Saving Me

 

The last thing I remembered before I fell asleep was the sound of my best friend screaming. Before that, we were walking down the sidewalk towards our favorite bakery. We were going to buy a box of pastries to celebrate the end of high school.

One minute we were joking about menial things and the next, Kitty was screaming and then everything went black.

Now here I was, standing in line in front of a huge wrought iron gate with no recollection of how I got there.

“Jeez, people need to quit cutting in line!” Somebody from the back of the line said.

“Ignore him, sweetie. He’s just sore ‘cause he’s been waiting in line for three days.” Said the woman in front of me.

I frowned, “Three days? But how did I get here in front?”

There were only about three people in front of me, counting the woman I was talking with.

She shrugged, “You must be a special case. Happens sometimes. I’ve been here for two days now myself and I’m finally this close to getting in.”

“I don’t understand. I don’t even remember getting here let alone where ‘here’ is.”

“Don’t worry, dear,” she smiled, “You’ll find out soon enough. But mind you, getting in the gate doesn’t guarantee you’ll get prime real estate. Some of us wait in line for ages and are only lucky enough to get a place at the suburbs.”

Her words only confused me more. Added to that, the longer I stood there, the more agitated I became. All I wanted to do was go home. I was pretty sure that my parents were worried sick about me. I tried to walk away, to break out of the line but my feet just wouldn’t budge. It was like they were glued to the pavement.

Left with nothing else to do, I looked around the surroundings.

The huge black wrought iron gate that I stood in front of had shrubs and bushes on either side. Trees lined the other side of the pavement.

No matter how hard I tried, I just could get a peek at what was waiting for me inside.

When I looked behind me, the number of people waiting in line was staggering. But what really flummoxed me was that, across the street, a steady stream of people were entering what seemed like a decrepit old building. By the looks of it, it should have collapsed by the collective body weight of all the people going in.

“How could they fit all those people there?” I muttered to myself.

“Oh, them. You’d best not worry about that. There’s not much we can do about it anyway.” The woman ahead of me whispered.

Surprisingly, she was the only person in front of the line now.

A voice from the inner gate called out and the woman gave me a serene smile.

“It was very nice to meet you, Megan Cassidy,” She said before going inside.

My feet moved a step forward without permission from my brain. I wondered how the woman knew my name when I never even introduced myself to her.

A few groans sounded from the back of the line. I turned to see what it was about and I was taken aback by what – or who – I saw.

Kitty stood right behind me, looking as bemused as I felt. She recognized me immediately and hugged me tight. “Oh my gosh! Meg! Thank goodness you’re alright!”

“Of course, why wouldn’t I be?”

“I was so worried that you’d be across the street!” She sighed in relief, “There was a really mean looking man there, he said that I was lucky I did something good to make up for all the times I lied to my mom and stole money from her purse.”