I'm Hollie

Confusion

“Hollie.”

Her voice cuts through my dream phase, it was firm and commanding, a tone I’ve grown accustomed to and fell in love with.

‘Yes, Eleanore…’

“Hollie, please wake up.”

‘No, Eleanore…’

She demands too much from me.  If I were to awaken, I would become the thing she hates yet again.  After all, how could she love a monster?  She wants childish Hollie, the one without any problems.  Perhaps childish Hollie is the problematic one; I shall never know.

I feel a pair of hands grasp onto my small frame and shake me gently.  I lazily lift an eyelid, amethyst orb flickering towards her direction.

“Finally.”  Eleanore sighs in relief.  “Hollie, were you wanting to help me run the counter?  You’d be like a big girl.”

I open my other eye slowly, both lids hanging at half-mast, and move my eyes to the other side.

“Oh, Hollie—“

“I am a big girl.”  I huff out.

“Hollie?”  Eleanore asks, startled.

“What’s wrong Eleanore?”  I ask, voice rough and coarse, lined with venom.

“You worry me…”  Eleanore whispers, looking to the ground.

“Oh.”  I murmur, face contorting into a forced-looking smile.  Eleanore steps away from me at the sight of it, just as I had thought she might.  I am horrifying.  I’m simply a mess.

“I should be asking you what’s wrong...”  Eleanore said, wrapping her arms around her body and turning to avoid my gaze yet again.

“I don’t know!”  I scream out gleefully, arms launching into the air.  “Maybe you should stop focusing on the problems of other people, and focus on your own!”

“No, Hollie, I want to help you.”  Eleanore says, voice stern.  As the sound reverberates around the room I am reminded that there is no stopping her now.

“Not right now.”  I say, wrapping myself into the blanket like a burrito.  I let out a round of giggles as I keep rolling around.   “I’m busy, I need to be sold and consumed!”

All at once the rolling stops and as does the laughter.  My friend has left and I am left alone in my fast food shell.

There is not silence when she leaves.  The sound of familiar laughter strikes my small ears and I perk up.  Whoever that laugh belongs to sounds so beautiful!  I continue rolling around in my fabric and cotton corn tortilla and laughing along with the gorgeous noise.  The sound causes a wave of familiarity to wash over me and I begin to wonder who that laugh belongs to.  Along with the comfort and distinct remembrance, I’m met with a small lump in my throat.  Tears threaten to fall.

Why are they laughing?

Are they laughing at me?

I stop rolling, eyes locked on the wooden ceiling and deep in thought.  It sounds so familiar, but I can’t place it and likely never will!

Ahahaha!

Ahahaha!

Stop.

“Stop!”  I scream out, struggling against my blanket restraints.  I thrash my legs trying to unwrap myself as my arms are too tightly packed against my body.

Ahahaha!

I roll off of the bed, landing with a hard thud on the floor.  I have escaped my prison but I have not escaped the damned laughter.  I look around the room, face scanning every inch.  There isn’t anybody here but me!  I’m not laughing, I’m not!

I turn towards a large hole in the wall and let a smile grace my lips as I’m met with somebody whose hair is curled and colored red.

“Hello.”  I greet, and watch as they match my movements.

The laughter does not cease, and I do not notice their mouth moving.

Then who could it be?  Who could be torturing me?

I bring a hand to my face and thoughts race across, and I’m met with no other option but to destroy my new friend in front of me.  She’s the one doing this.  She’s the monster.

I grasp onto the wooden handle of a brush I keep on a side-table near my bed and tighten my grip, claws digging into it and leaving marks that Eleanore will surely scold me for later, but I do not care.

I launch forward, brush swinging down forcefully upon the person in front of me.  Pieces shatter instantly, the sound of crashing singing sweet music to my troubled ears.  The glass in front of me collapses and I realize it was nothing but an image.  A reflection as Eleanore had called it.

The laughter is deafened now.  Had I done it?

No.

There’s only one way.

I open a drawer on a dresser and pull out what I desperately need to end it all.  My eyes look down upon the weapon, long and sharpened perfectly.  My secret knife.  I let out a few laughs at my own.  Finally you’ll be silenced!  Aha!

I position the knife under my ear, looking down at the shriveled mess I have become in a shard of broken glass.  My pupils were shrunken, my hair tangled into knots that would take forever to brush out.

Slowly I begin sawing, back and forth, cutting through the cartilage and skin.

My screams filled the inn, but the laughter never ceased.

…Ahahaha…

Charcoal and slate colored the twinkling night sky in this land.  Each star painted a different color, each star a different size and intensity.  It was almost as if the stars were people in the sky, beautiful and different in their own right, but equal in the idea of them being gorgeous beings.

Clouds spread across the night sky, being a much lighter color than the darkness stated before but being just as menacing.

After all, it was just a lie.

“Ahahaha!”

“Who’s doing that?”  I ask impatiently, turning around angrily.  The green eyes were there again, staring up at me, daring me to ask another question.

“It was me of course.”  She informed me, grasping onto my finger.  “You have a boo-boo.”

“You did this to me.”  I hissed, gritting my teeth and yanking my hand away from hers angrily.  She smiled and began rocking her body forward and back, her curled hair slipping over her shoulders and back over them again with each movement.  Her appearance was so dull in the night, reflecting who she really was inside of my mind.

“I didn’t mean to.”  She said.  “Why won’t you stay with me?”

I jerked my head to the side, eyes resting on a deer feasting on the grass in the distance.

“It’s really nice though.”   She said.  “You’re safe here.”

“I don’t feel safe.”  I said, looking at the girl and stepping away a few feet.

In the distance, almost hidden in the overgrowth of a nearby forest, I see large wings protruding from the back of a man.  Long silver hair hangs from his head, and his skin was the color of gray. The girl supposedly named Hollie sees it too and clutches to me in fear.  At her touch I feel my body warm and feel as if I should carry her away from the intimidating man.

“He’s mean.”  She says.

“How so?”  I ask.

“I don’t know, I just know he’s mean…”  She replied, clutching onto my green dress.

She climbs up my body, mouth close to my ear and I can feel her body shaking.

“He killed us.”  She whispers.

“Us?”  I ask.

“He killed Hollie.”