Short Story / When Darkness Falls
I stare at the ceiling, my eyes robbed of focus. Tears slide silently from their confines and track down my sunken cheeks. The bed beneath me creaks half-heartedly as I try to move, but I succeed only in rubbing my raw wounds to the point of bleeding. Cursing the leather straps, my mind falls into panic. Footsteps echo from the hall, but the head restraints prevent me from seeing who it is.
But there's no need to see, I know. I know he has come back. The darkness has fallen upon the daylight, has snuffed out my beloved light.
My mind feels loose. I have no control anymore. The fear of what is to come builds up to titanic proportions, overwhelms me. A shadow moves in from the edge of my view, a hand comes to rest on my shoulder. I scream. I sob, moan, shriek until my voice quavers uncontrollably in pain and my throat can only issue forth a dry croak. The hand tightens its grip as I struggle once more at the straps. The tears stop coursing over my dry skin as my panicked will to escape becomes defeated fatigue.
My will for this night has broken, just like the night before, and the night preceeding that. Just as always. As my mind slides into the blackness and shuts down, I hear muffled words. As unintelligible as they are, I know what is being said. It's the same as always. When the familiar pin-prick stabs the flesh on my arm, I begin to giggle. It echoes in the empty walls of my mind.
The same words. The same as every night.
How funny.
"Now just relax. Everything will be fine soon. It will all be over soon"
The warm sunlight played across my face and danced on the wall opposite the window. I groaned and rolled over, pulling my pillow tightly over my head. Somewhere in the house, my mom talked on the phone animatedly. The kitchen was alive with noise. The birds sang outside like they were auditioning for a new Disney cartoon. Dogs barked, kids played, the loud television voiced the weather: sunny straight through the week with pleasant temperatures.
Great. Perfect. Fine and dandy. I burrowed deeper into the covers and tried desperately to go back to sleep. I tried so hard, too. Counted sheep, counted backwards, went all zen and cleared my mind. The works. But the bloody Perfect Spring Day didn't want me to. And telling by the approaching footsteps from the hall, neither did my mother.
"Alright, honey, nice talking to you. I'll see you later," she chirped into the mouthpiece. The ensuing beep of her hanging up the phone rang in my head like the shriek of a dying woman.
"Hey, blanket-lump, time to wake up."
"Sure.... Be out in a sec. Just gotta.....," I mumbled, the rest lost in the mattress as I tried to hide in it like an ostrich. Silence. Then the click of the door as it closed behind my mom when she walked out. Curious, I peeked out from under the covers to see if she was truly gone. She was. I happened to glance at the clock on my cardboard box of a nightstand. 10:30 AM.
Mom was getting me out of bed early; she usually waited until around eleven-thirty or twelve. Oh man. That meant we were going somewhere....
What joy.
Rather than risk confrontation, I got out of bed and rifled through the heap of clothes at the foot of my bed. I picked out a T-shirt and a pair of jeans that smelled clean, ran my fingers through my short hair, frowned at my reflection as it mocked me in the mirror on my door. Bracing myself for whatever may come, I opened the door and walked into the living room. The TV was off, which meant we would be leaving soon. Mom was in the kitchen looking for something, and dad's car was gone, so he'd apparently already gone to town to get the lumber for the shed he was building. I seriously considered putting a sign up on the lonely frame that sat out in the back yard. "Coming Soon! The Behr Family Shed! Arriving Within the Century!"
I chuckled to myself. Dad always took forever to finish whatever he started. It was always worth it when he was done, though; that shed would probably outlast the house.
"We're going to the mall to get some shopping done. You need some new clothes, and your aunt and I want to look at some bathing suits for the summer, okay?" my mom said as she continued to look through her purse. With a cry of victory, she produced her keys from the confines of the Purse That Hides Everything. I smiled. "What are you smiling at?"
"Nothing. Can we stop by the park on the way back?" I asked hopefully. You were bound to run into at least one of my friends hanging out around the old oak tree in the park at just about any time of day, any day of the week. Meg had called last night saying she had something to show me. I couldn't wait to see what it was.
"Alright. But you've gotta buy at least one nice outfit while we're at the store, okay?"
"Sure, sure. One frilly princess get-up. Okay," I replied, knowing perfectly well that wouldn't happen. She did, too, but she lived by the philosophy that everything was worth a try.
"I'm serious. You are not going today if you don't get just one nice outfit. Understand?" she said, looking me in the eye. Apparently she wasn't in the mood for games today. Oh well. I figured I'd just buy something to make her happy, then "accidentally" screw up the outfit when I washed it, no problem.
We set off for the mall and met my aunt there. We went in half a dozen stores, and they racked up the credit charges. I mostly just looked at stuff. At the last store, I bought a pair of jeans and a stupid frilly shirt with intent to destroy. Satisfied, my mom dropped me off at the park and said she'd be back around nine. She obviously was very pleased with my purchase; she had given me a full five hours for the park. Sweet.
I strolled down the sidewalk lazily, watching the little kiddies frolick and play on the jungle gym. How cute. One little boy -- a child about four years old who obviously just started dressing himself, telling by the clashing patterns-- fell to the ground. A mother ran over to him and looked as though she might faint when she saw the wound: a small scratch barely deep enough to draw blood. She insisted on cleaning it and giving it all the care it truly didn't need, in spite of the boy's protestations.
Ah, what a stereotypical American day.
As I walked more toward the far corner of the park, the sidewalk gave way to weathered roots of trees long gone. Weeds flourished here; the city hadn't had landscapers back here in a long time. A golden lab emerged from the bushes that grew crazily along the edge of the sidewalk. He stopped in my path and looked at me quizzically. His hungry green eyes stared into mine intensely, and I stood stiffly, transfixed and a little afraid.
Okay, okay. I was petrified. The strays around here scare me shitless, and this one was a street veteran by the looks of him. His scruffy fur bristled with filth, and he had an air of caution that was found with all strays.
He stared a moment longer, then barked at me, making my heart jump into my brain. Screw my throat, that sucker was quivering in with my gray matter. I took a step backward as the dog took one toward me. He snorted with what seemed to be derision and walked off briskly toward the woods and left me shaken and confused in his wake.
A hand fell on my shoulder, and I jumped, giving a yelp of surprise. I whirled around, batting the hand away angrily. Meg grinned back at me.
"A little jumpy, are we?" she asked mockingly.
"Oh, bite me. It's not my fault you scare people. Freaking grim reaper sneaking up on people. What's your problem?" I shot back, but with a light tone. She just continued grinning. Then I remembered that she was supposed to show me something. "What? What've you got, Megs?"
"I'm surprised you don't know. Anyway, I found something at my house.You'll see. Come on, everyone else is already there," she said, leading me by the hand to the tree.
Nine people were there, gracing the heavy limbs with their forms. I grinned and ran up to a group that had coagulated around the base of the trunk and was taken into a three-person embrace.
"We were wondering where you guys were. What's this great and mighty thing that you've got now, Megs?" asked Chris. He looked at her questioningly from his perch on the branch above us, then jumped down and hugged the two of us. "Do you know what's up, Lee?"
I shook my head. "No, she wouldn't even tell me."
Meg climbed up on an upraised root, whistling for everyone's attention. We gathered around her and waited in anticipation. Reveling in the attention, she paused, building the suspense.
"Come on!" shouted Becky. She was the youngest in our group, having just gotten into highschool this year. She was also the most impatient and the most annoying, only tolerated because she was Chris' cousin. Freshmen.
Meg smiled mischievously and removed her booksack from her shoulder, holding it up as though it were an object worthy of worship. We stared at her in puzzlement.
"What the hell, Megs? Did you get a new patch for your bag or something?"
"Geez, this is lame even for you, Meg. Come on."
"I missed a cartoon marathon for this shit?"
"Megs, come on, you couldn't come up with something better than this?"
Meg just grinned and said, "Look what I found." She unzipped her bag and dumped its contents onto the ground.
We stared down in shock.
I blacked out.
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The opening was really good. You gave vivid detail, I was able to picture everything that was happening.
I love the character’s sarcastic tone. Very young-teen-esque.
I didn’t know whether the main character was a girl or boy until the princess dress comment. What’s her name? What does she look like? When she looked in the mirror would have been the perfect time to describe her physically. You did a very good job of portraying her tomboy persona though.
It isn’t impossible, therefore not a big deal, but it isn’t likely that a four year would protest to his mother’s care. I think it would be more realistic if the four year old did the oppsoite and overreacted.
Brilliant ending. Love the cliffhanger. I look forward to reading the next part.
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Must have been something really serious in that bag. Makes me really curious to what it could be. Over all the story flowed well and made sense. The character is very sarcastic and seems to dislike most of the world and as such is a very believable. The only suggestion i might have is a bit more description of the character. It was a good read overall.
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