The girls blonde hair, almost white in the pale light, was matted and dirty, knotted and greasy from constantly running hr hands through it. Her pale skin, cold and clammy, glowed amidst the dark street almost like a glow stick. She was the only thing visible; everything around her was encased in a cruel darkness, hiding the monsters she was so desperate to hide from.
The girls chest heaved and everything was eerily silent aside from the desperate sobs that tore from her throat violently. Tremors wracked her fragile frame, her weak body sagging with sheer exhaustion.
Her bare legs gave out and she collapsed in a heap on the grey, cracked concrete floor. The scratches and grazes adorning her bruised knees oozed crimson blood, the perfect red beads spilled over leaving trails of red down her shins like the trails on a map, except these red lines didn't lead anywhere good. They lead to a dark place; a lonely place, filled with terror and desperate cries of those who got lost along the way. The roads your parents warn you about, telling stories about what terrible things happened to the people who followed them, who are never spoke of again an become almost a taboo subject.
The girl pulled her knees up to her chin, wrapping her frail arms around herself, smudging the neat lines of red. Tears fell from her face, dripping from the tip of her nose and chin. Her wet eyelashes brushed against her cheeks leaving behind dark smudges, mixing in with her salty tears, the darkness bleeding through.
"Ej prom no manis," she chanted softly, her voice wavering.
The darkness had wound its way around her vocal cords, an icy grip slowly paralyzing her voice. She took a deep breath and turned her head to face the sky and exhaled shakily, the white puff curling through the air softly like skeleton fingers, reaching for something unknown.
Her empty stare burned into the twilight sky, watching with a far away look in her eyes as daylight approached, the sky getting lighter painfully slow. The faint light was forcing the shadows away, however the darkness remained like a heavy, invisible weight, pressing down on the girl.
The girl stretched her legs out and inspected the cuts with shaking fingers. Scrapes and bruises and trails of blood decorated the pale skin, her frail knee's purple and blue. Her thin hands shook as she traced a particually nasty gash, clueless on how she had obtained this wound.
Dried blood and dirt rested under her nails and bleeding grazes adorned her knuckles, along with faint bruising.
A long, thin cut stretched across her palm, the scab reopening everytime she moved her hand, blood dripping down her palm and down her wrist, winding its way towards the crease in her elbow.
Whether it was the bitter cold in the air or the girls heart, she was numb to the pain. With so many cuts and bruises surely, she thought, she should feel some pain? A small throb or twang? But there was nothing. She was numb from head to toe, numb to everything around her.
She stood up slowly, pushing herself up against the wall for support and let her head fall towards the ground.
She watched her feet for a moment, her scuffed shoes muddy and wet. Her laces were undone, trailing across the wet concrete.
She took a few shaky steps forward, her legs turning to jelly under the deadweight of her body. She was tired. Mentally, emotionionally and physically tired.
As a child you are taught to run away from the monsters and the bad people. Turn the other way and run away as fast as you can because if you don't, they will get you and once they have you, you will never get away.
So she ran. She ran as fast as she could for hours. Falling and tripping, but she got up everytime and kept pushing forward because she didn't want the monsters to catch her.
But no matter how much she ran, no matter how fast, how far, how long she ran, she would never be able to escape the monsters that were so desperate to smother her. They were a permanent part of her life, they were around every corner, every road she went down lead to the monsters.
No matter how many streets the poor girl ran down, she would never be able to get away from her monsters.
You can't run from monsters that exist inside your mind. You can't run away from yourself. The only thing you can do is stand up for yourself and fight.
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