BREATH . OF . LIFE . ~ { ReGenisis Chronicles Book I }

Chapter Four [Part 4/5]: The Living Dead

I bit my lip and pushed my door closed again. Glancing back towards my window. 

 

I was on my knees at the window box wrestling with the stiff lock. Once I'd unclasped it, I found that this old window did not want to budge to slide up. I inhaled deeply, puffing out my chest as if that would increase my strength, and gave it one last hard shove. I fell back with a clump as the window slid up, behind me the loud ring of Lacuna Coil's 'Our Truth' was just enough to soften my inability to be stealthy. 

I grumbled something to myself and pushed back up to my feet. Feeling a slight damp breeze blow in at me. I took another deep breath, backpack over shoulder, and started to slip my right leg out the window. I reached for the drainpipe almost three foot aside from my window. My heart was beating heavy in my chest, like a kick drum. The tips of my index and middle fingers met the pipe for just a second, sliding off of its slightly slimy surface. I caught myself against the side of my window frame, squished up against it for dear balance and life. My left boob was complaining, as was the whole middle section of my ribcage, for being smashed into so hard. 

Steadying my nerves I reached again, wincing my eyes shut once more,  my hand had grasped hold of the pipe. My arm was extended so far I could feel the stretch running right through my shoulder and into my back. I knew that this was the point when I either had to commit to getting out of this place, by highly dangerous means, or chicken out and forever be stuck at a window, going on short walks and watched runs around our grounds and dealing with fake, paid off friends. 

I started to swing my leg where it hung outside of the window, and knowing that nine times out of ten this would not work, I allowed the weight of the whole of my right side pull me from the window just as I swung my leg forward towards the drainpipe. Momentum hadn't failed me, neither had my grip or my wrist. My other hand grabbed at the pole as the rest of my body collided with it and my two knees met the wall with sharp pain, either side of it. I let out another sigh of relief and gathered my thoughts together as my muscles started to shake. Wind roaring in at me, little flecks of cold rain too. But the sky had subsided a little since I decided on this way out, thankfully. It didn't stop me from feeling the chill at my back. 

I carefully slid down the drainpipe in sections. I used my boots to catch myself on every join to the wall and tried not to look down. Before I knew it I was less than a storey from the bottom and let go of the pipe all together. I pushed myself off, falling to the soft pile up of dirt and leaves. I stared up at the grey sky for a moment, was this it? The day I got free? My heart thud in my chest, anxiety and excitement dancing within me.  I picked myself up and started to run down the driveway as fast as I could. The sooner I got off of this property the longer it would take them to find me this time. 

This was not the first time I'd tried to run away. Perhaps the first time in a year and a half. I realised I needed to build up some trust before I tried again. I needed room enough to breathe if I wanted room enough to plot and pull off a successful trip out of my supposed fortress of safety. 

There are many things I do not understand about my life. One of them is this being fenced in and protected from every angle all the time. 

I can understand my mother being worried about my health, even though I've not been ill one day in the last ten years of my life. I can almost understand my father's wish to keep my recovery quiet, his need to keep me out of lime light. He had told us that he was an important man with many enemies and that the number of those who would want to use his family was rising. But why does staying alive so often mean not being able to live freely? 

When I was three I had been diagnosed with Leukaemia, I don't remember much from that time. Having no hair from treatments, feeling pain run through my veins, headaches, tiredness. Being poked with needles. Throwing up after eating a lot of the time. Hazy memories like that. Being told I was brave and strong, a real fighter! Seeing worry stretch my parents faces repeatedly when new complications arose.