Lost in the Shadows

Echoes of raindrops falling into a rock cave was the first thing that she could hear when she woke up. Heidi gripped onto the flooring she was laying on to find it was a bed of satin sheets. The feeling was strange to her and she wondered if she was in a drug induced coma. She slowly got up and felt her forehead so she would not feel woozy standing.

She examined her surroundings but it was so dark where she was. In the room away from where she was she could see a flickering light of an ambitious candle and voices were softly talking. Heidi ran to the side of the wall and snaked along it so she would not be seen by whoever was out there talking amongst themselves.

As she peered out into the large caved in rock, she saw four boys that she knew too well. She had seen their faces at Max’s Video store. This was a dream. It was nothing short of a realistic nightmare.

The building they were in was surreal. It was like a caved in hotel or something. Chandeliers were still hanging on by a thread to the ceiling and red drapes were along the room. There was a clear front desk that was still awaiting customers but had lost hope.

There were only candles lit around the room to lighten up the hotel. Heidi walked out into the area and over to the troublesome boys. “This is sick.”

The short haired blonde leader gave a smirk to her. “Look who decided to come out of her coffin.”

The boys laughed at this helpless girl as she struggled to put her mind into working order. “Tell me this is just a dream.” Heidi looked up to see the rot of the ceiling. “How did I get here?”

The leader seemed to ever be the one to talk as if what he had to say would always be the most important. “We rescued you from a pretty nasty date rape drug.” He looked at his boys and back at her. “I’m David.” He pointed at the raven-haired boy who was sitting on the arm of a couch, the wavy blonde guy who settled down with his legs across the couch, and the curly haired angel who stood nearly directly behind David. “That’s Dwayne, Paul, and that’s Marco.”

They each gave her their own greeting sign but it deeply unsettled her. Her first impression of these troublesome guys was that they were robbers who felt entitled with whatever they did in life. Everything was justified because they were young, full of life and endless energy. why should the world not give them everything that they desire?

Heidi walked closer into the light and got a better look at all these trouble makers. “So, you boys kidnapped me? I want to go home. I want to go home this instant.”

Marco smiled his dimply smile and it was not unrecognized by David. “Marco, would you be so kind as to bring her home?” He thought for a second and gasped. “Hold on, no. You don’t have a home. You live in an alleyway at the end of the boardwalk. Doesn’t she, Dwayne?”

Dwayne just nodded and looked her up and down. “From what I remember, yeah.”

Again, this group of boys were making her heart jump fearfully. She was at their mercy and they knew where she lived. “I have nothing for you guys to take. I don’t have money and I don’t have anything precious to me that you would want. Please.” She felt like she was going to pass out again. The drugs had not worn off. She did not know how long she had been out for. All she knew was that this could very well be her resting place forever.

“Lay down and we’ll get you some food. You’ve been out for over 20 hours.” David put his hands on his legs and leaned in to closer to her.

The frightened young woman sat down on one of the couches and caved into herself. “I missed work? I had a 12 hour shift. Oh my god! Max is for sure going to fire me now!” she covered her face and tears fell from her eyes.

“You won’t be fired, Heidi.” She looked up once she heard her name and wondered how any of these guys would know her name. The one who was speaking was Marco and he sat next to her. “Everything has been taken care of for you.”

She frowned when he said this as if this group cared about her and what happened to her job. “You called out for me? I don’t understand. Why?”

Marco stood up to avoid the answer he was doomed to give her. “I’m going to get some food.” He then hopped out of the sunken cave and left her with the other three guys.

“You don’t look tethered like any other bum I’ve seen around here. You keep up with your appearances. You smell clean, you look clean, you wear makeup, and your clothes look nearly new. Who are you?” Asked David.

“I moved here a few weeks ago without much of a preparation. I wanted to see how things folded out but it wasn’t as smooth as I thought it might be but things are better.” She had no clue about why she was willing to tell them her story.

Paul kept looking her up and down as if she had more secrets to reveal to them. “I have a question. Why were you hanging out with surf Nazis to start off with?”

Heidi was shocked that they would call these surfers the same as the group of people who killed millions of Jews. “Excuse me?”

“Why were you hanging out with surf Nazis? I couldn’t think of a worse species to spend my time with.”

Answering Paul’s question was not in her books. She had no intention of talking about the group she spent her time with only 20 hours before. They were not only the ones who drugged her but they were the ones who took her guitar from her grasp. “They’re people, Paul. Just like you and me. They are humans who deserve the same respect as everyone else.” Everyone was so negative towards everything she did and said in Santa Carla. The bad seemed to over-look the good.

All three boys started laughing at this absurd idea that they were all the same as each other. Maybe they were and maybe they were not but they’d never see it that way.

The roll of a motorcycle reached the edge of the sunken in hotel. It shocked Heidi to hear the sound but she knew that it was Marco who would be walking in with food. “It’s feeding time!” He said as he walked into the entrance and down into the lair with bags stuffed with food. He handed everyone a box of the Italian food and then sat beside Heidi but still giving her the space she clearly wanted.

“Thank you.” She opened her box to see spaghetti and meatballs and began eating it as she got comfortable on the couch and folded her legs.

“You must be thirsty.” David snapped at Marco to get up and retrieve something. Just as Marco seemed to do, he fetched his owner whatever he wanted. It was a beautiful bottle of gold on it and jewels. David poured some into a cup for her and Marco tried to hand it to her. “Drink and it will make you feel better.”

“What is it?” She gazed into Marco’s hypnotic eyes for a moment before looking down at the drink. It was clear to her that it was not a natural drink. It looked like blood but it was clearly a red wine that was being darkened in color from the lack of light. The smell of it had a clear aromatic smell of rust. “No, no way.”

Marco took the cup from her and he slowly drank from it to show that it was ok for her to drink. It was a weird situation to her. She forked her spaghetti and ate it, trying to think of how to stop whatever this was. David and his gang were extremely serious about her drinking this wine. “How are those worms, Heidi?”

Heidi looked at David with a turn of her head. “What do you mean?”

“Do you like your worms? You’re eating worms.” All the boys began laughing when they saw she fell for it and looked down but she really did see those worms he spoke of. They were crawling around ferociously trying to get out of the paper box. The meatballs had turned into little turds. Heidi’s were deceiving her.

“Oh my god!” She threw the container on the ground and jumped up on the couch but as soon as she settled, she looked back down to see that her noodles were no less of noodles than they were when she opened it. Still, she could not calm down from this breakdown. Though she was drugged, she was hardly convinced that it was the reason for this harsh illusion. These boys were just childish and would do anything to terrorize people. “I should be leaving now. Thanks for the Italian.”

As soon as she stood up, David spoke up. “You’re leaving already? You still have drugs in your system. The cops will notice and they’ll put you away.”

“I don’t care if they put me away.” She walked out and her stomach tumbled. No one was going to take her away. There was not once when the cops said something to her while in her place of solitude in the alley.

Heidi realized she had no idea where she was. She stopped walking and looked out off the cliff at the dark waters.

Marco came up behind her and put a hand on her shoulder. “I’ll take you back to the boardwalk if that’s what you want. It would take you hours to get back if you walked and there’s no guarantee that you’d find your way back.” He climbed on his motorcycle and looked over at her expectantly that she would follow.

Heidi considered her choices. Riding on a strangers bike had always sounded like a bad idea but Marco was right. It was a far walk. She got behind him, squeezing up to him as close as she could and wrapped her arms around his waist. As soon as he sped off, she laid her head against his body and closed her eyes and a wave of vertigo passed into her. Every second on that bike was a step closer to her death. He did some moves to impress her including jumping between pieces of land or over fires, going down steps.

He kicked his bike stand up once they got to the boardwalk. He turned around to make sure she was ok since she was still grasping onto him for all she had. “Heidi.” He tried to get her attention but she made no effort to budge. Marco made sure not to drop her and picked her up in the typical bridal style and laid her on her ‘bed’.

Marco took her hand and rubbed it. “No more beach parties with surf nazis.”

Heidi opened her eyes for a moment once sitting up and looked up at him. She had very little to say to him but she wished he would stay with her for protection. “Thank you for bringing me back.” She kissed his cheek forcing a smile upon Marco's face.

The boy put the blanket over her and stood up again. “Goodnight, Heidi.” With that, he was gone.

She hoped that she would see this artistic angel once again. What it was about him, she could never figure out. Perhaps it was all a part of her drug visions. She was not herself. She had seen so many things that were impossible. She spent almost a whole day in a cave of a fallen hotel, she saw worms in a bucket of Italian spaghetti, and an extremely attractive guy gave her a ride home on his motorcycle. There was no way this was possible. She saw what she wanted to see because she saw Marco with the others at the video store only a few days before and knew he’d be a special one.