Sweet Escape
seven
My arms were trying to grasp at the water but it was sliding between my fingers as if it were less then air. I felt like I had just been pushed of the top of a building as I sank and sank lower and lower. I glanced up toward the surface of the black water and say nothing but gray, steel gray water surrounded me as I held my breath. My lungs starting to burn and ache I was still struggling to stop myself searching around for the sides of the fountain but not finding the walls. I clench my jaw shut and look down searching for the bottom, pleading that it would come around before it was too late there was nothing but black forever, my legs disappeared into its depths even now that I was falling.
I’m going to die down here, I’m going to drown to death and no one will ever find my body, not in this world or the real world. I will just fall and fall forever and ever until my skin erodes away and I am nothing but bones falling. My eyes feel like they are about to burst out from my eye socket, my teeth ache with the force I am bearing down on them. Finally with nothing left to lose I gasp in letting the steel fill my lungs but nothing happens, I don’t choke or sputter trying to get the water out. It’s just cold as it fills my lungs and I continue falling and falling. I breathe slowly not completely trusting the water to stay oxygen rich and safe.
With a loud crack and THUNK I land on the body my body falling forward onto asphalt. I shake my head and look around, I’m home. Standing right outside my house in the middle of the street, smiling I run toward the house and up the stairs of the deck. My feet are loud and clumsy against the steps but I don’t mind, they’ll know it’s me when they see me. I step into the living room and look around for my family, for anyone of my siblings. No one is there and the living room is a mess of a trash and dirty dishes. I squint my eyes as I look around the room, moving into the dining room and into the kitchen, no one is there not my dad or step mom or brothers and sisters. When I go into my dad’s room I find him laying there a heap on the bed unmoving except for the steady rise and fall of his chest. I rush over trying to wake him but find it impossible to do so.
Looking around I realize the lighting is all off, everything is still the same steel gray and if I look up the sky is black moving around me, this isn’t my home. This is just me moving around my home not seen or noticed by anyone. I move up the stairs of the house feet clomping and tears rolling down my face and floating away into the sky before they land. I find my sisters up in the room avoiding the corner that was once mine. My books are still there covered in dust but just the way I left them. No one talks but they all know that that corner is forbidden. They are not allowed to touch or even look. I didn’t think it would be this big of a deal my disappearing. But it was apparently a big thing to them. I glance down to my feet, they are cased in cement, a statues feet.
This is not what I wanted; this isn’t how I wanted to see them. I wanted to be a part of their world again. Watching what they did and how much they missed me would not help, it’d do nothing but make my heart hurt and my chest ache. I’m done here I rush out of the house and into the street where I landed, I look up. I can vaguely see a lightening of gray where the top probably is. Or maybe it’s just playing with me, teasing me. I sigh and jump up landing hard on the asphalt again and cracking it, creating a pot hole. This is not going to work, I start to cry in frustration, I just want this all to be over and done with. Why did this happen to me, I was a good person and a great customer to that book store. Why me?
Sighing I start to move down the road and toward the bookstore thinking that maybe just maybe I could find my way back from there. I would rather be in my own world than this one, this one was dull and gray and I could do nothing here. I made no difference in anything; my family couldn’t even see me. Once at the book store I was amazed at what I found. Little Miss Victorian dressed in normal clothes and sitting in my chair, in my corner of the book store, reading one of my books. I move toward her making faces at her and grumbling under my breath to myself. I got right up in her face and start poking her forehead, poke, poke, Poke, POKE, POKE.
“Stop that!” She glares up at me her finger closed in the page of her book. She is staring right into my eyes so I know for a fact she sees me, actually sees me. “You stop poking me stupid girl and get back to your world.” She cracks the book open again and continues to read.
“No I will not go back, you get out of my world you aren’t even from this time, and you need to get back in the book.” I glare at her as she sighs again annoyed this time and stands up. She closes her eyes raises her hands high above her head and I’m gone. Shot right through the ceiling so fast, I’m like a torpedo speeding through the water and shooting out the other side. I fly into the sky screaming and start to fall back down to earth. Closing my eyes I concentrate and suddenly I am soaring. The muscles in my wings contract and retreat into the skin of my back as I land beside Bayard and the stupid fountain. With a wave of my hand it is gone, exiled to the bottom of the ocean. I flop down eyes closed before I head the cushioned ground, so tired I don’t even want to think up a blanket and pillow. I just fall asleep once again happy for the escape.
I’m going to die down here, I’m going to drown to death and no one will ever find my body, not in this world or the real world. I will just fall and fall forever and ever until my skin erodes away and I am nothing but bones falling. My eyes feel like they are about to burst out from my eye socket, my teeth ache with the force I am bearing down on them. Finally with nothing left to lose I gasp in letting the steel fill my lungs but nothing happens, I don’t choke or sputter trying to get the water out. It’s just cold as it fills my lungs and I continue falling and falling. I breathe slowly not completely trusting the water to stay oxygen rich and safe.
With a loud crack and THUNK I land on the body my body falling forward onto asphalt. I shake my head and look around, I’m home. Standing right outside my house in the middle of the street, smiling I run toward the house and up the stairs of the deck. My feet are loud and clumsy against the steps but I don’t mind, they’ll know it’s me when they see me. I step into the living room and look around for my family, for anyone of my siblings. No one is there and the living room is a mess of a trash and dirty dishes. I squint my eyes as I look around the room, moving into the dining room and into the kitchen, no one is there not my dad or step mom or brothers and sisters. When I go into my dad’s room I find him laying there a heap on the bed unmoving except for the steady rise and fall of his chest. I rush over trying to wake him but find it impossible to do so.
Looking around I realize the lighting is all off, everything is still the same steel gray and if I look up the sky is black moving around me, this isn’t my home. This is just me moving around my home not seen or noticed by anyone. I move up the stairs of the house feet clomping and tears rolling down my face and floating away into the sky before they land. I find my sisters up in the room avoiding the corner that was once mine. My books are still there covered in dust but just the way I left them. No one talks but they all know that that corner is forbidden. They are not allowed to touch or even look. I didn’t think it would be this big of a deal my disappearing. But it was apparently a big thing to them. I glance down to my feet, they are cased in cement, a statues feet.
This is not what I wanted; this isn’t how I wanted to see them. I wanted to be a part of their world again. Watching what they did and how much they missed me would not help, it’d do nothing but make my heart hurt and my chest ache. I’m done here I rush out of the house and into the street where I landed, I look up. I can vaguely see a lightening of gray where the top probably is. Or maybe it’s just playing with me, teasing me. I sigh and jump up landing hard on the asphalt again and cracking it, creating a pot hole. This is not going to work, I start to cry in frustration, I just want this all to be over and done with. Why did this happen to me, I was a good person and a great customer to that book store. Why me?
Sighing I start to move down the road and toward the bookstore thinking that maybe just maybe I could find my way back from there. I would rather be in my own world than this one, this one was dull and gray and I could do nothing here. I made no difference in anything; my family couldn’t even see me. Once at the book store I was amazed at what I found. Little Miss Victorian dressed in normal clothes and sitting in my chair, in my corner of the book store, reading one of my books. I move toward her making faces at her and grumbling under my breath to myself. I got right up in her face and start poking her forehead, poke, poke, Poke, POKE, POKE.
“Stop that!” She glares up at me her finger closed in the page of her book. She is staring right into my eyes so I know for a fact she sees me, actually sees me. “You stop poking me stupid girl and get back to your world.” She cracks the book open again and continues to read.
“No I will not go back, you get out of my world you aren’t even from this time, and you need to get back in the book.” I glare at her as she sighs again annoyed this time and stands up. She closes her eyes raises her hands high above her head and I’m gone. Shot right through the ceiling so fast, I’m like a torpedo speeding through the water and shooting out the other side. I fly into the sky screaming and start to fall back down to earth. Closing my eyes I concentrate and suddenly I am soaring. The muscles in my wings contract and retreat into the skin of my back as I land beside Bayard and the stupid fountain. With a wave of my hand it is gone, exiled to the bottom of the ocean. I flop down eyes closed before I head the cushioned ground, so tired I don’t even want to think up a blanket and pillow. I just fall asleep once again happy for the escape.
♠ ♠ ♠
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