The Cliff

Just a short story I have been working on.

Sitting on the edge of a cliff was one of her favourite feelings, the feeling of being on the edge of the world made her happy. She always came up here whenever life was getting hard. Nothing could touch her when she was here, here she was her own person. She wasn’t bound by the rules of society, up here, she was society. The only thing that mattered was what she said, what she thought and what she wanted to do. Not what anyone thought she should do, or thought she should say.

She dangled her legs over the side of the cliff, humming to herself softly as she watched the sun slowly fade. She wouldn’t be home before dark, but that was okay. Her parents were never fairly worried when she would come home late, but she knew they cared for her. Just in a way that was different than most parents.

When she finally decided it was time to go home it was far past dark, she stood up and picked up her bag as she began walking down the mountain track. This was her routine everyday, after school she would walk up the mountain track and go to her special spot on the edge of the cliff, then after dark she would return home. She normally would eat up on the cliff, not wanting to be home alone.

Opening the front door to her home she was instantly taken by the cold feeling it always gave her, her home had never had heating. She dropped her bag at the door and continued down the dark hallway to her room, sitting in the middle of her bed she rested her head against the wall.

Hearing the door open and shut she flings herself into bed and shuts her eyes tight, as if she were asleep. She hears a man enter the room, and instantly thinks this to be her father. She hears the soft sigh of the older man and he exits the room, shutting the younger girl’s door.

Instantly she opens her eyes and gets out of bed, moving to sit in the middle of the rug in her room. She lies down flat on the ground, shutting her eyes tightly as she listens to her father making food for himself. Since her mother left, her and her father hadn’t had the best life. He worked late and got up early, meaning she almost never saw him. But it worked out okay, she liked being alone more than she liked being with people.

Time and time again she wouldn’t even leave the house, she’d call the school posing as her mother and told them she was sick. She hadn’t told anyone and her mother’s absences, nor had her father. The idea of telling people the she and her father were abandoned was too much for her.

You couldn’t blame the girl, dealing with the loss of a mother was a lot for her. She stood up and opened her door, tiptoeing to the basement door, cautious not to tip off her father. She opened the door and shut it quietly behind her. The basement was one of her other happy places, the cliff and the basement. Two seemingly scary places, but the two places to her were the least terrifying places she could think of.

Her father had never told her to stay out of the basement, like most parents did. He never told her the basement was dangerous, or it was not a place for kids to play. He told her the house was her playground, and she was to go wherever she wants, whenever she wants. Because of this, she felt a certain sense of power over her father. The father that would do anything and everything for her.

She sat in the middle of the empty basement, taking in the cold feeling of the basement. There the young girl fell asleep, praying for her mother to come home one day. Though she knew her mother wouldn’t, as she knew where her mother was.

Her mother wasn’t ever going to come back. The eight year old girl knew better than to hope she would.