The Torn

Chapter 1

People say that a positive attitude changes everything. They couldn't be more wrong. The smog burns my eyes. When I sneeze, it hurts my throat. Resuming my dutiful post of staring down the wet, dripping spot in the corner of my room and the rotating ceiling fan, I close my eyes. How did I get here? Didn't I live a life of joy and normalcy just a few days ago? Everything was lost to me, I was living in a confused daze. I roll over. My eyes fasten on the nearly empty jug of water plopped in the corner of the room. If my captors didn't let me out soon, I was going to die of thirst. I had been careful with water since the begin when I saw how quick it was disappearing, but being cautious won't save me for long. The mattress is stiff with age and dust, and squeals in protest with every small movement. Swinging my legs around the side of the bed, I sit up, quickly, too quickly. Ahh, head rush. I squeeze my eyes shut, pressing my temples with my now grimy fingers. Once the dull ache starts to ease, I blink slowly in attempt to clear my foggy mind. Despite the fact that I had been trapped here (where ever here was) for about a what feels like months, it's not, I'm dramatic, but I still can't seem to figure anything out about my current situation. More than a 'situation" I would say. It seems as if my "prison" is part of a clock tower. One of the walls is made of just plain glass plates that make up windows, and every so often one of the hands of the clock will tick by. The others are just plain, smooth wall, painted in a pasty, cream color. Even though one-fourth of the walls making my prison is made of dingy, somewhat transparent glass, the clouded sun still doesn't shine bright enough to cast the amount of light fit for any person, but here I am. At least there's that old lady reading lamp. My cot is stuffed into one of the corners of the room, farthest from the window, with a small table about the size of a footrest next to it. The only other thing in the room is the lamp whose shade looks like it might have been white in its prime. The walls are dotted with nail holes that made the fact that many people had stayed in this room, very obvious. God, the whole room is hideous, making it feel like I'm trapped in an old, pale mushroom tower with a window. Actually, I kind of am... I sigh, the sun only creeps out from behind its cloud, like, once every full moon, and as it turns out, when you've been knocked out on your way home and dragged into a creepy antique mushroom, you have lots of time to watch the stars. 

A song plays in my head, what it is, I can't remember, but it's becoming more and more annoying, only consisting as a sad reminder that my kidnappers had forced me to leave my whole life behind when they took me. Bummer. Standing up slowly, to avoid further head rushes, I walk to the window and glance around pressing my hand up against the cool glass. I lean my forehead against the freezing glass. Frost on the other side of the glass stings my hands. I can almost smell it. I watch silently as flurries swirl around in the wind below performing a miserable dance of sorrow. It's sad how I can't help but relate. No one has ventured out into the snow-lined cobblestone streets I can barely see out of the far edges of the window in the entire time I've been locked up. My eyes threaten to leak the tears they've been begging to shed ever since I woke up and found my self in this wretched prison. I long to hear my mothers voice, my brother's paintbrush stroking across a canvas, the rustle of the branches as an agile cat leaps from tree to tree outside my broken window, my favorite band. I bang my fist against the thick glass window in frustration. Aghh. Harder than it looks. I shake my aching fist hoping to relieve the pain. I press my cheek to the chilled glass unaware of the tears streaming down my dirty face. What am I doing here? Why? Who? When? My mind fails to come up with any answers. I've been sitting in this horrible prison, for what seems like forever, never seeing a human, never hearing a voice. Who would do this?! What do they want with me?! My heart throbs as I slide to the wood planked ground. Red rust rains down on my lap as I drag a hand down the window pane unlodging dust-sized particles of the old metal frame. My mind doesn't even register the flakes that continue to rain down onto my tangled hair. I don't know how long I sit there and cry I don't seem to have a good grasp on time anymore. Amazing how ironic how that is, sitting in this clock.