat there with a literal cold shoulder and no way to count time unless I literally started counting. The bus made frequent lurches which I assumed were stops and I was wondering how much longer until we would be off this beast.

Questions rattled around in my mind, leaking out from behind my wall of panic and adrenaline. Would I ever see my parents again? Do they even know I'm missing yet? How is it possible that I am this small? What am I going to do? What is he going to do with me? And I dang sure hope he washes his hands.-

My thoughts were interrupted by suddenly feeling the somewhat stable ground being separated from the pocket and I sunk and swung as it left me.

"Bye, see you tomorrow!" My captor called out. 

"Yeah man, see you!" His friend replied.

I was once again jumbled up as he walked off the bus and I think motion sickness was starting to set in. I was never one to typically get sick easily, I was that kind of person that could go on ride after ride at an amusement park and still be up to riding just one more before lunch, but after being swung around so much and not having at least a horizon line, I wasn't feeling that good.

I heard the rumblings of the bus disappear and a couple steps later, I could hear a door opening. It shut with a vibrating boom, almost as if it was mocking me like an announcers deep voice, " Now it's final, you are trapped. In a stranger's house, at a couple inches tall, and you shall have no hope, muahaha." How I heard that from a door, I have no idea.

I shifted to a different position as he went up some stairs, turned a corner, then went into a room with another thud representing what I could only assume was a bedroom door being closed. The coat came to a rest when he sat down on a springy surface, a chair or bed?.

A moment of hesitation passed, me holding my breath and the giant boy giving a moment before the dramatic reveal. The hand blocking the exit disappeared, opening to a giant world before me. I just stared and stayed perfectly still, hoping that he would somehow forget I was there.

I thought it was the best plan ever, until the hand came back. It slid along the side of the pocket until the index finger reached my shoe. I didn't move a muscle as it approached slowly and poked my side. I squeaked at the contact. It was so weird to see something so big and crushingly strong be... soft.

I grabbed handfuls of the orange material to keep me in place and tried to avoid the fingers as they gently tried to grab me. Curling slowly around my front. It was like avoiding a rolled up sleeping bag that was trying to snake around you.

"Come on. I won't hurt you." A low, soft voice above me says. Wait, is he talking to me? A few seconds frozen hesitation allows the digits to scoop me out of the pocket, me loosing grip, and being pulled out into the enormous open room.

hey again,

-Ema