Just Run

Chapter 2: Stranger in the Dark

Chapter 2: Stranger in the dark

I couldn’t believe it. My head and heart couldn’t believe it. I’d gone beyond the pain of tears left with numbness.

I did the only thing I could think of, I went home. Surely it was a lie. My mother would be there when I walked in, apologise for not picking me up and we would have a quiet evening together celebrating my birthday.

When I reached the doorstep I realised the door was already open a crack. I held out my arm and gave the wood a push. The creaking sound was ominous in the dark, the chill of an empty flat filling my soul. As I took a tentative step in the hairs on the back of my neck rose.

I wasn’t alone.

I switched on the hall light and then slowly made my way down the corridor, stepping cautiously on the stone floor. A slight glow in the kitchen drew my eye, the sound of my heartbeat throbbing in my ear was deafening.

Suddenly a figure moved swiftly towards me from the shadows backing me into the wall behind me, the figures fingers found my throat the other hand covering my mouth preventing me from making me any sound or even taking a breath.

“Listen close and only answer by nodding or shaking your head” He growled. “Nod that you understand.”

I was stock still, then quickly came to my senses and nodded.

“Do you know Mrs Smith who lives here?”

I nodded.

“Do you know where she is?”

I paused at the question, not answering quick enough for the man. He pulled my neck forward and bashed me back against the wall. Tears fell from my eyes from the pain in my head.

“Do you know where she is?” He growled again, more forcefully.

I nodded slowly.

“Where? Speak up!”

I swallowed as he let go slightly.

“D…dead” I spoke in little more than a whisper.

The man’s eyes went wide and he took a step back. I took this opportunity to grab an umbrella from the stand behind me and wacked the man on the head, causing him to slip, cracking his head first on the wall and then on the stone floor.

He didn’t move. My shaky breath came out in gasps as I saw a trickle of blood appear on his forehead. Coming to my senses I realised I couldn’t stay here. I ran into my room grabbing anything I could get my hands on, stumbling into my mother’s room in my haste ransacking it for anything valuable. In my head her instructions, I had been made to recite since I could remember, were playing in my head.

In an emergency:

1: Collect basic clothes.

2: Take anything of monetary value.

3: Collect the blue box.

4: Try to get food.

5: Leave anything useless.

6: Just run.

In her closet I reached for the box and picking up the last items I ran back down the corridor where the man was starting to come round. I didn’t stop as I ran out of the door, not even to take a last glance at the life I was leaving behind.

I rounded the corner of the bus station and climbed aboard handing some money to the driver before going to the back. As we pulled away I saw a car swing round the bend, barely missing some pedestrians, swerve to a halt and 2 men in suits dashing out, their eyes darting around. I kept low till we were far away

I looked at the box clutched tight in my hands, so hard my knuckles were turning white. Opening it I saw a note lying on top of sealed files, two words which were already drilled into my memory scrawled across it.

Just run.