Escape

What's Happening?

The continuous banging, as well as the thought that the front door may be knocked off its hinges, told Jessica that she shouldn’t hide out in the room closest to the possible danger awaiting her. Quietly, the brunette tiptoed from the guest bedroom to her parents’ bedroom at the other end of the house. She slowly and deliberately closed, then locked the bedroom door.

Jessica’s high hopes of getting a hold of her parents diminished. Instead of hearing the concern tone of her mother’s voice, the voicemail answered with its customary hello. Her mother usually has a problem with answering her phone. The next number through her contacts was her father. Jessica could always rely on her father to answer his phone. Unfortunately, the same thing happened, her father’s business-like voice thanked her for considering their business.

“Was this really happening?” Jessica thought to herself.

The teenager scrolled through her contacts list once more until the name of her eldest brother, Jacen, popped up. The dial tone began to ring as she pressed it to her ear.

“Hello?”

“Jacen? Jacen, are you there?”

There was static for a minute or two until she could clearly understand her brother. “Jess, where are you?”

“I’m at home,” Jessica stuttered. “I just got home from the store.”

“Okay, whatever you do, do not, I repeat do not leave the house.” Jacen’s voice practically shouted in her ear. “Lock the doors, close the shades, whatever, just don’t be seen, do you understand?”

The teenager felt as if she was going to exploded from all the confusion and emotions swarming within her, but she knew that wouldn’t do any good.

“Jacen, what’s happening?” The words barely left her vocal cords. “Where’s Andy?”

“Don’t worry, Andy is with me,” Jacen reassured her. “He was attacked by Mrs. Rogers at the Easy Mail place, but he’s fine.”

“But what’s going on?” Jessica nearly screamed.

“I don’t kn-“ Her brother’s voice was cut off, leaving Jessica with nothing but the blaring of the dial tone, indicating that the phone was out of service. There was no point in calling out to him, either something happened to him or his phone was dead.

Hoping that Jacen and Andy were coming to get her, Jessica spared a few minutes going around the house locking doors and closing curtains. She was tempted to check the front door, to see if her neighbor was still waiting outside, but as soon as she took a peak through the blinds of Jacen’s bedroom window, she hightailed it back to her parents’ room, locking the door behind her.

After secluding herself in the bedroom, the red cell phone began to vibrate against her thigh. She retrieved it from her pocket, her hands once again trembling as they flipped it open. “H-hello.”

“Jess!”

Jessica’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion, until fear etched themselves into olive gaze from hearing the panic within her younger brother’s voice. “Michael?”