Page 25 of Beautiful Nightmares (Asylum 3)

I don’t need him to tell me again because only mere seconds after he gets the words out, that is exactly what I do.

~ ~ ~

When I wake up, Damien is gone.

Of course.

That’s how it usually is. He only comes around when he feels like it. Sitting up, I peel the pieces of my matted-down hair away from my face and glance in the direction of the window. My stomach howls out, crying in pains of hunger as I take notice in the color of the sky. Swirled sprays of oranges and yellows and pinks. Then I mentally curse myself for sleeping through dinner. And then I mentally curse the staff members for not waking me up.

An image of Mommy flashes through my mind and I tuck that image away.

I lock it up.

In a box.

Chain it too.

Then I build a brick wall around that box, concealing it from the entire world, myself included. This is something I’m good at. I’m good at blocking out all of the things I don’t want to remember. Or so I’ve been told by some members of the staff. But, I agree with them for the most part. What I’d really like to tell them is; if you lived a life of nothing but agony, tragedy, and death, wouldn’t you block it out too?

I never do though.

I never say anything about it because parts of people’s pasts are meant to stay hidden. And if they to happen to be found, it should be because they want that part of their lives to be found out.

Thinking of that subject, and finding things out, I go back to the notion of creating a diversion so that I can steal a fork from the mess hall. I know they keep metal forks in the kitchen, but I have to figure out how to get into the kitchen in the first place.

My eyes sweep over the walls of my cell. I’m thinking, thinking, thinking and the survey of my cell comes to a halt when I notice a spider on the wall. It’s in the far right corner and I watch with a smile on my face as it weaves a web in between the walls on each side of the corner.

Then I think to myself…

That’s just perfect.

Brilliant, I tell you, brilliant.

And in that moment it seems crazy to me how an arachnid could aid me in creating the type of diversion that I so desperately need.

Chapter Fourteen

~Before~

; I feel like I’m living in an alternate reality.

And in this world in my mind I’m standing in front of my Daddy, sobbing.

My face is in my palms and tears seep through the cracks in my fingers and rain down my wrists.

It’s not until I peek through my fingertips that the gun goes off. Suddenly, I’m paralyzed by a pain so brutal, so piercing, and so intense that the wind is knocked out of my lungs and I hit my knees. I let out the loudest howl I’ve ever cried and touch my left side, trembling in fear when I see my fingertips covered in red.

I feel like all the warmth has been sucked from my body and I shiver.

After taking two jagged steps forward, Daddy stands before me. We are only separated by inches. I’m staring with wide eyes into the barrel of the shot gun. At that moment, my entire life flashes through my eyes. I close them for a second and I swear I see Mommy’s face. I swear I can hear her voice. “Don’t cry little bird.” The tone of her voice is soothing and the sound of it puts me at ease. “It’s not your time yet.”

I believe her.

I believe her.

I am too young to die.