Trapped in an Island Without Josh Hutcherson

Chapter One

Kate's POV

Crush. If I were to write the memoir of my life, it would have probably been titled that. 

My body was trapped underneath the crushing weight of damp wood and plaster, the air thick with the scent of rot and dust. My lungs, as flattened as they felt, managed to heave out a wheezing cough as my eyes fluttered open. Where was I? 

The bright green of the trees and soft white sands underneath my good foot, the bathwater temperature baby blue water, and those luscious Day-Glo color fruits. Those colors intermingled throughout my memory. These colors were forgotten in this sea of black and darkness. As if it were midnight contained in this small section of the world. But where was I? 

My hands reached out to nothingness of black, grabbing the steady wood. Whatever was on my back leaned in on my bad leg, weight shifting and slamming into my bones.

I let out a scream. My eyes, already like I had weighted them down with drained tears, began to sting with pain. I grit my teeth, breathing in. The dust had formed in the air, heading into my lungs. I let out another cough. But the wood, it yearned. Something inside of me told me to pull. 

Using whatever manic energy I had left from hours of crying, I pulled myself out, wiggling on my stomach. Bits of glass and wood, dust and fragments of what once could be called a beachfront mansion coagulated around me as I parted the particles like the Red Sea. I could feel stings accumulating on my skin, through the fabric of that gross granny dress she forced me to wear.  

Crush.  As I worked my left leg out of the thing, the other was stuck stubborn and unyielding.  My leg was flattened, bones weak and unyielding. No amount of ice, rest and kisses from Josh could ever heal this stupid thing. The pain skyrocketed from the tips of my numb toes, weaving through my veins and through my spine. Knives and needles, pins and pricks covered my body. Numb. 

With a final gasp, I let myself fall. My brain, my body, my soul seemed to yield to exhaustion from the pain.

Crush went my face, my neck, and my arms. Loose, loose, loose everything went as I slipped out.

Once upon a time, it was a winter day far away from the sunny California skylines of Los Angeles that I dreamed of long ago. My parents were at work in the emergency room of the hospital they met in, I was at home.

I sat alone in my bedroom, cradling the Josh teddy bear my best friend had bought me before she moved away years ago. She promised she would write. The bear was an almost perfect facsimile of that Josh Hutcherson, from his dark hair to his bright eyes and winning smile. The toy had his best outfit, the gray shirt and expensive jeans that my friend had shoplifted from Build a Bear for me. 

The eyes of Josh were stuck forward on the cheap paper I printed the pictures on. The unusually hard Josh pillow on my back, fabric stiff enough to be used as computer paper.

I took a deep breath and gave the plushie a squeeze, inhaling the scent of the bear. It wasn't much for perfume, rather the smell of cigarettes stolen from her father's packs that she used to smoke, the warm buttery mall soft pretzel from her summer job she took at the request of her probation officer, and the scent of the cheap laundry detergent she had used months ago. I missed her. Understatement of the century. 

Something rattled downstairs. Tucking the bear under my arm and turning off the light, I bounded down the stairs and to the front door. I saw the blue uniform of the mailwoman as she turned away from the front door and into the beachy, Northwest neighborhood I lived in. The streets were packed, the school was over and work was ending for the breadwinners on my block. I had classes and homework but I wasn't interested. What mattered was just the mailbox. With one hand, I scooped up the mess of spam and bills and deposited them on the floor under my feet. Dad will take care of him, he usually finishes off the day shift in an hour. 

But my eyes reopened the time I got to the mail. The room, no not the room it was more of a space in the midst of destruction, was still pitch black. As if someone had turned the lights off in this space. My eyes, piercing with pain, saw the thick wood I used to pull myself through. My ribs ached in pain. 

If I was going to die, it all came from that crush. 

But somehow, I would not.