EVELYN (ON HOLD)

10 ~ Running Away

"Just because you're breathing, doesn't mean you're alive." --- Carew Papritz

♣♣♣♣♣♣♣♣♣♣

Soft, luxurious, comfortable.

I look around the bedroom that I'd been living in for the past month, and sigh. Placing all my clothes and undergarments in a plastic box that was inside my closet, I put the lid on. The box is see-through and has a flat lid, that seems like it can fall off by the slightest tug. So, I pull my bedsheet roughly off my bed and think.

Think.

Think.

I rush to the bathroom and get a tiny, nail scissor out of the drawer. Rushing out, I snip a piece of bedsheet.

This is going to take forever. It's wasting so much time. And I haven't got time to waste.

I try to brutally rip the sheet, tearing it from the part I had cut, and eventually, I have a long strip of white sheet.

Perfect for tying around the box. So that's what I do.

When I'm all done, I pull up the zipper of my hoodie and put on a pair of jeans over my thin shorts.

The makeshift suitcase I prepared is heavy. Like, very heavy. Maybe it's overstuffed. Maybe I'm too weak.

I make sure I have the Key Card safely in my hands and I slowly open the door to my room.

I drag my box along the tiled floor after I shut my door, and walk as quietly as I can down the hall. My heart, for some reason, feels calm and my beats are regular. Perhaps because this is something I'm supposed to be doing.

I turn a few times to look behind me as I go the way to the EMERGENCY EXIT. The first door that led me outdoors. If there's one thing that I'm going to miss from this place, it's the library. The place where I spent most of my time this month, reading as many books as I could.

And I know that one day, I'm going to find another library to read books in.

One day.

Soon.

I push open the EMERGENCY EXIT door and smile as the cold night air whips across my pale face. I look up and smile wider at the billions, trillions of starts that light up parts of the sky. Flashing pinpricks on a veil of darkness.

I love stars.

Without a glance back, I run, dragging the box behind me. Beyond the pavement, there's grass and grass and grass, and then the final exit.

I can see a lamp far away, and there's a guard standing under it. I have to make sure he doesn't see me.

Running across the large, vast field, I painfully drag the box.

Why can't this box have some goddamn wheels?

I make minimal sound as I trudge forward, and after about ten minutes of running across the large field, I'm not sure I can handle the pain in my arms. My legs, so far, are fine.

I pull out the Key Card and press it against the cold, metal panel beside the small gate. I'd rather open the small gate, than open the large one, which would get me caught.

But as I place the Key Card in my pocket, the door starts to open.

And it makes the largest, whiniest creaking sound.

Are you kidding me right now?

I decide to just rush it. Even if it means leaving with a bang.

So, I take a deep breath.

And I run.

With the plastic box screeching roughly behind me as I drag it, I run.

Adrenalin courses through my veins. Cold air bites through my lungs, but I welcome it.

Gut-wrenching, heart-pumping, calves burning, I run.

I let the cold air entwine with the long, black strands of my hair and tug the plastic box along with me, it's sound fading away as my mind becomes absorbed in this new sense of freedom.

And in an instant, sirens blare behind me.

But I don't stop for even a second.

My steps are bounding in time with my heartbeat, but my mind is racing faster.

In the corners of my eyes, everything becomes blurred. My breathing quickens, trying to appease my need for oxygen.

But I run.

The sirens don't seem to stop, and then, suddenly, there're flashing lights all around me.

Spotlights moving rapidly from one place to another, but they all miss me. I divert my path and run to my right, where there's so, so many trees.

Gasping and cowering, coughing in pain, I lean against a tree trunk to catch my breath and watch, happily, as the lights and helicopters fly ahead.

Away from me.

And I know that I'll regret this moment if I don't keep going, so I walk deeper into the woods.

Deeper.

Deeper.

I walk and trudge, the leaves and rocks and dirt and twigs and insects ruffle and scatter beneath me as I delve deeper. I don't care about the bats screeching or the snakes slithering. I don't care about the weird, senile sounds that await me and I don't care about the spiderwebs stuck to my face. Stuck to the lines of blood caused by rough branches.

My heart's still not at it's regular pace and my legs feel like they've fallen off. Like they're not a part of my body. And my calves? Oh, my calves. I'm pretty sure the muscle fibres in my calves have torn apart.

But all of that doesn't matter. None of it matters. It doesn't matter that my face is caked with blood, or that I'm in the middle of a forest and it's late at night, or that there's animals here that could maybe probably kill me, or that my legs hurt more than hell, or that my heart's beating like it can never be normal again.

None of it matters.

Because I'm not in the place that I hate, with the people I hate, that gave me a childhood to hate.

Because now?

I'm

F R E E.

And there's nothing they can do about it.

'HEY! DUDE? HOW THE HELL DID YOU MANAGE TO GET HERE?' I hear a loud, booming voice say.

And I stop in my tracks.

The trees shiver and shake in the harsh wind and just for a moment - if it can be considered a moment - moonlight peers through and lands on someone not so far away from me.

And the first thing I notice:

Tattoos.

♣♣♣♣♣♣♣♣♣♣