I reach out slowly and feel the air, I stick my hand back under the covers. Giving me immediate warmth from the silky comforter. I see the other side of the room is completely pitch black. I hear a distant howl, I turn and stare out side of my window, I see the guard dogs walking on the dusty old path close to my house. "Guard dogs." I sigh loudly. This place is completely unlivable. I think inside of my head as I watch them. Wanting to yell at them badly to get away from me. I slowly get out of bed. What day is it? I ask myself. "Inspecting Day." I mumble. "Inspecting Day." "Inspecting Day." "Inspecting Day." I say repeatedly out loud to myself. "Inspecting Day!" I yell. I run down the stairs, slipping on the dusty wooden stairs. I run to my father whom is still sleeping. "Father." I said in a deep voice. "Yes, Emma?" He says in a grouchy tone. "It's Inspecting Day, Father." I say. "Emma that starts in quiet a while." he says rubbing his eyes." I need to go out and find us some food." I say. He starts to drift of into sleep, snoring. I run back upstairs and get dressed. I wear my Camo hunting jacket, Jeans, muddy boots, and slide my pocket knife into my jean pocket. "Ready." I say walking down the creaking stairs. I open the door and smell the fresh air. Sweet. Like spring. Sweet Spring air. My feet start to sink into the muddy ground from the rain last night. I stand back and look at my house. Old. A creamy yellowish color painted poorly on the house. I tried to act proud of it, but there was no use anymore. I run off into the woods looking for berries, nuts, herbs anything I could find. Something catches my attention. A flower. A dandelion. Planted beside a dead tree, that looked like it could fall over anytime soon. I walk over and pluck the flower carefully. "Finally, something nice around here." I say aloud. I suddenly hear footsteps, crunching the leaves. I back up cautiously and slowly, waiting. "Who's There?" I say anxiously. I pull out my knife. "It's just me." The voice says. The voice is coming from everywhere. "Who's me?" I say confused. "Landon! Stop scaring me!" He comes out from behind a tree and laughs. "Sorry Em."
"Your 11 mins late, as usual." I roll my eyes sarcastically. Landon mocks me and rolls his eyes back. "You don't take a thing seriously.. Do you..?" I say. "No not really." He smiles. "Not even serious on a day like today..?!" I say feeling surprised. "No. Not even today." He laughs. "Today. I love it every 3 months when these "trustworthy people" come inside our houses and scramble through every single space they can fit in to find stuff that is 'bad'. I say stressfully. Landon nods slightly. "Yeah. This one time I had a toothbrush on the floor and they took it." He says staring at the ground, confused. I laugh. "They probably want something extra for themselves. That's the whole reason they do this you know, to come in, take your things, and use it for themselves. That's why we're left with nothing."
He stops staring at the ground. "Exactly." He gets up, acting like we had never spoke to each other and walks away, back into the woods to his house possibly, I thought. I sat quietly not thinking much of him just walking away. I breath over and over watching the cold fog come out of my dry mouth slowly. "This wet fog is the closest thing I'll ever get to water." I say mumbling.
