Pitch black. I feel the ice cold breeze hitting my cheeks as a shiver goes down my spine, as if my body can feel the terror about to come. "We're going to take her" a soft whisper yet loud enough like a scream to make my eyes open wide. My soft warm bed suddenly turns cold as I'm standing outside looking over the town I called home. The home I hadn't been to in years, memories, overflowing euphoria. But that quickly fades away when I come to my senses and ask myself, "how did I get here?". A dream, just a dream. A dream as real as day, yet at the same time it was the dead of night. No stars shine like how I remember, they used to light up the sky with hope. But now they were dim, lonely. The street lights flicker instead of illuminating the beautiful streets with a light layer of snow and the old neighbourhood playground creeks, the bright colors of it faded to a plain metallic grey. The mountains that overlooked the town looked as beautiful as always though, with shiny white snow on top. Emotions bouncing back and forth through my head. "We're going to take her." The front door of the house slams behind me and I get a sudden rush of panic. It was like a bubble had formed around my body that took away all the oxygen closing up my throat. Struggling to breathe, I knew something was wrong and followed the voice inside.
I went in and the door closed behind me, my throat opened and I took a deep breath, but it wasn't of relief that I could finally fill my lungs with fresh air but what I inhaled was fear, the fear that crawled inside that house. It was no longer a warm loving home like I remembered. The wooden floors were rotten and holes all over the walls, windows were shattered and the furniture was gone. Empty. Abandoned. The stairs whispered to me to go up, step by step, being careful not to fall. My parents always told me to be careful going up those steps because they were slippery wood with no railings. But I was too stubborn to listen, they were just stairs. I felt like I was invincible running up those wooden stairs everyday with nothing ever happening. But as I ran something changed. The fear in the air weighs on my shoulder and I slow down, grabbing the door of my sisters room it swings open but all I see is our old bunk bed empty. The walls that had been freshly painted last time I had been in this room was gone. Every improvement that made this my home faded and I ran to my parents room. Empty. Silence. That's all that there was. And as I couldn't understand what was happening or why I couldn't wake up I once again crawled into my parents old bed, the one place I used to believe could shelter me from the world, from the cruelty, from the monsters that hid under my bed. Sitting there looking out into the elevated view of the town. So beautiful, yet so lonely.
Water. Slowly making its way down my flustered cheeks feeling so lost. The room starts spinning and the soft mattress I laid in suddenly became grass as the walls disintegrated right in front of my eyes. The room keeps spinning and the voice becomes a scream "we're going to take her!". If I just cover my eyes it'll be okay and I'll go back home. But when I opened once again I was in a field covered in apple trees. Projections of myself as a child ran past me chasing my sister. When I was younger our parents would take us apple picking but all we did was chase each other playing tag. No worries in the world for two kids having fun in the fresh morning breeze, before age takes over and we develop hatred for each other, as if we're destined to become enemies as we grow into our teenage years. But as my mind looked around all the confusion, all the sadness turned to anger. Its gone on for too long, what reason is there for me to go through this with no sign of what it means. My blood boiled and I stood up, no longer being a lost puppy trying to find someone to help, I needed to leave now. Clouds turned to black and the sky angered as it roared at me. Wind blew my hair out of my face and the grass danced aggressively while a storm made its way towards me. The more angry I get the frustration reflects in the environment around me. But I can't stop, I can't stop crying, I can't stop the confusion, the voices screaming to my ears. The apples fall and turn to a rotten black. I look across the field and see myself as a child, holding my sisters hand as the wind around them turns to a tornado made out of pure emotions, destroying everything in its way.
The weight that keeps me on the ground slowly starts to leave me. My ears feel like they're bleeding. As painful as it was to keep my eyes open I couldn't close them while witnessing what was happening right in front of my eyes. Every moment closer to the last, every second counting down, what a short life some people live. Makes you think about all the opportunities you could've had and turned down. And as I reached the top of this raging storm I finally accept the fate life gave me and let my body fall. The ground seemed so far away as the rage of emotions let me slip away to my end.
Pitch black. A light hits my eyes. Cries. Yelling. That's all I hear. I open and look but as I get up to get out of bed a picture frame laid upside down on the floor. A photo of me and my sister cracked in the middle, I must've knocked it over when I was dreaming. But as my head adjusted to reality the cries I thought came from the television were from my mother. Heart pounding, I stepped out to see police officers questioning my father. The door across from me wide open. Broken desk, lamp shattered on the ground, sheets ripped off the bed. Empty. They reported it as a kidnapping. But kidnappers normally get caught out...This one never did.
