Underlying Truths

Underlying Truths - Chapter Five - "The Message"

This story (as a whole) is going to be short. I can feel it.

Please vote. Or leave a comment advising what I could improve on if you didn't like it.

Thanks [:

+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

Underlying Truths - Chapter Five - "The Message"

I woke up Tuesday morning, gasping for air. My encounter with the shadowed figure just hours before caused nightmares to plague the rest of my sleep. More than once throughout the night, I found myself shooting up in bed and glancing around my room. It seemed that I got less and less sleep with each passing day. I ran a hand over my face and sighed. Another day, another possibility for something even worse to happen.

After going through my daily morning routine, I sat in front of my laptop as I waited for it to emerge from its "sleep" mode. My nails repeatedly tapped against the plastic casing of the device, the rhythm helping to calm my nerves down. Every few minutes, I couldn't help but glance behind me, just to make sure the room was empty save for myself.

My guard was on extra high alert at the moment due to the fact that I was home alone. My mom had some community service meeting to attend and my dad, as

usual, was at work. Tuesdays and Thursdays are always my days off meaning that I was free to spend today any way I felt like it.

As the screen before me began to light up and the applications slowly begun to run, I realized that tomorrow marked a whole week of strange, scary, and immoral actions directed at me. Tomorrow would be exactly one week since that image was sent to me and the emails begun. I couldn't help but wonder if that one-week mark had any significance to the person behind all this. Would it be the start of something worse? Maybe even of a grander scheme? I shuddered in fear just at the mere thought of it.

I took a deep breath as my email client began downloading all my new messages.

'Time to face another piece of evidence to prove that your life is no longer your own,' I told myself. 'Someone is living it with you.'

I gasped in shock when I realized there was no new log of every single move I made the day before. My eyes widened and watered at the faint hope that maybe this was all coming to an end. Some may call me naïve to assume that so swiftly considering all that has been done to me, but that faint glimmer of hope was enough for me to grab onto and never let go.

There was a smile on my face as I made my way downstairs to the kitchen, though I still listened for sudden, inexplicable movements as I climbed down the stairs. Glad that, so far, nothing strange had yet to make an appearance, I hummed to myself as I bustled around our kitchen. I spotted a note from my mom explaining the food inside the microwave and how to properly heat it. Apparently, she cooked for me and decided to leave the meal in a "safe" place. I rolled my eyes at her disbelief in my ability to properly feed myself and quickly punched in the time written on the note into the microwave's keypad.

Once done with my meal, I opened the refrigerator in search of a glass of pulp-less orange juice. I noticed that we were running low in a lot of the essentials: eggs, milk, butter, juice, etc. Making a quick decision, I opted to actually be thoughtful and go out grocery shopping for the purely essential items needed in a refrigerator, since I really didn't have anything better to do.

My mood was bright for once as I made my way out of the house, purse and car keys in hand. A smile was on my face as I faced the sun and took it all in. For once, I didn't find myself heavy with worry or paranoia. I was happy and carefree. It felt amazing. I jogged down the stone pathway that connected my front door to the driveway, more cheerful than I found myself in days. The instant I found myself standing in front of my Range Rover was the immediate second that my mood darkened and I froze in my tracks.