Radiant Eclipse

Two weeks passed us by in Michael's cabin, the hours slipping by silently as I awaited his crime. My heart beat each time he passed the bedroom where he kept me locked in, the sounds of his feet hitting wood flooring causing my blood pressure to rise and lower like waves of an ocean getting ready for the hurricane. He came in three times a day to give me my meals, which were usually consisted of pretty delicious food, but I refused to eat anything but the bread product and gulped down the glass of water. I wasn't hungry anymore. I'd rather die of malnutrition than to ever be with him.

On the fifteenth day, he opened my door late at night, causing the skin on my body to roughen up and become goose flesh, and I held my breath as I faked sleep. I closed my eyes and faced away from the door, keeping still as I hear him round the bed to view my face. Please go away...Go away...Away...

“I know you're not asleep, Vickie,” he said humorously. He brushed his hand lightly against my bare arm and gently smoothed it up to my shoulder, causing me to jolt and jump off of the bed. I backed into a corner and glared at him heavily, though the room was only lit by one single bedside lamp beside him.

“Don't touch me,” I snapped.

He got to his feet and grinned slyly.

I rounded the room to the door and, using a hair clip that I'd been holding secretively, I proceeded to pick the lock of the door while I said, “If you so much as lay a hand on me, I will make you wish you never set eyes on me. I'll show you pain like you've never been able to comprehend before.”

Michael laughed. “Really?” he asked, stepping towards me slowly as I heard the quieted Click! of the lock undoing itself. I kept my hand pressed to the door knob and watched him sincerely. “What makes you think you'd be able to hurt me? You're the lamb and I'm the lion. Who wins that fight?”

I held my breath and said softly, “I do,” and then whipped the door open as it took Michael a minute for it all to sink in. I hurried down the stairs in frenzy of tears and sweat, practically jumping down the stair case as I tore open the back door of the cabin. Snow was on the ground and caught me off guard, but I continued running into the woods. I wore nothing but jeans and a sweater, my feet were home to a pair of running shoes, and I shook violently as I inhaled air that was so cold it stabbed my throat.

You're gonna die out here! I thought to myself.

As I continued to run, I heard two shots ring out behind me, and then the snarling barks of Michael's three Alaskan Huskies. I didn't stop. I would never stop for anyone, and if he did shoot me and killed me, then so be it. It was better than living my entire life away from Johnny. I have no idea why the caged bird would sing. There's no security in a prison cell, at least not from yourself, and I was pretty sure I would go to any lengths to get away from Michael.

Adrenaline kept me running, though it was dark and I knew I was lost. The sounds of dogs closing in, though, forced me to hurry up. Nowhere was somewhere, wasn't it?

I saw a large tree fifteen yards ahead, with a good amount of branches that I could climb and stay above Michael and his hounds long enough to run back to the cabin and steal the car. I scraped and bruised my legs and arms as I started upwards, my heart beating so fast I thought I had meticulously morphed into a hummingbird. Wind ripped through the branches, and I hugged the tree trunk as tight as possible as I reached a large branch almost one fifty yards up, tears streaming down my face as I prayed that I would live to see daylight.

I held my breath when I heard the barking fiends approach the tree, and I closed my eyes, thinking that if I didn't see them, they didn't see me. I counted the seconds in my head.

One... Feet crunching branches underneath approached hurriedly.

Two... He shouted at his dogs to keep going.

Three... Michael kept running.

I waited five minutes, then ten, and after twenty minutes of silence, I crawled back down from my perch and hopped to the ground, where I ran in full spring to the cabin.

I rummaged through the house, trying to remember where he put the keys to the van. I'd been made to clean a lot, and so I had seen them in the knife drawer near the microwave. Breathing heavily, I yanked open the drawer in a loud clang and grabbed the silver Ford van keys, shining brilliantly like my beacons of light guiding me to shore amidst the storm.

I sped through the front door of the cabin and into the garage, where I proceeded to hop in the car and start the engine. I didn't bother with buckling my seat belt, but just geared the car into reverse, slamming on the gas as I eased out of the mile-long straight driveway.

Tears felt warm against my cold flesh, and I continually wiped them away as I turned the vehicle onto the road. I was in drive and about to stomp on the gas when I heard a shot ring out, and I ducked, the front windshield shattering as I slammed the gas pedal without looking. If I hit him, it wouldn't really matter, would it? I thought, hearing another guns shot, the back window now shattering.

I looked up and found myself going eighty around curves and bends, a car speeding up behind me. “For the love of God!” I shouted, keeping my speed at eighty as I hurried down hill.

I saw lights of a gas station in the distance, and just glanced at my tank. It was full.

Something was going my way for once.

I screamed when I felt the car behind me hit my bumper, and I pressed the pedal down a little bit more as I entered a lonely intersection. I ran through a red light, and continued on towards the town, where there were no people at two in the morning. I knew that if I staid on the main road in town, it would lead to northern Wisconsin, and from there to Illinois.

What I hoped was that Michael's car was almost out of gas...