City of Light

Chapter 9

While I stare out the window time escapes me, what turns into a two-hour drive feels like mere minutes. I try not to fall asleep when the driver tells us were home. A massive pent house on the 22nd floor, the latest tech installed, a gift from my parents. I had a room remodeled to fit my engineering needs, along with a state of the art 3D construction system. That's my safe space when things go bad because of family problems. We make our way to the elevator and squeeze in four of us including two body guards. I immediately spot two familiar faces standing at my door to my penthouse.
"Sam, Joseph! It's been too long!" I call out, they smile at my arrival. They have been by my side since I could walk, they're my best friends.
"It has Ma'am, glad to see your okay!" Sam calls back, I approach and open my door.
"Same here," Joseph says. He was always the quiet one. Kept to himself, but he is a real sweetheart. When I and Sam have conversations Joseph would silently listen. I could feel his laughter and him talking to us. I walk in and grab two bar chairs from my counter and put them on each side of the door.
"All you do is stand all day, the least I can do give you a place to sit." One is orange the other yellow, each for their favorite colors, it was a coincidence when I found that out. They don't know.
"Ma'am we are required to stay on our toes," Sam says with his arms by his sides still at the door.
"I won't tell if you don't." I smile. Sam takes a seat, and Jj soon follows. Jj was the nickname I gave Joseph when I was little. Sam calls him that jokingly, I say that when my parents aren't watching or there aren't any other guards that I don't know.
"Glad to have you are back Ma'am," Jj speaks up and looks at me.
"It's good to be back," I say. Mathew finishes up with the driver and walks in with me. He greets the men and collapse on a white leather couch and tosses his papers on the glass coffee table. He takes a deep breath and lays on his back.
"Good night Mathew, I'm leaving early tomorrow. You won't see me when you wake up." I walk into the bedroom and take off my hospital outfit and get into a night gown. I sink into the covers and push Mathew out of my mind. I allow my mind to fall into the inky black.
---------------------------
This world feels so familiar, water, black, the lurking demon in the shadows. They evil whispers, the feeling of being surrounded, it compresses your spine and makes you bend, makes you twist and coil. It makes you hate everything around you, it makes you run to your hiding hole, like a mouse. You can never see it, it's a mystery that lives in the empty space around you. It never leaves.
---------------------------
I open my eyes and look at my bedside clock, 4:55 am, perfect. I quietly open the closet and take out my tight black jeans with black leather knees, my white long sleeve crop top, and my red scarf. I wrap the scarf around my neck and pull it up over my nose. I slip on my tennis shoes and tip toe out the bedroom, past Mathew, and out the door. As expected the boys are outside the door taking into their radio telling them security team to switch.
"Thanks, guys." I whisper. A moment or so later the elevator at the end of the hall opens and a two man team come through. I walk past them, they put their backs to the wall and make way for me. Unnecessary. We ride the elevator to the ground floor and I walk along the sidewalk as the guys tail behind me. It's still dark out, and I chill goes through me, and I look up. A lonely snow flake descends. I hold up my hand to greet it, the first sight of snow this season, I sigh and pull my scarf over my nose. Much more like it fall, and now allow my shoes to make footprints. While I walk, I play with my metal limb. I twist and turn it, I can hear the gears turning and machines working, the clicking and ticking. I need my skin, it's hard to look at this. I'm not truly human anymore, I don't know what I am, what I'm meant to do on this earth. I enlisted in the army to defile my parents and I got farther than I thought. What can I do?