Psychotic Terrors

When a young girl loses her father and has a rough patch in her life she begins to lose her mind.

 

ONE

 

 

 

            “I still blame myself for what happened to Leslie!”

            “What do you mean it’s not my fault, yes, it is! I shouldn’t have told her that then, not while she was behind the wheel.”

            “I know I didn’t know how she would react, but I could have waited! All those emotions and heartache she must have felt in a split second, it must have…”

            “I know… but knowing her last thoughts were of her fiancé and knowing that he cheated on her is unfair, its just not how it should happen…. and it shouldn’t have happened…she should still be here!”

            “Yes, of course I trust you, you have been there for me for as long as I can remember.”

            “What? No, you have never lied to me.”

            “I know…I do want to believe you.”

A big sigh was let out, “all right, I will try to stop blaming myself.”

            There was a knock on the bedroom door, I took the bear and stuffed it under her pillow.

            “Lonnie, are you in there? Can I come in?”

            “Sure,” I hid the bear further under the pillow, making sure it was out of sight from her mother.

            “How are you feeling today?”

            “I’m fine, just a bit tired still.”

            “Yeah that is normal, you’ve been though a lot recently,” she paused. “How are the wounds healing?”

            “Fine.” They were never that bad to begin with; I don’t understand why I had to get stiches.

            “Are you sure? Those were some terrible wounds, you had thirty-eight stiches in total.” I said nothing, just picked at the frayed edge of my gauze wrapped arm.

            “Stop picking at that!” I ignored her.

“Have you changed it today?” Silence.

“We don’t you to get an infection!”

“Enough!” I demanded, “I don’t need you to hover over me, I’m fine!”

She was silent for a moment or two, “Lonnie, your sister is dead, you must be hurting inside.” I discontinued my eye contact with her and started to fidget with the loose strings of bandage again.

“Talk to me, for Heaven’s sake, talk to me!” There were tears building up in her eyes and her cheeks were becoming puffy and a pinky-red color. I didn’t want to, I didn’t think I needed to, besides there was nothing to say.

“Bottling these emotions up inside yourself is a recipe to disaster, you are going to cause so many more problems.” Why wouldn’t she just shut up and leave me alone? I had everything under control; I wasn’t bottling up emotions at all. I had an escape from reality and that’s all I needed to cope.

 

TWO

 

Sleeping was an issue for me, though I didn’t want to admit it to anyone when they asked. It would go away with time. I really believed it would. The nightmares would eventually stop and I would be able to sleep though the night and not wake up in a cold sweat, shaking and confused. Right? Tell me I’m right!

I slid myself feet first under my quilt and sheets, lied on my back for a moment and just let out a huge sigh. I rolled over onto my left side, facing the window. The shades were still open and the streetlights peered in at me making me feel afraid; but of what I don’t know. The light made me too weak to get up and close the shade that would drown it out, but it was too strong that I couldn’t just let it glare in on me. It caused me to see the lights of the ambulances and police cars. It made me feel the airbag pressed up against my chest suffocating me. I could see my sister, but only partially; most of what was sitting next to me where she once sat were shards of glass and bits or tree and metal. I can taste the blood that drips down from my forehead and onto my chapped lips, painting them a deep red. The lights moved in closer and closer and amongst the ringing in my ears, I could hear sirens speeding closer. I wanted to get up and close the shade but I felt like I was pinned down just like in the accident; I was unable to move, I was paralyzed.

Eventually, the almost realistic pain I was reliving took my strength and any of the energy I had inside and sucked it all away. My eyes slowly narrowed and closed, my muscles gave in and then relaxed, and my breathing slowed down, probably more than it should have and I fell into a comatose state of sleep.

 

THREE

 

            The slam of a car door outside woke me from my unconsciousness state as I nearly flew out of the sheets and onto the floor. The window shade was still open, but the only light was that of the sun. I sunk my face into the overstuffed pillows and let out what I like to call an exelscream: it’s merely just an exhale where a usually muffled scream is released. It was my little freak out I did, and actually sometimes it did make me feel better…no a lot…but sometimes. This was one of the times it didn’t help, and I was left in a state of distress and pain. The pain weighted me down into the mattress; it was as if an unseen force was pinning me down to it. I couldn’t move, I felt too heavy and that I’d sunken too deep. I was stuck, and I didn’t know how to set myself free, so I waited.

§ § §

            My muscles felt so weak and my bones stiff as I lifted my body from the bed. Every part of me ached from the inside out. I braced myself with my wobbly legs and pressed my way to the bathroom to shower away the stiffness that imprisoned itself within my joints.

            I turned the nob on the shower and it let out a high pitch squeak. I stepped into the tub and closed the shower curtain as the not warmed water hit my back and sent icy chills down my spine until I stepped out of the streams of water. I stood there shivering as I waited 56 seconds (roughly) for the water to increase to a temperature that was bearable to stand in. Stepping in with my face first, I let the beaded streams of water hit my face and wash away the makeup I put on to hide reality. I slowly spun around and let the water beat at my back. It felt like rhythmically tapping fingertips dancing around on my back. It began to loosen the tense muscles that encaged my body and soul, it was like I was being set free from a not so distant group of demons that played movies without command inside of my head.

            I just planted my feet onto the tub bottom where the little no slip sticker peeled up on their edges. Standing there with the warm water pounding on my back was just what I needed to keep the demons away.

            The water slowly started to become less warm, and then rather cool before turning into ice droplets that felt as though they kissed my skin with frosty lips. I turned the faucet off, this time not making that screeching noise as it did before and I opened the shower curtain to a fogged mirror. It was hiding me from myself and this for some reason angered me, it drove me mad. I took my shaking, waterlogged hand and slid it across the mirror revealing a pale face with sunken eyes; it was a face I didn’t recognize. This can’t be me! I didn’t want to believe that this was the face beneath the plastered on makeup. I was covered in guilt and shame; I was so fucked up, but I wasn’t going to admit it.

            Quickly grabbing a towel and wrapping it around me above my breasts to cover me I walked out of the humid, condensation filled bathroom and down the hallway to my bedroom. My room had become my sanctuary, my prison cell, my hole, or whatever you want to call it. I never left it because out there they would try to make sure I’m all right, and I knew they would never take my word for it if I said I was. Too much had happened and too much has changed for them to believe that lie; no one would have lost everything that once mattered if they were fine…I just don’t even care about what I had, it’s gone.

            My eyes began to widen and twitch as tears started meeting at the corners, planning a trip down my cheeks. I let my legs go weak and I collapsed down to my knees, what was going on with me? I was beginning to experience physical pain with all the emotions; it was out of my control.

            I reached around under my pillow feeling around for my bear then grabbing it by the leg. A smile grew on my face and the bear smiled back at me.

            “Oh do I need to talk to you!” I said to the bear as I sat it on my knee.

            After a few silent moments, the bear replied.

            “Know how you said to me that everything was going to be O.K and that what happened to Leslie was not in any way my fault?” I paused and waited for the response, “There is still so much more that’s brining me down.”

            I brushed away the stray tear that fell, “I’m loosing control of the memories. They just flash into my head and I can’t make them stop.”

            I peered down at the bear and waited as patiently as possible for a response; I could see in his two button eyes that he was about to say something crucial. There was only silence though. I lifted him up above my knee and gave him a little shake, maybe just to get him going, but nothing happened, he didn’t say anything. It was just a blank stare of loose buttons on a tattered face.

            Panic, worry, fear set in, and it became uncountable; I needed my escape from everything, my best friend, whatever it should be called, I don’t know, but I needed it. The dreadful and negative emotions transformed into anger. I put my dominate hand around what should be the neck of the bear and squeezed tight enough it numbed my hand and turned my knuckles white. Until there was no strength left in my hand I squeezed the bears neck then threw it across the room, its head bouncing off the wall. There was only silence amongst my heavy anger filled breathing.

            Before I even had a second to relax and control my temper there was tapping coming from the corner of the room where I chucked the bear. I thought nothing of it, we got mice sometimes, and it had to be one of those. I sunk my face into my joined hands and rested it there. The tapping sound became more prominent and louder. Slowly I raised my head from my hands and looked over to the corner and shock and fear set in. The bear was standing; tapping its foot as to gesture to me that it was displeased.

            I shut my eyes as tight as I possibly could and shook my head, this couldn’t be reality, he never moved on his own before, only talked. I slowly opened my eyes and began to tremble; this was not a dream. This thing was alive and clearly displeased with me.

  

FOUR

 

            “Lonni?”

            I couldn’t move, I was frozen and confused; I just stared at this old ratty thing standing there with my eyes wide and pupils dilated.

            “Lonni?” it whispered to me again.

            I was unable to speak coherently I stuttered, “Wh-what?”

            “You tried to hurt me. Why would you want to hurt me?” The voice was not the normal one I would get from this when I talked to him, this was an eerie, deep, demonic-like voice; it was like an old man who lost his voice.

            I could only sit on the floor as my insides shook like an earthquake was coursing inside my bones.

            “Lonnie, I thought you cared about me.” His head tilted to one side and his button eyes seemed to get bigger and blacker.

            “I-I didn’t mean it.” I said quietly as if I was talking to myself as a pep talk.

            It then waddled on its uneven, mangled legs towards me stopping once reaching half way to me. A crooked grin formed on its face.

            “I have always been so good to you,” it said in a tone that sounded like it was holding back tears or was having difficulty breathing.

            “I’m sorry…I wasn’t thinking, really.” That was the only thing I could gather in my head to say.

            The furry legs took a few sliding steps towards me, it was getting too close so I scooted across the floor keeping distance from it as I shook my head showing I was displeased and not comfortable with what was happening. It was something out of a horror movie; like the ones with evil dolls or clowns who lost their sanity.

            “There’s no excuse for the way you treated me, Lonni,” it said softly as if it was a loving grandmother trying to sooth a distraught child.

            “What do you want me to do? I didn’t mean any harm,” I blurted out.

            It slowly began to ease closer to me, but I had all ready scooted across the room and my back was against the wall. I was cornered.

            “Nothing,” it said in a level I almost couldn’t hear what was being said.

            I crouched into a fetal position pressing my legs to my chest as tightly as I could, dropped my head down, and started to rock.

            “You betrayed me,” I continued rocking but he didn’t seem to notice or care, “how can I ever trust you again?”

            I lifted my head up slowly and looked at this creature, “I-I’m sorry!” I tried to put on a fake smile tin attempt to possibly show sympathy for what happened instead of the fear that was coursing though every inch of my body.

            I squeezed my eyes shut and tried not to whimper or show weakness. The patter of the felted feet tapped across the wooden floor, getting closer to me. I was afraid to open my eyes and look. The tapping of one foot started up again in a rhythmic pattern showing how irritated he was with me still.

            “Please!” I shouted at the thing, “get away from me!”

            “You really messed up, Lonnie, and this time it is your fault,” a deep, robust laugh escaped from what had to have been the bear. I felt a strong, heavy pressure start to build up around my neck, it was as if I was being strangled or suffocated, but without anyone or anything touching me. The laughter escaped from this child’s toy and violated my ears with uncontrollable fear.

            The pressure became heavier with each millisecond. It felt like I was sinking into the floor as my breath was being sucked from my lungs. I started to wheeze and gasp for air, but I couldn’t get any though the strangulation feeling around my neck. The room started spinning as it turned into what felt like a fire pit causing sweat to pour from my skin and form a puddle beneath me. The laughter became constant now; it pounded against my eardrums. Everything I was feeling and healing slowly started to ease away or at least that’s what it seemed like. I saw white spots as the laughter faded away, then a fog grey, and lastly a pure pitch-black nothingness surrounded by silence.

 

FIVE

 

            Once conciseness entered back into my body it felt as if I had melted and been pasted to the floor like candle wax that dried and hardened. I peeled my still naked corps off the ground; it felt like I was rising from a drunken slumber, everything difficult to recall. Placing both hands on the floor in front of me, I levered myself from the floor to a standing position. I looked around the room thinking to myself that something felt off to me. I tiptoed around the room seeing if there was anything out of place when a sharp pinch in the bottom of my foot startled me from pain. I fixed my vision to the floor where a shattered picture frame was scattered all over the floor.

            “Where the Hell?” I didn’t have and picture frames in my room, how could this be here? I stepped back looking around for an explanation for it being in here, there was no reason for it. Standing there slightly confused and scared, the foot pain became more intense as I stood on a foot with a sliver of glass in it. Over to the bed I hobbled and sat on the edge. On observation of my foot there was a bit of blood encircling a puncture wound with glass inside. I just looked at it for a minuet before attempting to pull out the sliver of glass from my flesh. It’s these kind of things I can’t tolerate, or splinter either for that matter. Pulling a foreign body out of me caused too much anxiety. My hands went everywhere around the foot but where I needed. I was trembling too much to control any of the movement. I inhaled deeply through my nose and out my mouth slowly and pulled what was a much longer piece of glass then I had anticipated. A like droplet of blood began forming where the glass was pulled from. It seemed to bubble up in the one spot rather than dripping down the arch of my foot. With a finger, I wiped about the little bubble of blood from my foot off.

            I looked down at the shattered mess that was scattered on the floor and lifted up what remained to photo frame. My breathing became fast and I started to hyperventilate. It was impossible for this be here or even exists for that matter. There in my hands I held a photo a Leslie and dad, but it looked like a recent one of Leslie, but Dad died from Cancer when I was three, and Leslie nine. This was impossible; she was not a child in the picture that was for sure. Shivers began to crawl up my spine and that’s when I released the picture frame remains letting them hit the floor as I watched the remainder of glass shatter. 

            I closed my eyes and leaned back on my bed, legs still hanging over the edge. It was impossible to find any logical expiation for that photo. I placed my palms over my eyes, took in a deep breath of air, and trapped it in my lungs until I needed to set it free. Confused and shaking I sat up to the edge of the mattress.

            “What the Hell is happening to me?” I asked myself, but of course, I had no answer to give to myself. All I knew was that I had to put myself back together the best I could before my mother got home from work and suspected something. I did not have it in me to deal with her and whatever she has to say right now.

            I carefully got off the bed being sure not to step on any more glass and made it to my closet for clothes. With the closet door wide open I stood there and blankly stared at all the clothes, “Why does it even matter?” I sighed, “It’s not like I’m going anywhere.” I grabbed the first thing that my hand landed on, an oversized tee shirt from God knows where then pulled out some black sweats. With the tent of shirt covering my top half, I then slid myself into the sweats. I could feel the pilled up material on the inside of them rub up against the unshaven hairs on my legs. I grabbed my old slippers from the bottom of the closet and crushed my feet into them. My attire showed more effort and ambition than I felt inside myself at that point.

            I grabbed the dustpan and broom from the closet in the hallway so I could clean up before I had to explain the unexplainable to my mother. I picked up the larger pieces of broken glass with my hands and threw it into a brown, paper shopping bag before sweeping the tiny shards up into the dustpan.

            “Hopefully I got it all.” I said to myself in a whisper. Once the problematic mess was tossed out to the trash in the yard and I put the broom back precisely where it was before I trudge down the hallway to my room. I moved with little speed and gazed at the photos my mother had hung on the walls over the years. Ones where my father was holding me as a newborn, some of my sister at her senior prom and college graduation amongst a good amount of various school photos of us that were taken during our school days. There was so much love for my sister, she had such a great future ahead of her, even if she was without that pig she thought was her true love. Leslie was in the process of finishing up and getting her masters in special education; she was going to make a difference in children’s learning experiences, but now she is gone and all there is left is… me. That jobless, college dropout, friendless, f**k up who can’t even keep a boyfriend. My mother must be real proud of her now, only daughter.

           

SIX

            A buzzing noise alarmed me to the point where I dropped my old psychology book (which I was honestly not really reading; just pretending so I felt I was smart) onto my lap. The noise continued to happen and after about thirty seconds, I comprehended that it was my cell phone vibrating. Reaching across the bed, I grabbed and answered it, “Hello?”

            “Hi, you all right?” It was my mother checking up on me.

            “Yeah,” I said in a tone like a confused recipient of an unordered package.

            “Wonderful,” she paused for a moment. “I’m going to be home late tonight, do you feel up to making yourself something to eat?” I didn’t say anything, I actually was too lost in my head to remember I had to talk while on the phone to get the answer across to the other end.

            “Lonni?”

            “Oh�"yeah I’ll do that in a little,” I wasn’t really hungry but she worries too much if I say I’m not hungry and don’t eat.

            “You best do it, you can’t go starving yourself.” Some of the things she would say irk me and make me want to walk away from her, or in this case hang up on her.

            “I will, I promise.” That was a huge lie and I didn’t care.

            “All righty then,” she coughed to clear her throat, “I won’t be able to answer my phone so please be safe.” I knew that she was keeping something from me, but what does it matter?

            “Uh, bye.” I hung up the phone before she had time to shove any more crap into out little chat that was not required to begin with.

            I slithered myself back to the center of the bed and felt around for the book. Why am I pretending I am something special? I’m just a f**k up and nothing will change that in other peoples eyes and certainly won’t in mine. I threw the book across the room and let it crash on the floor the cover half open, holding itself up at an angle only to slid the book into a face-down and open position.

            With my knees pressed to my chest, I sat there and did nothing, didn’t even think, I didn’t have anything going on in my head for however long. Once I finally unravel myself, I turn to gaze out the window. The streetlights were on and glaring through my window; the shade was open again.

            I didn’t even look at it’s hypnotic gleam more than a millisecond before I squeezed my eyes shut and took all the strength I had to turn away from the window. I couldn’t take a chance of it happening again, whatever it was. If that light was possibly be the trigger to everything that was going on, I wasn’t going to take a chance.

 

            It must have been at least nine or so at night; the black, moonless, sky seemed to scream it. I knew I had to eat something before my mother got back and got at my throat demanding me to eat that I was going to end up “skinny and sick.” I was never good enough for her, not as long as I can remember…or at least that’s what I want to think anyways.

            The fridge was mostly empty; it looked like my mother decided to clean it before work. There was not even a little bit of pasta in the pantry to cook. How does she expect me to eat if she doesn’t go shopping? I’m clearly not the one who is suffering after the accident, but rather her. She’s sneaking around doing who knows what leaving me home alone; she only calls to “check in” aka make sure I’m still alive (then again, I’m not even sure she cares). If she’s not out she’s “asleep” on the couch, but in reality she’s drunk off her a*s and passed out and stinking of cheap booze and stale cigar smoke. What does she take me for, an idiot? I can see what’s going on and I’m not the one she should be worrying about, it’s herself that needs work.

            My stomach sat inside me, it was an empty pit, but that was nothing new and I was rather used to it. I started to slide my feet across the hardwood floor as if I was skating like when I was little and my dad and sister used to take me to the pond in town once it was frozen enough to not fall through. Mom would stay at home, she never did anything with us, or as a family as a whole for that matter. At the pond, Daddy would hold my tiny, mitten covered hands and pull me around the ice. I would scream for him to go faster and Leslie pranced around on her own looking like a professional Olympic figure skater. I used to idolize her, she was so much more than just my big sister, she was my best friend, and I wanted to be just like her when I grew up.

            I was lost in the memories of the pond and the two most important and influential individuals in my life and I started sliding a little too fast down the hall, hit the door to my room and came crashing down on my a*s. I would never be as graceful as my sister was, I would never be anything close to what she was…I was a weed and her, a perfect sunflower. That’s just how things worked out…but why should I care now, that’s the past, it’s over and their gone just like my ambitions to succeed.

 

SEVEN

            After I picked my a*s up from the floor and brushed off some cobwebs, I climbed into bed and stared at the ceiling and watched the fan spin, spin, spin. I was motionless. I felt nothing; or maybe I couldn’t identify what I was feeling, or maybe it wasn’t anything at all.

§ § §

 

            Just as I made it just about to sleep, I heard the hand-made oak door slam shut and produce a sound I’d never heard it make in my life. Strange non-rhythmic tapping that sounded like a big-footed toddler learning to walk seem to sound like they came from around the front door. I had no idea what time it was, but I was guessing it must’ve been close to midnight or one.

            A strong thud shakes the wall across the room from me followed by the shatter of what I knew was the expensive china tea set from my Mammy that he mother handed down to her now hitting the floor. Just by the sounds it created when it clashed and tumbled to the floor I knew there would only be little scraps of white and blue glass left; there would be no way to fix it. (Oh, and I bet anything that when my mother sobers up and is awake tomorrow she’ll discover a system which will put all the blame on me.)

            Oversized baby steps filled my ears as they traveled down the hallway and just stopped.

            “Please, don’t be outside my door,” I prayed to whomever people pray to when in need of a miracle. I looked at the bottom of the door to se if there were any shadows being formed from on the opposite side; I didn’t see any. Was I safe?

 

§ § §

 

            It has to be the number one most sickening sounds any human could produce by only using their body and I could overhear it coming from down the hall. My stomach rotated and warped itself deep inside me as I heard her vomit hitting the toilet bowl. A stench of bar food and what may have been vodka traveled down the hall and crept underneath my door, entering without permission. It was putrid, so much worse than even a fridge packed of old, spoiled fish. My gag reflex was about to kick in and I would be the next one sick; I held my nose then used my mouth to breath.

            The sound of the toilet flushing was never such a wondrous sound to me in all my life. I just had to hope that was everything she had inside her. Expecting the footsteps to go back down the all toward the couch as she always did when she came home drunk, I was surprised when I saw a shadow come from the other side of my door. It was clear she was still shitfaced as she rattled the doorknob as she muttered every profanity in the English language. This was not something normal for her to come home and do even when drunk.

            The doorknob was rotating and the door was cracking open as if a turtle was attempting to push a ten-ton brick. A trembling, manicured hand gripped the edge of the door and pushed it open. A middle-aged woman wearing dress that looked like she stole it from a frat girl. Vomit dripped from her chin to the floor, but she didn’t seem to care. She stood there speechless and wobbling from one side to the other with blank face with widened eyes glued to me.

            I didn’t know how to deal with this, I never partied or dealt with drunken crazies in my life.  With my lips trembling I look her right in the eyes, took a deep breath, and said what I thought was best, “Mom, I think you should go to bed.”

            A smile seemed to grow out of an expressionless face, “Shut the f**k up, Lonnie!”

Her speech was slurred more than in movies, but somehow I could understand what she was saying. My eyes widened, she never spoke that to anyone, not even when she’s drinking. There was so much more to this picture then what I knew.

            “Mom, you really need to get some rest,” I said as nice and softly as possible. “I’ll walk you up to your bed.” I walked over making sure not to move to fast possibly scaring her. I gently put me arm around her trying to rotate her in the direction to leave my room.

            She yanked away from me with all her drunken strength, breaking out of the grip I lightly had on her skimpy dress. There was a snapping and popping sound; the seam of the dress was breaking.

            “You b***h,” she scoffed with a shower of spit from her dirty, drunken mouth. I relinquished the grip I had on the dress and put my hands up to show no harm. Her trembling hand rose up then came within inches of striking me across my face before stopping. My mother stood there without moving, her hand was still near my face as I squinted my eyes, afraid. A sigh was released along with the stench of the vodka in hear breath hitting me in the face. Her eyes jerked away from me and towards the door before she walked out it and wobbled on broken heels down the hall and thankfully away from me.

 

SEVEN

 

            The rising sun filled my room and snuck beneath my closed eyes to wake me from my slumber. Its rays were warm on my cold and pale flesh trying to warm the cold and dead feelings I held inside of myself. I rolled myself away from the window to shield my eyes from the light. I didn’t want to get up and face life but the rays of light pounded on my shoulders between the straps of my tank top. It was pushing me to wake up then eventually I had to give in and get up.

            I eased my weak and soulless body off my bed and over to the door. I could hear my mother’s post-drunken snores from the still l closed door. Did I really need anything out there? Even if I did, it wasn’t worth it to me to go out there.

            I never had this much of fear and resentment towards my mother and she was never truly this bad until about a year or two after my father’s death. Before this, I don’t think I ever saw her drunk and if she was, it wasn’t noticeable to the naked eye. Before she would have never raised a hand at her children only maybe make a joke about it, but to go and do it, no she would never have.  

            Things were changing, my mother wasn’t the same woman she used to be�"but neither was I when I thought about it. Leslie’s death put a lot of weight on us, it was life changing and still new to us. In time, things would have to get better, that is how things worked in life, so I have been told: when you hit rock bottom you can only go up from there. Things could not possibly get any worse than they already were, so everything should be getting better soon. I’ll just keep on telling myself that until it does get better. 

 

§ § §

 

            The snoring continued to vibrate off the walls, down the hall and into my room for hours upon hours as she slept in an alcohol induced slumber unable to wake. Being in the room when I had to be and not by choice made it hell. I swear the walls around me were caving in on me and I was running out of oxygen to the point where my chest felt tight and I couldn’t get air in. Hyperventilating, I lay on my bed and hypnotized myself with the spinning ceiling fan. The pattering sound it made from being loosely bolted to the ceiling echoed in my ears, beat my eardrums to indescribable pain, and caused agony that I could not bear. I pressed a pillow over my head to attempt to muffle the sound but it was no use, the pattering was too much. I began to shake and tremble, it was uncontrollable. There was no oxygen left, I couldn’t breath, and everything became so dark and dim.

            I rose to my knees and grabbed at my neck as I gasped hoping to get air into my empty lungs. I swore this was going to be how I died, suffocation by nothing. As I kneelt there taking what I thought were my last breaths of life, my bedroom door flew open and a half awake and hung-over mother stood there in confusion as her daughter suffocated to death. She didn’t move from the doorway, just stood there and watched me as I died right before her eyes.

            Then, in less then a second it all suddenly stopped and air entered back into my lungs. I was physically alive. I peered over to my mother who still stood there not with a care in the world. Her foot was tapping, what the hell did I do this time?

            “What the f**k is wrong with you, Lonnie?” my mother screamed.

I just looked at her blankly having no idea what she was talking about, unless she saw everything that just happened.

            “You’re loosing your mind,” she said, “suffocation from thin air, that’s not normal.”

What was I going to say? I didn’t have a cover up story planned, I was going to have to wing it.

            “What are you talking about?” I asked as if she saw nothing.

            “Don’t play me as a fool, I’m not stupid.”

Even though I begged to differ by her statement on her intelligence, I continued to cover my a*s.

            “Are you feeling all right, Mom?” I wanted her to second guess if she really saw what she thinks she saw.

            She placed her hand on her head and wiped away beads of sweats, “You’re f*****g nuts, Lonnie. F*****g nuts.”

            Before I had a chance to get in a comeback, she was gone, leaving the door wide open. I was never going to live this one down and who knows what she was going to do next. My mental health was being questioned with my sanity levels too. The only thing I will admit to if questioned is possibly being a little unstable and slightly depressed but nothing else. As far as I was concerned I was fine.

 

 EIGHT

 

            I was running, from what I don’t know, but I felt I couldn’t stop or look back. No matter how fast and far I ran everything stayed the same and I didn’t move. I could feel the warm, moist breath of some thing breathing down my neck, it wasn’t human, and I wasn’t safe.

            My legs were giving in and then began to collapse from under me as I tried to run from the unknown that was chasing me.

            “Come on, come on, don’t give up!” I kept screaming to myself thinking it would make a difference.

            “Just a little bit more and I can be safe!”

            My legs started to shake and turn to rubber with each pounding stomp as my foot hit the swampy, moist ground.

            “NO, NO, NO!”

            My legs gave out and down I fell, face first. No matter how much power and strength I put into my arms, I couldn’t get myself up off the ground. I knew it was going to be over soon, I felt the ground tremble underneath my body as the monster came closer.

            A rough, inhumane hand with long talons took hold of me and lifted me off the ground causing me to hover to the point where if I was dropped, I would surly die from the impact of the fall.

            The creature began to shake me like a baby and a rattle; my brain was hitting off the inside of my skull to the point where I must have been internally bleeding from this abundant amount force taking place. I felt my eyes roll back into my head and my body felt limp.

            The hand that was holding me and shaking me profusely loosened its grip and I began to free fall to the ground. I was falling for much longer than I would have been from the height I was at but knew I would hit the ground soon.

            Right before hitting it all stopped. I was in my bed, covered in sweat and shivering from fear. I looked over beside me; I felt I was being watched. The light from the streetlight poured into my pupils and burned my retinas. How the f**k was the shade open again?

 

NINE

 

            I laid back down to go back to sleep but heard footsteps in the hall and knew it had to be my mother. I closed my eyes and pretended I was asleep. I could hear the door creaking open and saw even though my closed eyes a light come in. Whoever or whatever it was must just have been standing there because the light was motionless and I head nothing.

            I opened my eyes partly, not enough to give to the fact I was awake and it wasn’t my mother standing there. Chills rode up and down my spine; this couldn’t be reality it had to be another dream.

            “Lonnie…”

The glowing figure knew my name… but I couldn’t focus my eyes enough to distinguish who it was standing in my doorway.

            I rubbed my eyes with fists and gazed into the light that illuminated in the shape of a woman standing in the doorway.

            The apparition giggled at me, the sound so familiar and vivid in my memories that I knew it had to be my sister.

            “Leslie?” I felt like I was loosing my mind at this point, but I honestly didn’t care.

            The figure started to hum a familiar tune but I just couldn’t put my finger on what it was and where I heard it before. The humming was graceful and peaceful; I felt no fear or pain while it was there. I wasn’t afraid either.

            I went to get out of bed and just as I swung my legs over the edge, the light of what I swore was my sister, slowly eased backwards and out the door as is faded into nothingness. What the hell did I just see? I know I wasn’t that insane like my mother thought I was… but what the hell was that?

            I got up to close the door so I could go back to sleep and upon turning back around to my bed saw my bear standing at the end of the bed facing towards me.

            “What did you see, Lonnie?” the bear whispered.

            “Wha-what do you mean?”

            “Who was that in the doorway?”

            “Nothing, go away!” I had to keep quiet so I didn’t wake my mother.

            “Lonnie, you saw something, didn’t you?”

            “Leave me alone!” I shouted this time a bit louder than I should have.

            “I saw it too, it’s ok.”

            “NO! Stop it! Get out of here!” I was panicking and I knew I had just spoke way to loudly.

            The bear began to release its demonic laughter as it fell from the bed, picking itself up and walking towards me.

            “You are not welcome here! Leave!” I had to fight back this time.

            The bear slowly continued to move towards me and my back hit the door as I moved away from it.

            The bear began to hum the same tune that the light was humming only a bit ago, but this time it was evil sounding and because of it, my skin crawled. I slide to the floor with my hands over my ears trying to block the sound.

            “STOP!” I screamed to the point where the room echoed it back at me.

            The humming stopped and I was alone again. Fear brought tears to my eyes and I rocked back and forth on the floor until I hear footsteps in the hall. I raced over to my bed and crawled back inside. The door flew open so fast it didn’t even squeak.

            “What the hell are you doing?” my mother screamed at me.

            “Nothing?” I said pretending I was in bed the entire time.

            “What was going on in here? Who were you talking to?” her voice was deep and full of anger.

            “Nothing, don’t worry about it! Just go back to bed!” I pleaded as I held back tears and couldn’t project my voice.

            “You need help, Lonnie! This is out of control!” For once her voice seemed like she was worried rather than angry.

            “I’m fine!” I said sobbing into my hands, “just leave me alone!”

            “You’re delusional and unstable!”

            I knew something was going on, but to say I was delusional was an over statement!

            “It was the bear!” I said without thinking about repercussions.

            “What bear?”

            I pointed to the end of the bed, “it was sitting right there!”

            “What kind of drugs have you been taking?” she was breathing heavily now, it was clear she was sick of this and getting angry.

            “Nothing, I swear!” 

            “How can you lie straight to my face like this?”

            I was shocked, I had nothing else I could say that she would believe, or to get me out of this catastrophe I put myself into in only a few words.

            “You need to see someone before you get seriously hurt or something.”     

            Or something, it was clear that from her choice of words that she didn’t truly care if something was to happen.

            “Tomorrow either you call and get yourself some f*****g help or shut up and deal with whatever it is going on quietly!”

            “I-I’m sorry.” I said but I was mostly just sorry for saying too much on my part and revealing the demons she saw to be all in my head.

            “Go back to sleep and I don’t want to hear another single sound from you tonight!” she sighed,  “is that clear?”

            “Yeah, I got it.” I said to her, but still I didn’t know how I was going to be all right and stay quiet about this when I didn’t know what was going on and it felt like I was being attacked.

            She turned around and left the room without closing the door behind her. Did she have any respect for me because she sure as hell didn’t believe a word that would fall from my mouth. I was alone in a battle with fear and things I didn’t understand not to mention, I had no one to help me fight back.

            With my heart racing in my chest to the point where I thought it might pound out I laid there unable to fall back to sleep for fear of what may come out of the darkness, or even the light. I lay there and counted the echoing and rhythmic beats of my heart as it screamed for freedom from my captivating chest. Then finally, I drifted off to sleep again.

TEN

 

            The sun didn’t shine into my room in the morning. Instead, there was the pitter-patter of raindrops beating off the window glass from the moaning, gusts of wind that redirected the droplets. I knew what it was like to be a water droplet being thrown around by the wind, so I thought. It’s like this: you are created and you plan to have one journey leading to your destination or life long dream, in a raindrops case it be straight down to the ground to create a puddle. However, sometimes, unknown factors come along and change your planned path, just as the wind did to the falling rain. Then, sometimes the direction you go in end in you crashing into a barrier making your destinations feel out of reach. It’s just like those rain droplets hitting the glass instead of forming into a puddle. That’s how my life felt, redirected and stuck as I fought with myself to get to where I once was and where I planned to get in life someday.

            I wish my mother saw life in the same eyes as me…it would make things so much easier to deal with if I could tell her what I saw and not be judged or deemed as insane and delusional. Really, I don’t think insanity can show up overnight and my mother never said anything about my mental state before. I really think that it’s her that is unstable and in need of help, help that’s not liquid to numb the pain in her life. 

 

§ § §

 

            After I decided it was safe to leave my room that my mother had to be at work by now I came to find her on the couch in her pajamas with a burning cigarette in between her index and middle finger, fitting like a missing puzzle piece who had finally found its home. She didn’t seem to notice me as she exhaled a puff of grey smoke into the once clean air.

            I tried to hold my breath and not inhale it, but my lungs gave in and I let out a deep, raspy cough startling my mother to the point she ended up dropping her cancer stick and burning the couch.

            “For f**k’s sake, Lonni!”

            “I’m sorry!” I shouted out as I hopped backwards in fear of what her next move may be.

            She brushed the burning ashes off the couch cushion with her bare hand without a flinch from pain from the heat it produced. Even from as far as I was standing away I could see the brown-black circular burn that it made in just seconds of landing. I was about to just slowly sneak back to my room as if it never happened and I was never even there but my mother’s wide-eyed, evil, demonic gaze drew me to stay. I mounted my feet to the floor and stood there as tall as I could to make her think I wasn’t afraid. Inside I was shaking and slouched over unable to hold my own weight of my shoulders as it pushed down crushing my spine, vertebra by vertebra.

            Something consumed me and I felt possessed to the point where I for some reason or another went towards my mother and the couch and sat down. It was like I couldn’t stop my legs from moving and walking that way as much as that was the last thing I wanted to be doing.

            As I sat down on the couch, I couldn’t even partially feel any parts of my body, it all had a tingling numb sensation that worsened with each shallow breath I took. I had put myself into a position (literally and figuratively) where my mother could take advantage of me if she was to snap. I felt unsafe and vulnerable but I couldn’t get up and leave that spot. Her eyes had me pushed down to the cushion and unable to move and inch, even if it meant my safety or even my life.

            “Look at this?” she pointed to the burn hole in the couch between us.

            I didn’t say anything, I just stared at in hopes it might just disappear, or maybe my mother would be the one to vanish.

            “Do you see this?” she shouted with he face in mine to the point I could smell her untamed and disgusting morning breath.

            I shook my head with wide eyes, it wasn’t like I had planned this, nor was it really even a big deal, a simple fabric patch could cover it right up. That wasn’t the point though, nor did I know what was.

            “You can’t do anything right,” she said with shrugged shoulders and a body that slouched in a way to indicate she was displeased.

            “You and your big mouth cause so much s**t,” she huffed, “if you learned to just keep it shut things wouldn’t be this way.”

            I didn’t know what she was referring to other than the burnt couch.

            “We can just flip the cushion over and it will be like it never happened!”

            It wasn’t just the couch she had on her mind though and I was afraid to hear what she was holding back and about to unleash in my face.

            “You’re sister was such a happy girl an never did anything to you!” she shook her head. I didn’t know what she was getting at quite yet, but I knew I was going to be blamed for something huge.

            “You could have waited, you are so stupid!” she shouted with her face almost touching mine, “You knew how much your sister loved that�"that--boy and you had to go and break her heart for no damn good reason!”

            It was clear as a spring day that my mother didn’t really actually care, if she did she would have remembered her oldest (and clearly favorite) daughter’s fiancée’s name and not go and refer to him as ‘that boy.’

            “She deserved to know the truth!” I shouted back into my mother’s face.

            “Her relationship was not something you needed to step into.”

            “He was cheating and lying, she deserved so much better then that f**k!”  

            “You don’t know what was going on! You just assumed the worst!”

            “Watching him as he shoved his tongue down another girl throat in the diner is me just assuming something’s going on?”

My mother never even asked me what I had seen just went and figured that I was just assuming something I didn’t fully see and only wanted to hurt my sister. Leslie was my idol and I wanted everything to grow up and be just like her, I strived for that. I would have never done anything that would of or even could have potentially hurt her in any way, shape, or form!

            My mother accusing me was a level that I didn’t even think she would stoop too, well at least not while she was sober or this soon.

            “Now you’re lying to my damn face like I’m stupid!” her hands were now in the air.

            “I’m not lying about s**t and how would you even know, you were never around the two of them!”

            “I didn’t have to be around to know my daughter was in love!”

            “She was too good for him and their relationship was clearly abusive and controlling!” I knew they were always fighting and screaming at each other over the phone. I knew that he had her wrapped around his finger and she wouldn’t ever leave him no matter what he would said or do to her. It was a textbook abusive relationship and not ‘true love’ or even close to that.

            “You wouldn’t know what true love is or isn’t if it went in bit you in your a*s,” she shouted as she shot herself up from the couch, “you have never even had a boyfriend for six months, what makes you a the relationship expert! Huh?”

            “You are acting like a damn child, you are supposed to be the adult here, but you’re too boozed out of your skull nowadays and not to mention, you were never home or cared about anything before either!”

            “So, I go out for a few drinks here and there, who are you to define me as a ‘booze head’ when you’re sanity is leaking out your ears?”

            That was the last straw. I wasn’t going to listen to her dictate to me what was going on in my life. I just witnessed my sister die next to me; of course I’m going to be a little more uptight and different. Insanity was not the reason for this; there was a logical explanation to everything, but my mother has such a thick skull nothing was going to convince her otherwise.

            I stood up and went to storm away but had to get one last thing in before I walked out.

            “A few drinks my a*s, you are a mess.”

            I stormed down the hall making all the photos shake on the nails that held them I place. I got to my room and slammed the door as hard as I possibly could and let out a scream as if a killer was in my room with me holding a knife to my neck.

            CRASH!
            The family portrait of a once happy, or at least faking to be happy family came tumbling and crashing down on the floor just as our lives were doing.

 

ELEVEN

 

            My bed was my only place to get away from the world and sometimes; I didn’t even feel safe there anymore.

            Part of me knew my father if were alive still wouldn’t have let things ever get to this point. He was the head of the house; he was the one with a head on his shoulders and a heart in his chest. My mother was just like an evil step-mom in a fairy tale, but only I was biologically her child, and as much as I never wanted to admit to that it was the truth and that was that.

            Ha, I can remember as a child, all the kids telling me how mean my mom was. It got to the point that when I had any of my few friends I did have over the house, I would lie and tell them that my mom wasn’t my real mom, but just some alien mix-up. I don’t think they believed me, but I didn’t want them to hear from me she was actually my mom and yes, she was that mean and I did have to live with her.

            I knew if my dad was alive that he would have filed for divorce years ago, before anything even got close to this disaster I’m now am stuck living in and unable to get away from no matter how much I wanted and wished to.

            I laid there on my side and within seconds had my pillow covered in tears. Everything in my life that was good and I loved was gone now, my father and then sister. In 10 years but what felt like only a blink of an eye, my life had changed and shattered into indistinguishable pieces right in front of me. I remembered as a child my dad telling Leslie and me about God and heaven even though we weren’t a religious family. He would tell us that whenever we felt too tiny and weak too go on in our lives that we could pray to God and he would be there for us and no matter what we did he would still care. I never thought much about praying ever, never thought I would need to either, but if there was ever a time I think this would be the right one.

            I didn’t know how I was to go about this, it’s not like my dad got into details on prayer but I had seen enough s**t on television to come up with something close. I sat myself up and wiped away the leftover tears from my face. I took my hands, folded them, and placed them on my lap. Now what do I do? I didn’t want to just start talking to the walls or air incase my mother was to walk in on me and assume the worst so I whispered to the point I couldn’t even hear myself.

            I asked God to give me the strength to move on and overcome what was being thrown at me. I asked him to make the pain subside and the thoughts and nightmares to go away. Lastly, I asked Him for forgiveness. I didn’t want to be blamed by Him or any one for that matter for my sisters death. Even after telling me God wouldn’t ever not be there for me I still wanted to make sure and ask, better yet, beg for his forgiveness.

            After I finished my rendition of a payer, I just knelt there on my bed as my knees sunk into the mattress and springs poked into me silently. I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to get a response or a sign of some sort, or if that was that and I had to wait. I sat there silently and waited for what seemed to be hours but couldn’t be longer then a few minuets. Nothing.

            I felt kind of like I was betrayed. I’m not sure who did it, if it was God who betrayed me for not answering to my prayers, or my father for imbedding this horseshit into my head about God and how He will always be there for me, no matter what. I don’t know what was worse, the fact I just wasted time talking to nothing, or just the fact that I thought it was going to work but had nothing happen.

 

 

TWELVE

 

            The darkness of the night rolled in faster then my fear of it. Tonight I actually remembered to make sure I closed the shade before the streetlights could sneak themselves into my room and torment my mind and soul.

            My stomach screamed at me with rumbles for not feeding it, yet again. It’s not like I was trying to starve myself, it was just I didn’t want to cross paths with my mother for any reason. I lay there starving myself to nothingness only causing myself a headache that no pills could take away.

            My blood sugars must have plummeted to levels too low for me to function from not eating in what must have been maybe days. My body began to shake and tremble uncontrollably as the room began to spin around me as if a twister had picked my up my walls and started to twirl them around making me nauseous and felt the urge to puke. Sweat began to pool around me on to the sheets to be absorbed as I shivered. My ears began to ring and I couldn’t make them stop, I knew that I was slipping from life quite fast.

            Reaction time delayed and legs like rubber I managed to pull near dead body down the hallway and to the refrigerator to find something, anything, but only finding juice. Not caring I opened the carton and poured it down my throat. Unable to hold myself up any longer I collapsed to the ground and just sat on the cold tiled floor waiting to become alive again and hoping my mother wouldn’t find me here and if she did wouldn’t question me. I knew she would though, I mean I was on the floor with a carton of orange juice in my hand as I was shaking from head to toe. Still I hoped for the best and sat there until I had the strength to get back into my room and hide there for the night, or maybe the rest of my life.

 

THIRTEEN

           

            I woke up to a loud and high-pitched scream that could make someone’s ears bleed and sounded like it was right next to my head. I jumped looking around for the reason I was hearing this but there was nothing, my room was dark and empty and I was alone, at least from the looks of it, but my heart wouldn’t stop racing. I knew I heard something, what it was I didn’t know and that’s what frightened me to no end. Having had all theses unexplainable occurrences happen lately, anything was possible.

            Once my over active heartbeat eased down to normal once again and the fear I had of the darkness finally seized, I drifted back into slumber.

 

§ § §

 

            Peaceful dreams filled my mind after being what felt like an eternity of nightmares and fear. I had my father in my life again and my sister by my side. As I looked around this feeling of perfection, my mother was no were to be found and this made things in my life-like dream even better then I thought possible.

            Somehow, the three of us all ended up on the pond we would skate at when we were young. My dad was pulling me around the ice as I squeaked with excitement and joy. My sister was dancing around the ice like a ballerina on skates. It was just how I remembered it. It was perfect and peaceful with nothing to fear.

            I was in mid-spin when my dad’s hands lost grip of mine and I went spiraling out of control and falling to the ice. I looked around to find my father and he was nowhere to be seen and neither was Leslie. I started to scream and call out to them on the top of my lungs, but there was no answer. The only the response was from the howling wind screaming into my ears.

            The loneliness engulfed me as I sat on the ice and waited for my father and sister’s return. After time the wind grew colder and picked up speed as the sun escaped into pure darkness. They weren’t coming back. I started to cry and weep until the tears felt like they would freeze to my face.

            I got up to walk home, alone, in the dark but before I moved even ten inches the ice made a cracking sound. I felt movement beneath my feet, the ice was breaking right below me. I ran as fast as I could as to not let my weight break the ice, but no matter how far I got it wasn’t far enough, the pond was never ending and the ice still breaking beneath my feet. It as hopeless and I was never going to get myself to safety.

            I gave up and stood there as the ice cracked below me and I fell into the cold water, which seemed to swallow me in one big gulp. It was dark, but I could see my sister and father, they were in the water too, but they didn’t move, I don’t even think they saw me. Slowly everything turned to grey and then to black and it was over.
           

§ § §

 

            I woke up and realized it was only a dream, as real as it felt and how magical it began in reality it was just a dream. I was alone in my bed and that was that. There was no reason to cry, no reason to pray, it was over, and that was just a dream.

            As much as I knew there wasn’t a reason to cry holding it back was still difficult to do so. I clenched my eyes shut as tight as possible to not let a single tear escape. The simple task became impossible, the dams broke, and waters escaped from deep inside of me and began to flood the bedding.

            I wasn’t the same as who I used to be and my life was gone. I didn’t understand what to do anymore when the only person I had put all the blame on me. This all made a simple task as waking up and leaving my room an impossible journey. No matter how hard I pushed myself to move on and not let the blame tug me down to the depths of hell, nothing was working anymore. I was hopeless and stuck in a life of misery and nightmares that will always be part of my life.

 

FOURTEEN

 

            Where did I go wrong in the relationship with my mother to cause this much of a problem now? I was never a bad child and never caused her much of a fuss either. I wish she would realize this isn’t the way it should be. The bond that a mother and daughter have is something started in the womb and continued into life. It shouldn’t be able to be broken and shattered into tiny bits. It shouldn’t ever have become what it has become between my mother and I. 

            A constant hand at each others throats want to strangle the life out of them is what we had become. This wasn’t a family anymore, it was a mess that couldn’t be cleaned up, like a shattered mirror that when attempted to be fixed it just cuts someone’s hands and caused blood to leak from their flesh and land on the ground later to be absorbed into the earth.

            My mother and I are a broken mirror or a relationship, no matter what I do and how much I try; I will just end up being the one who get hurt in the end. She will never see the damage she has done to me, or the confusion I have because of it. That was something I was going to have to learn to live with as I moved on in my broken life.

 

FIFTEEN

           

            I always thought my life would have a happy ending like in the stories my dad would tell me and Leslie before bed. I never thought it could possibly turn into the horror movie that it was now.

            I could hear the moans of my mothers come down the hall. I knew she was drunk again; there was no doubt in my mind there. Later on tonight, she would be in the bathroom puking her brains out as I try everything possible to muffle the sound of it so I can sleep.  Then in the morning, the sober but hung over, beast would find something to break me with and keep at it until I either fight back or just give up and walk away to hide in my room and not come out until she was asleep.

            This is how it would go week after week and nothing would change. It was as if I could see it all before it even started because I was getting so used to it being a routine every single night.

            It got to the point where I stopped even caring anymore, there was nothing I could do to make it stop no matter how hard I tried. It was what it was and that was that.

            Even after months of this occurrence and routine, the blame she would put on me for Leslie’s death was never easier on me. It was the same pain as if it was the first time I was blamed for it. Nothing would stop the pain and nothing would even slightly numb it either. I just wanted to run from it all and hope it never found me.

            I didn’t have a place to run to though, I had no way to be on my own when I couldn’t even go a day without something my mother called ‘psychotic’ happening to me.  I wouldn’t be able to go out into the world alone, not like this anyway. I was a damaged good with no way to fix my flaws.

            I was my mother’s disaster that she could do as she pleased and knew I would never truly fight back. She knew I was too afraid and didn’t have that kind of courage to hurt my own mother.  I wish her gone or dead all the time, but she was right, I wouldn’t ever actually make a move like that, even in a state of confusion and fear I wouldn’t do that.

 

 

SIXTEEN

 

            It was rather cool that night comparatively to the previous ones. The cold seemed to creep into the cracks of the house and come into bed with me, invading my space and consuming the warmth that was once there.

            I tossed and turned for hours attempting to get warm enough to where I could fall asleep but that was out of my reach. The cold was too much to fight off and I was too tired to even keep trying.

            A loud sapping sound startled me to the point of my heart entering my throat until I nearly coughed it up onto my bed. The window shade had opened itself, the streetlight was now glaring into my room, and exposing me with the light it radiated and pushed in though the glass.

            There was a sound of something loud and heavy dropping to the floor behind me. I was too afraid to turn around and see what it was though. Once I finally gained the courage to look, the bear stood there in the light from the window. The light made the bear look almost translucent the way the light was hitting it.

            After staring at the thing that stared back at me, I noticed it was holding something behind its back, however it was too tiny to keep it fully hidden from my sight. A sharp tip of a knife was poorly hidden behind the bears back. The demonic humming from months ago crept from its stuffing filled body. I wasn’t sue where on it the sound came from, but still it was unnatural and sounded evil.

            The bear moved closer to me as it continued to slowly hum just loud enough for me to hear. It was pulling me into a trance-like state of mind. I didn’t feel like myself and I didn’t feel a care about anything. I just sat there and stared into the two poorly sewn on button eyes as they started back into my soulless corps of a body.

            “Lonnie?’

            “Yes?” I was in a complete trance and had none of my own body control or even thoughts of my own.

            “Are you tired of all the blame?” it asked me.

            “Yes, I am.” I admitted even though it wasn’t in my own words or my choice to say.

            “Don’t you want to make this all end?”

            “I do.” I said as a smile grew on my face.

            “I have the answer to all your problems, do you want to hear it?”

            I shook my head and leaned in to the bear to listen to the solution to my pain.

            It pulled out the knife from behind its back and slowly handed it to me.

            “This is how you stop it all for good.” He whispered, “You know what to do with this, right?”

            I nodded my head and tightly grasped the handle of the knife in my trembling hands.

            “Go and stop this nightmare!” the bear moved aside and a pathway to the door was lit by the streetlight for me to follow.

 

 

SEVENTEEN

 

            I tiptoed down the hall alone, the bear must have stayed in my room for some reason, and I didn’t care though. This was my answer to all my problems. It was so simple; I was surprised that I never thought of it before or on my own.

            I made it down the hall without making a noise that could wake my mother up or cause for suspicion. I could still hear her drunken snore from the other side of her bedroom door. It was still safe. I opened the door and tried to make sure it didn’t creak from old hinges.

            As I crept over to the bed, my mother rolled over, startling me as I thought she might have just woken up from me entering the room. I stood motionless in the darkness until the snoring started back up again and I felt it was safe to continue closer.

            With each snore that she let out I could smell the alcohol being released. Tonight it was whisky. With wide eyes I started at the beast of a mother who had been torturing me for far too long to let it go any further. This was my chance to end it all; I would be free and not blamed anymore.

            I raised the knife above my head with both hands grasped around the handle and tried to control the shaking that came from deep inside of my body. I slowly but forcefully brought the knife down within inches of my mother’s drunken body before she let out a scream that caused me to jump back in fear. She saw I had a knife in my hands and more eardrum shatter screams escaped from her mouth and shook the house and I bet woke the neighbors. I was caught in the midst of murdering my own mother.

 

EIGHTEEN

 

            I didn’t try to hide the fact I wanted to kill her as she slept and I didn’t deny that’s what I was attempting to do.

            The sound of police cars moved closer in the silent night. From the window, I could see the flashing lights, they blinded me.

            Within seconds, there was a banging knock at the front door. It got louder with time when no one answered. My mother afraid to move near me and myself not finished with what I had planned.  I wanted my life back without blame and fear in the house I once grew up in with a loving father and sister.

            I rose up the knife in my hands again and went to stab my mother wherever I could get the knife’s sharp and shiny blade in. Right as I was about to make the stab into the flash of my mothers right shoulder I was tackled down to the floor by a man with too much strength for his own wellbeing.

            The knife was ripped from my hands and I was placed in handcuffs and dragged from the house and into the lights that seemed to swallow me whole without even chewing. I was thrown into the back seat of the police car and the door slammed shut, locking me inside unable to break free if I was to try. All I could do was laugh. I didn’t understand what was so funny, but the laughter wouldn’t stop no matter what I was told. 

            Apparently I had the right to remain silent and some other crap, but that didn’t stop the being that seemed to posse me to take over all of me and shout every profanity possible, some I never heard in my life, but still seemed to know during this point in time. I was pulled out of the car after a short ride thought the night of the town. I was dragged into the police station like a ragdoll and pushed into a cell. This is where I spent the night in hysterical laughter for a reason unknown to anyone.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

NINETEEN

 

            I can’t totally recall what was happing to me in the next few days, all I knew is I wasn’t brought back home and I didn’t see my mother either.

            The words ‘insane,’ ‘unstable,’ ‘dangerous,’ and ‘psychotic’ were constantly ringing in my ears. Everything seemed to mush together into one big, undistinguishable mess of moments that I couldn’t take a part and make sense of.

            I was found to be what they called ‘clinically insane’ and put away somewhere, but it wasn’t jail, I knew that much just by how it looked and smelled not to mention the way that the staff there dressed. Everything started to get fuzzy after entering that building; it was like a drug was administered to me without my knowledge.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TWENTY

(5 years later in the psychiatric hospital)

 

            Everything was clear to me now, and this wasn’t where I wanted to be and I didn’t mean to do what they said I did.

            I began to scream and shout at the top of my lungs to let me out of there, they wouldn’t listen. The doctors and nurses didn’t believe me when I told them I didn’t have the control over my body when I did those horrible things.

            “The bear, it was the bear!” I screamed at the nurse that didn’t even seem to hear me.

            “It gave me the knife, it told me to do it!”

            The nurse dragged me into a small room and shut a heavy and thick door with a small six by six inch window covered in bars behind her.

            “That’s how some of the best ones end up,” I heard the nurse say to someone on the other side of the door.

            “Yeah, it’s too bad.” The other, unfamiliar voice said in a reply to the nurse.

            I screamed my lungs until there was no more air left to get a scream out and I started to feel light headed. The medication that was slipped to me must have started to take effect and I fell down to my knees as my body went to complete limpness and my mind became at full ease and I fell into a drug induced sleep in the cell I would now call home.

Author's Note

I wrote this while I was very physically sick and to be honest, I was actually near death; so there are most likely many errors, don't mind them and just let me know what they are so I can work on them!