Cassandra's Curse

Clinical

The gravel road was sharp beneath my feet. My lungs and legs both burned and the wind was starting to sting but I kept running. I don't know why- I wasn't in danger. The man wasn't chasing me. There was no reason for me to run. Maybe I worried the shadows in the trees would reach out and drag me back, or that something  quite cursed and quite foul would emerge from the woods, which towered on all sides of the road.                 After a few minutes my run turned to a walk. My breathing was heavy and my heart beat quickly, but not from running.                  I'm . . . free. I escaped.  I wanted to stop and take a moment to breath, to take in all that had happened, but I worried that if I did I would collapse. The black night sky was turning to more of a gray, and the wind was finally calm. I could hear crickets now, and see small lights far on the horizon. My throat felt dry again and my stomach growled. I brushed a hand through my hair, grunting as I pulled at the tangles.                  I didn't know how much time had passed. It felt like several days, but maybe it was only one? Maybe it was only hours?  I shuddered as another thought crept from the back of my mind. Maybe I've been gone for weeks. Maybe I've been gone for years.         I quickly pushed it away. I knew it wouldn't have made sense for me to have been gone for so long, but the thought made me awfully nervous. Everything felt very sharp and very strange, but only slightly unreal. I tried not to think too much about all the things that man had said, but I worried he was right. I didn't know what I would do if they didn't believe me, but the more I thought about it, the more I worried they wouldn't. I was covered in dirt and wounds, and my hair was tangled and greasy, and my clothes were dirty. Not to mention the fact I didn't even have shoes.        I looked unwell. I felt unwell.

I felt insane. I felt clinical. 

I quickly shook my head. Maybe my state will make my story more believable. They'll see how distraught I am and know I must be telling the truth.           A patch of night on the edge of the horizon was light blue. I hadn't seen the blue sky since I was taken- it was almost a magical sight. The far away lights were closer now and I smiled slightly. The rest of the walk was long and rather numb.             The lights grew even closer, and eventually I came to several houses sitting on the edge of town. I weaved through streets, the buildings growing larger and more clustered. 

The sun was just over the horizon when I finally reached a police station. It was a small tan square building, and it didn't look very promising. I shut my eyes for a moment and swallowed. They're the police. They have to help me, it's their job. The thoughts in my head were far more uncertain than I would have liked.            I pushed through the door with anticipation. For a moment I worried that it was empty, but soon noticed a man sitting at a desk in the corner. I made my towards him. My movements felt very still and the air felt almost damp and cold, although I knew it really wasn't. "Excuse me?" My voice came out very quiet and very uncertain.             The man in front of me hummed. He was a large round man looking to be in his forties, with thin brown hair and a bored expression resting on his face. A laminated card on the desk read 'Kyle Smyth'.  Kyle glanced up when I approached his desk. "I-I need to make a report." I stuttered out, my face flushing red. I wasn't really sure what to say. I had never done anything like that before, and frankly, I never thought I would have to. I worried if I said things wrong he wouldn't believe me or I would accidentally leave out important parts. "Something happened." I murmured. I felt foolish. "I was kidnapped."

Kyle raised an eyebrow and slowly pulled out a sheet of paper. "How old are you?"

I gripped the counter until my knuckles turned white. "Thirty six." I felt much older than that. I felt like I had been trapped with that man for years.

"What's your name?"

I swallowed. "Eternity Evans." It was strange to hear my own name aloud after that time. The man had never said my name, if he did know it. He didn't care for the names of rabbits. It made me feel better, if only slightly, that my name was my own. Something that man hadn't taken and twisted, and something he hadn't buried like he had intended to.

Kyle let out a sigh. "Is that your real name? It sounds made up."

I gave him an exasperated look. "I just need you to listen to me!" The questions Kyle was asking me seemed like they were meant to distract me, instead of actually helping me.

He spoke in a rather monotone voice. "So what exactly is it you think happened?"

I frowned. I didn't like the way he said 'think', like it was an incident isolated in my own head, rather than something that had really happened. "I already told you, I was kidnapped."

Kyle shifted. "Are you sure? You didn't just do something you regret now?"

I glared at him. "Yes I'm sure, he-"

"Are you sure you didn't just give him the wrong idea?"

I gripped the counter tighter. "No. I didn't give him any ideas. I wanted a safe way home and instead he took me to his house."

"So you went with him willingly?"

"Yea, because I thought he would take me home!" I snapped. "He lives just outside of town, in that house in the woods. I'm telling you what happened and I'm telling you where he is, so why don't you do something?!"

Kyle let a small light laugh. "The man who lives on that fancy private property? He's harmless. A kind man, really. You probably got him mixed up with someone else."

 I was growing impatient. "I know what happened, and I know it was him!" He isn't interested in helping you. Not really. A thought crept out. Maybe if your skin was just a little lighter, or if you had money, or if you had anything that made you particularly special or exploitable-

"Listen, ma'am, I think maybe you should go home. Get sleep." The way he looked at me made my stomach turn. He knew I was telling the truth. He just didn't care.

"What the hell do you mean?!" He didn't say anything in response, just shaking his head. He wouldn't look at me after that. "B- But I have proof!" Tears pricked in my eyes, my voice cracking. "I took off my shoes, I left my shoes at his house! If you just search you'll find them, and I'm sure other trophies he's kept, too!" The man looked uncomfortable and rather uncaring but said nothing. I stared at him for a moment before leaning over the desk. "L-Look! He burned my shoulder with his cigarette lighter!" I pulled down my shirt to show the burn on my skin and held out my arms. "My wrists are hurt from being tied up! The glass cut my arms when I escaped out the window!" He just continued pretending to fill out paper work and shrugged. "Y-you think I did this to myself?!" 

Kyle let out an irritated groan and looked up at me. "Are you joking, or are you just clinical?"

I stared at him in shock. He was deliberately not listening to my account, and he only felt bored about it. I slammed my hand on the desk. "Why won't you take me seriously?!"

Kyle slowly pushed his paperwork to the side. "Listen, you can come back tomorrow and we'll make a report." 

A report. I have information about a serial killer and they're going to just put it in paper and file it away for dust mites. My breath caught in my throat. My head and chest ached. "No." I took a step away. "Don't bother."               I felt ashamed. And then I felt even more ashamed, for feeling bad about something that wasn't even my fault. The whole thing just felt bad. 

I had escaped. I was free. But it didn't even matter, because they didn't believe me.

To them, I might as well have been clinical.