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Shadow Monsters are in the house.
I can’t breathe… They’ll rip me apart.
There’s a scraping sound, like something is being dragged across the floor. Then it falls deadly silent.
All I hear are my breaths, the hammering of my heart.
Shadows pass over the wood slats just outside my door. With it comes a rancid meat smell. My stomach tightens so much, I think I’m going to vomit.
I flinch as another scream pierces the air, and I bite down hard on my bottom lip to stop myself from sobbing.
Someone slams into the wall just outside my hiding place. I shove backward, my spine pressing against the wall. Every inch of me is trembling ferociously, but I don’t speak. Not a sound. Or they’ll hear me.
A slurping sound mangled with screams fills my ears.
I want to yell, to run. My hands plaster to my ears, and I tuck my chin into my chest, rocking back and forth.
Swift and silent.
Swift and silent.
Swift and silent.
Swift and silent.
I don’t how much time passes. Tears drench my cheeks. I can’t stop trembling. I finally push forward and press my ear to the door. Sweat trickles down my back. My legs are cramping from sitting so long in one spot.Mama, where are you?
When I get too anxious to wait anymore, I unlatch the lock. The door creaks as I push it open. My heart stops.
I freeze on the spot.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Sitting here makes me an easy target.Swift and silent.So I force myself to look out.
The walls look like someone splashed red paint across them, but the sickening odor tells me it’s blood.
Jaine lies on her back, her legs and arms twisted and broken. Her stomach lays splayed open. Shattered ribs poke up through the fabric of her pajamas. I’m going to be sick.
Terror bubbles on my throat.
“Don’t be afraid of death,”Mama would say.“Our bodies arejust vessels before we ascend to heaven.If you see someone dead, just look away and keep going.”
I whip my gaze away from Jaine and scramble out of the closet.
The silence is suffocating.
Moving fast through the old house barren of furnishings, I find no one around. I rush barefoot from one room to the next. Abandoned.Mama, where are you?Cold sweat sticks the fabric of my pajamas to my skin.
There are other homes in this homestead she may be hiding in, so I creep outside into the yard.
Rain falls as the bruised sky rumbles with thunder. A flash of lightning plunges across the heavens.
But I gasp at the sight before me.
Bodies lie everywhere, chaos all around me. Mothers. Children. Guards. A splitting ache tears through me. I should have tried to help rather than hide. I scan familiar faces, my stomach churning from the sickness, from seeing friends and neighbors torn apart and bleeding.
