Daisy in a Meadow

3 - Claustrophobia

Then, the door was shut.

"Wait, no!" Panic overtook me. I scrambled up and jiggled the door handle open. They'd locked it.

"Let me out, you meatheads!" I yelled, praying they were still out there.

Fortunately, they were. However, the only sound emitted was a deep, malicious chuckle from Elias. I froze in place as he said, "payback's a bitch."

And with that, they were gone.

I banged on the door, pleading to be let out. However, the sound of their footsteps only faded away more and more, until eventually, I couldn't hear anything.

The tiny closet was too dark for me to be able to see anything. I hastily took a step, looking for some source of light. Since I couldn't see where I was going, I'd accidentally tripped over a mop bucket. I shrieked on the ground as dirty mop water splashed all over me.

I couldn't find the strength to get back up and crawled into the corner, suddenly petrified of how dark and tight the space was. My breaths began to get shorter.

"No, no, not again." I moaned, placing my head into my hands. To an outsider, I probably looked like a madwoman. Thankfully, no one was here to see the internal panic I was going through as I was hit with a flashback from my unpleasant childhood.

"Get in the closet, Daisy," my mother had snapped at me.

"I'm sorry, mommy, I won't do it again," I'd screamed. It was no use. She dragged me by my hair and locked me in the closet. I wasn't going to be let out until the next day.

The Closet was my mother's personal favourite punishment for me when I was younger. If I did something wrong—broke a vase, got in trouble at school, lied to her about something—she'd lock me in a closet for hours at a time. There were a few times she'd forget about me, and I wasn't let out until the next day. I had severe claustrophobia because of it.

As I was sat on the ground of the janitor's closet, I found myself unable to breathe. My heart was racing, and my fingernails were digging into my palms.

"So this is what it feels like to die," I muttered, before I went unconscious and everything went dark.

*****

A stream of blinding light woke me up. A tall figure was looming over me. I briefly wondered if I was in heaven. As I moved my arm, it landed in a puddle of dirty mop water. Definitely not heaven.

I squinted my eyes open.

"What the f—is that Crazy Daisy?"

Dread pooled in my stomach. It was Anthony Miller and his girlfriend, Heather Addams. Just my luck. They'd probably gone in here for a quickie or something.

"No way. She sleeps here too? She must be homeless or something," Heather looked at me with pity.

"Yeah, that or she's just really fucking crazy," Anthony laughed, pulling out his phone to take a picture of me. His flash went off as he did so.

I grabbed my backpack and got up before barging past them, unable to take the humiliation. Meanwhile, I glanced at my phone. It was 8:00 in the morning. School was just about to begin, meaning I'd been trapped in that closet overnight. Of course, I had no notifications on my phone. No one had even noticed I was gone.

Could things get any worse?

My phone suddenly dinged with a notification from snapchat. Anthony Miller mentioned you in their story.

"Uh oh," I stopped in my tracks, opening up the photo. It was the picture he'd taken of me in the janitors closet. He captioned it #HomelessLoser.

With the amount of popularity and friends he had, I was sure the photo was already circulating. People in the halls were looking at me. My hair was a frizzy mess, and I must've looked crazy wearing yesterday clothes—the only difference being they were covered in dirty mop water this time.

"Hey, Crazy," a guy on the football team stopped me. He was no doubt one of Anthony's friends. "There's a homeless shelter down the street if you need it. Although, I'm pretty sure they don't accept animals."

He and his friends roared in laughter. Mortified, I stormed down the hall, desperately urging to get out of here.

Just as I neared the door, I caught Elias, Andre, and Malcolm leaning against the lockers. They'd been watching me the whole time.

The telltale smirk on Elias' face said it all. Checkmate.

*****

I feel so bad for Daisy :(

QOTD: what colour are your eyes?
AOTD: dark dark dark brown

Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter!

Love, Emmanuela<3

12/15/2022