The Night Sky

3 - Vision

Evelyn's POV

I groggily pushed away the mound of blankets, unleashing the drowning warmth into the bitter cold air. Despite the extreme effort it was taking me to fully wake up, I felt very refreshed. That means that I had been sleeping for a while, but I had no idea how long. That's one of the things I hate most about not being able too see anymore; not being able to look outside and from that, tell the time.

I pulled myself up and landed on all fours, beginning to feel around for my backpack that I had carelessly dumped somewhere last night. I clicked my tongue quietly and sensed something about two meters in front of me, to my left. It wasn't long before my hand felt it's old tattered fabric and I yanked it closer to myself. I unzipped the small front pocket and felt inside until my hand closed around the cold metal frame of a watch.

I had decided, not long prior to now, that a key element of surviving would involve me always knowing the time during the day and as soon as I woke up. So I popped out the glass at the top of my favourite watch allowing me to be able to feel where the hands of the watch were sitting. I considered it quite a good idea, unless of course the watch stopped working, which I just had to hope didn't happen for a long time.

I lay the watch flat on my palm, buckle at the top, meaning twelve was also at the top, and traced it's hands with my finger tip.

Two... No, three. Yes, around three forty-five.

Wow talk about a good long sleep, I had slept for almost fifteen hours!

Oh well, not like I had anywhere to be, plus I felt rather safe here... Like nothing could get to me... Like they couldn't get to me.

I took hold of the warmest blanket that had been wrapped tightest around me last night, and draped it over my shoulders. I made my way up the spiral staircase taking a deep breath of the damp fresh air that filtered in through the cracks in the Church's ceiling. I wished I could see what the place really looked like. I could tell it was a messy place but that was as much as my mutant abilities could tell me. I wanted to know so much more.

The walls, were they still coated with thick eggshell white paint they were covered with in the beginning, or was the vibrant floral wallpaper starting to fall away and expose the pale, water filled wooden boards beneath? The statue that I sensed at the back of the church, maybe it was made from aged stone, it's grey colours bruised with darkness from the rain. Or maybe it was still shining with it's glossy finish, giving off an aura of hope to all eyes that happened to fall on it. I closed my eyes and imagined the Church in hundreds of different ways.

Since becoming blind I've found that I can see more with my eyes closed than when they're opened.

I reached out one of my arms and swung it slowly around, grazing tables, pews, books and anything I could, feeling their distant emotions. I ran my hand thoughtlessly over a small book and was suddenly overtaken by emotion.

A blur of Autumn sunlight. A crowd of creamy frills and pastel dresses. Giggles and mouths wide with pearly teeth, not far from the cotton candy kissed cheeks of a group of women sharing Sunday hugs. And in the corner, atop a chocolate coloured pew sat a head full of sun-bleached ringlets in a fresh mint dress. A girl no older than eight with her rosy tipped nose buried securely in a small book titled "Wednesday in the Meadow" in thick golden letters, pressed shallowly into the thin, forest coloured felt outside of the book.

I stumbled back, knocking something behind me and hearing it crack to the ground.

What the hell was that?