My Key to Outside

Forced to Face the Fear

I woke up to a shoving. I didn't think anything of it until I thought about what I had seen a few weeks ago.

"Hello?" I yelled with a frightened look on my face. I looked to my left and saw that it was just my dad trying to wake me up.

"Good morning; are you okay?" he asked.

"I am now," I sighed with relief as the fear left me for a short moment.

"Bad dream?"

"No, I was worried that you were something else," I looked down at the sheets with the usual tired look from the morning on my face.

"Are you still worrying about that?"

"Well yeah!" of course, I was! That was the scariest thing I had ever seen!

"It's gone now. Stop worrying about it. Get up and get ready and I'll make you breakfast. We're going to find something to do today," he said. My fear was back when those words came from his mouth. That had to mean we would go outside of the house.

"You mean, outside?" I asked.

"Yes, we're taking you outside. You haven't gone outside in weeks. This will show you that there's nothing to be afraid of," he said.

"I hope you're right..." I sighed.

Great. The exact thing I don't want to do: go outside. I'm not afraid of germs or anything.. I'm afraid of scary people that growl at you in the day and who come out at night and try to attack animals. I was not looking forward to today, but I guess it would help for when I had to go back to school.

I picked out a good summer outfit. I chose something nice since it would probably be the only time I was going outside this summer unless I had to go out again.

I ate breakfast, finished getting ready, and then we left. I was the last one to go outside. I was hesitant to let my foot step over the line that marks where the door closes. Before I knew it, I was walking on the side walk.

It was a pretty day, and I loved to feel the sun. I was enjoying it in the smallest way possible until I saw a shaking bush in the woods and heard a growl. My small good feeling was gone.

"Di..did you see that?" I asked my mom.

"No; it was probably nothing. You're worrying too much," she answered.

Maybe I was, but I was the first person to get into the car.

They took me shopping since it wouldn't be that easy to make me want to go outside. They wanted me to enjoy my one day in public.

We went to the local mall for the very first time. My brother saw a comic book store, and just had to go inside. I'm not interested in comic books, and I don't play video games that much, so going in a comic store doesn't appeal to me.

I decided to look around the store. "Why not?" I thought.

I picked up a comic book and started looking at it. Comic books were better than summer reading.
I was halfway through with my comic when somebody bumped into me, causing me to drop it.

"Sorry," a boy with brown fluffy hair and hazel eyes said as he handed back the comic book.

"It's okay, me too," I forgave and also apologized, even though I had nothing to apologize for.

We looked into each other's eyes for a few seconds, and then...

"C'mon, we've got to go," another boy said and pulled him away.

What just happened?