When the World Gets Blurry

I was the first to notice that something was wrong.

Alaina was not at breakfast. If there was one thing that my sister loved, it was coffee, and her world would stop turning on the day that she didn't get it first thing in the morning. The kitchen was unusually quiet that morning when I woke, there was no gurgle from the coffee maker, no voices coming from the small television set in the corner, and no clatters as her spoon hit the porcelain bowl.

And there was no Alaina.

Seeing that there was no sign that Alaina had been in the kitchen that morning and wondering if she had overslept, I made my way upstairs to her bedroom to find that she wasn’t there either. But the fact that my sister was no where to be found wasn’t the only thing wrong that morning. Alaina’s room had been trashed, her clothes thrown everywhere, her closet overflowing with boxes of all her childhood toys, and her bookcase had been emptied onto the carpet.

On her bed sat a piece of paper that had been torn around the edges. It bore four words, scribbled hastily in my sister’s half print, half script handwriting.

G, Don’t look. ~Lainey

However, on the back of the piece of paper was a map of Long Island, with about five different locations circled in pen.

They say that actions speak louder than words. I know my sister, and no matter what she wrote to me in a note, I know that she left me that map on purpose. And I also know that most people run away because, secretly, they want to be chased.