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Our first place Middle School category winner was written by Belmonte Middle School student Rachel May of Saugus. |
It was a seemingly normal day, or at least I thought, on September 2nd, 2012 at precisely 2:09 pm. I remember the time exactly because at that exact moment, my family and I had descended into the dark and dank catacombs of France. It was bittersweet of course, as it was marking the end of our summer long tour through Europe, but the beginning of a day packed with mysterious excitement. I had heard the stories about secret, and very illegal, passageways which led to foreign parts of the underground city, but I had no intention of going anywhere near that side of life. That was until I was pushed by a jostling crowd into a small corridor.
Once I regained my composure and dusted myself off, I noticed my current location smelled very strongly of dirt, and mystery. Trust me; I know what mystery smells like. The only light in this “room” was coming from a small and flickering light bulb which was dangling dangerously by a single wire connected to the ceiling. I pulled out my cell phone for a light, which coincidentally had no bars underground, (then again what was I expecting?) and decided to take a better look around.
Surely if I just turned around I’d the see the way back to the main entrance, but instead stood a tall, menacing, dark wall where I was positive I had come from. After banging on it a few times with a pointed and bony elbow and kicking it thrice with my big toe, I concluded that I was certainly not escaping from this claustrophobic space the way I had entered it. And just to paint the icing thickly on this wonderful cake I was being promptly served, the single light source, dimmed, went out, and landed with a crash and the sound of shattering glass to the cold floor.
I turned and headed down my only option I could see, a murky, swampy and utterly disgusting tunnel-slash-pond. As I began walking, (or would you call it wading?) I felt the water creeping into my brand new cheetah print Converse. They would definitely be ruined if I didn’t take them off, but I wasn’t chancing walking barefoot. Who knows what could be lurking around? As I stumbled along almost blindly for several minutes, I eventually came to halt as I saw a light ahead of me flicker. Hope.
“Hello!” I yelled frantically, “Hello?”
Suddenly the horrid realization that this faint spark in the distance could be my only way out hit me like a lightning bolt to a tall tree, jerking me awake.
But no answer came. I waded deeper, splashing and sloshing, now in a full run, shining the shadowy light from my phone against the dirt walls towards the glow. Suddenly as I was about to reach it, the brightness vanished.
A voice replaced its presence quickly with a booming, earth-shaking, “STOP WHERE YOU ARE.”
The light switched on and off helplessly, as if it was unable to make up its nonexistent mind.
“Who’s there?” I asked, trying my best to hold off the quiver slowly climbing its way up my throat. “Who... who are you?”
“Brave of you to venture into my parts, young human,” the voice snickered, as the water rose halfway up my calves. “Beat the clock and slender man, by the bank, amongst the sand, two steps back and one step right will lead you from the black of night, the chest is locked but you will find, the key is only in your mind,” the voice screeched as a large crow’s feather fell into the palm of my hand. The world went foggy as my peripheral vision blurred and I slumped facedown into the murky water.
I woke up with the worst headache I had ever had in a room I didn’t recognize, the booming voice still pounding in my head its dark omen. What did it mean? But the better question would have been where was I? Strangely, I deduced that I was standing up in a dark room like the one I was originally in down in the catacombs. How was that even possible? My mother pulled me along by the arm and whisked me away on the tour.
Several months later and things aren’t much clearer, if anything I find it harder and harder to remember and understand what really took place. A few days later, and dozens of scenarios and doctors visits later, I found out that the scenes like the catacomb corridor weren’t real. The people at the hospital called it paranoid-type schizophrenia, which means I hear and see things that aren’t real. But surely I couldn’t imagine this all happening. Surely if I can still process my thoughts the doctors are mistaken, right?
This is where it all gets interesting. The voices I hear which are so-called “imagined” are telling me that my time is almost up and that I must follow the strange riddle the dark voice so loudly pronounced the day of the first vision. In case you were wondering, it’s kind of challenging to explain to your worried mother why your “schizophrenic” self needs to visit every river bank near Boston to search for some chest which is opened only in your mind without sounding completely off your rocker. So I find excuses to wander off and search aimlessly really, with no luck of course.
Nearing the end of the list of nearby river banks, I was also nearing the end of my inner faith. As I ambled down the stream’s sandy edge, I kicked my shoes off to feel the fresh water flood over my toes. I thought to myself, ‘Wouldn’t it be nice to just stay here forever?’ There were no worries. There was no time. There indubitably weren’t any voices or curses or chests or keys, just sand and water and sun and beautiful sky.
To my right, a small and black bird took off into flight and left a long, crow feather drifting down between my feet. Then it hit me. The dead of night! The feather was midnight onyx. I looked down at what remained of the creature which had soared off and wracked my brain. My feet seemed to move on their own, two steps back and one step right. I dropped to my knees and began to dig and dig with as much determination as I’d ever had in all my life put together.
Then my hands hit something solid. I reached down gently and pulled a big, wooden, light brown chest in front of me. It seemed to gleam in the sunlight, which wasn’t even possible, but many things in my life weren’t supposed to be possible either. I took a nanosecond to admire it before I searched for a way to open it, but an ominous keyhole sat mocking me. “The key is only in your mind,” the boom hit me square in the chest. But this time it was different, now a tall and skinny man stood before me, with a black swirling darkness for a face. He cackled heartily, but spoke not a word, just reached down lightning quick and tried to snatch the chest which was clenched firmly between my strong hands.
He pulled and tried to pry it from my iron grip, without success. I let out a low growl as I ripped it angrily away from him and took off running down the rocky beach, stones flying and pebbles aggravating the soles of my feet. He chased after, seemingly hovering over the ground like a ghostly specter. The phantom whipped up wind around him as he pulled a long scythe from his flowing robes; I stopped at the edge of the cliff I had run up. Nothing stood in the way of me and the man. I was done for.
He approached me and slowed down as he came before me, with an intimidating attitude about him. I began to think, he isn’t real. The doctors say so. My mother says so. I’m the only one who doesn’t know. The man isn’t real. Go away, man. You cannot hurt me. I say it over and over again in my crowded head, and the chest fades before my eyes. I hear my name being called down the beach by a familiar voice, and as the blade comes down to hit me clean through, the man disappears too. I sink to my knees and begin sobbing. My mother runs up to me. “It isn’t real, it isn’t real,” she comforts me.
And for the first time, the clutter in my brain seems to grow fainter also. The thoughts begin to slowly erase themselves. Everything was only a dream, it seems. Maybe nothing was real and I am okay again. A smile covers my face.
For me, it is over. I am lucky. I have escaped. But for you my friend, it is only beginning. Time begins to slip through the hourglass already. By now you know the mission and you know the consequences. Now hurry before you become less fortunate than I. And most importantly remember, no matter what you believe, things are never as they seem.
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