Hey, guys. I know I've been gone a while, and I'm sorry. I'm upset by my own actions, and I understand that what I did was almost unpardonable. It's just that in the past few months, I've had a lot of...stuff going on, and I haven't been in the best place emotionally. It's no big deal, and it's in no way enough reason to disappear for so long. So for that I most sincerely apologize. Oh, god, I'm crying. I'm sorry, guys, I really am. And I can't promise that I'll update on a regular basis, but I will try.
After having to halt it for technical purposes (darn computer), I have come back with what is left of Keeper Week. Hope you enjoy my mainly Willa-centric/Wilby story. This is sort of based on what happened to me a while ago (actually the same day that I first publish Wish), when I couldn't fall asleep at night.
The darkness surrounded me, mercilessly, trapping me in the horrid land of eternal black. My heart leapt in my chest from fear and I jumped to my feet. Scrambling for the light switch, I turned on the lights in my room so that the dusk was driven away. In and out, in jagged gasps, I could finally breathe after what felt like ages. I was being silly, irrational. But sitting in my room, knowing that the entire house was empty, lifeless, I became hyperaware of the tiniest of noises, movements, a change in the shadows thrown across the wall.
Sighing, I slumped back onto my bed, resting my head in my hands. Though soothed by the light, I was unbearably aware of the fact that my paranoia was getting worse. A couple of weeks before, I had jolted from my slumber with a scream. A terrible nightmare. Afterward, aside from the elongated time that I spent in my bed before I'm finally able to fall asleep, it stopped. But now, I couldn't even close my eyes for longer than five seconds before my mind fires several signals telling me that there is something in my room, ready to attack me.
Outside, I could hear the rustling of the tree branches, so close I could almost feel the cool summer night breeze. Another sound reached my ears, this one from downstairs. I knew it was just my own mind playing tricks on me, but regardless, I cautiously stood off my bed and slipped quietly through my bedroom door. Climbing down the stairs, it was hardly ignorable how loud the squeaking steps were in the silence.
In a quick five minutes, I had scaled the entire first floor of the house, flicking on lights in almost every room to drive away the darkness. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I had a gut feeling there was something there, even those consciously I kept telling myself that I wasn't in danger.
I ascended up the stairs again, this time less panicked, though not by much. My head was spinning when I reached the top step. A noise again, it sounded like a low thump from the backyard. There's nothing there. It's in your imagination.
Carefully, I slipped over to the window at the end of the hall that overlooked the patio and peeked through. Though at first I had to adjust to the dark, staring into the night, I still couldn't see anything. Everything was exactly the way they were supposed to be. Just as I was about to turn around and head back to my room, something caught my eye.
Draped over the side of the patio table was the towel that I had used to dry myself off when I got home from the pool, where I had spent the day with the girls. But I could have sworn I had hung it on the clothing line to dry. Being as forgetful as I could be at times, I tried to assure myself that I must have simply thought I had even when I hadn't.
However, the sound of the thump played on loop at the back of my head, vibrating at the base of my eardrums. I was tired and afraid, good enough cause to have believed I had heard something that wasn't really there or at least misinterpreted completely innocent reasoning for the disturbance.
Both as a Keeper and as a victim of too many horror movies, I had recently developed the nocturnal ability to come to the worst conclusions with the smallest of things. Earlier in the night, I nearly jumped out of my skin when I heard a short scream from outside, which I was sure was harmless. Often the teens in my neighborhood liked to walk around late at night and have some fun; from what I understood, they were no danger at all.
Knowing that if I left it as is, the crumpled towel would reek horribly the next day, I convinced myself I had to hang it. The trip back down and out the back door was mostly indifferent. However, upon reaching the darkness of the backyard, I hurried to turn on the lights before 'something jumped out at me'. Swiftly, I hung up the cloth and returned indoors, rushing up to my room.
Once comfortably under the covers, I reached over to my bed-side table and turned off the lamp. Leaving me in utter obscurity. My heart beat thrumming much faster than I knew it should have been, I slowed my breathing and tried to calm myself. The cool of my pillow was pacifying against my burning face, and I sunk into it, closing my eyes.
For several minutes, I lied in bed, twisting and turning to find a more relaxed position. I huffed, my head aching terribly. So many things to think about, so many ideas running through my mind. It just wouldn't stop. I turned over to stare up at the ceilings, my hair softly brushing my shoulders. Weighing down in the mattress, my legs felt like lead. Trying to lay still, I eased my arms to my sides and waited to welcome sweet sleep.
When centuries past and nothing happened, I looked up at my alarm clock, which read one forty-five in the morning. With a groan, I rose from my bed, figuring that I wasn't going to fall asleep any time soon. I put my head in my hands, racking through my hair with my nails, trying to get the images out of my head. I couldn't.
Recalling the last time we had been threatened by the enemy. The blood. Being trapped in the cellar. The red dripping down to the floor. I remembered the way my scream bounced off the walls while I watched, still chained to the wall, as the knife tore through skin. Amanda was crying so much.
"Amanda…" I whispered, pulling as far as my chains would allow me to reach her. "Mandy, please be okay. Can you hear me?"
But the girl remained limp on the cement floor, arms extended far above her head, as though she was reaching for the stars that had fallen to the ground. She faced away from me, towards the cell door.
I bit my tongue, choking back the vile tears, in vain because they came anyways. My face felt hot with frustration and fear. Head to toe, I was absolutely shaking. I gulped in another long breath of air before leaning back and palliating myself.
In the moment that I tried to stand, I only made it to a bent-kneed position until the chains reached their limit. Exasperated, I let out something that resembled the growl of a cornered animal.
My fingers wrapping tight around the strong chain, I yanked hard, hoping for it to give. Again, again. I was imprisoned. I was stuck. It was wrong.
"Break, dammit!" I shouted, tugging, and waiting for the plate bolted into the wall to pop out. But that just wasn't going to happen. For an instant, in the back of my mind, I cursed some unknown force for not making it Finn or Philby who got captured. Not because I wanted them to be hurt or for them to be in danger. But at least they would have known what to do!
Was I the easiest one to hurt? Was I the most vulnerable? The weak link.
The weak link! Everything had the one spot that can be broken. I slid back to the floor, into a sitting position, and took the chains in my hand. Running my index finger along them, I traced the metal, observing it for cracks or kinks.
I nearly jumped with joy when I spotted a small fissure in the pewter. Timidly, I turned toward the rough wall of rock material that penned the chamber. With a horrific clash, I slammed the chain against a jagged edge, in the exact point that held the flaw. I continued, praying that it would eventually break.
Sucking my bottom lip, I ceased a yelp when my hand smacked against rock. It was the only way that I could get it in that precise locus.
For another tiring ten minutes, I banged it into the wall, my energy draining. By then I could barely rap it against the stone, let alone smash it. Amanda hadn't moved and my hope was just on the verge of diminishing completely. It must have been just about the smallest noise I'd ever heard, but it was the most promising I had ever had the pleasure of hearing.
One tiny little snap. My eyes widened indefinitely. When I looked down at the chains in my hands, they were in two pieces. Two! As in, one attached the wall, and one not!
In one motion, I slid to Amanda's side, turning her over. The gash along her abdomen looked bad, but it was at least treatable. My own was just along my arm, which wasn't serious, aside from the far that they chiseled the main artery.
One, only one of my problems were solved. But, in that moment, it was enough for me.
However, I would have hoped more for Amanda. She was still bleeding out, and the red stained my hands. I sobbed, wishing that the others would find us soon. Before something bad happened.
I tiptoed down the stairs –for what reason, in an empty house, I don't know- and took a seat on the sofa. Remote in hand, I flipped through the movie options and chose the one that I knew wouldn't scare the hell out of me.
As it just began, I waltzed into the kitchen and microwaved a bag of popcorn. Some to my surprise, I didn't jump on the cue of the beep at the end. Just as I was about to turn around and return to the living room, something catch my gaze, through the corner of my eye. Hesitating over the idea, I reached out and stole a knife from the counter. When I sat back down, I set it on the glass coffee table and retreated into the corner, legs tucked under me.
By the time the credits began to roll down the screen, my eye lids were starting to feel heavy. Seeing as it was still only just past three in the morning, I had to find some other entertainment. Early morning sitcom reruns, reading the book I hadn't touched since the previous afternoon, playing computer games, music. You name it, I tried it. But I got bored quickly and moved on. At the point that there was just about nothing left to do, it was still only three thirty.
And it was at that same time that I heard the noise. In my head, I continued to convince myself that there was nothing there, that it was all in my head. Nonetheless, it nagged at me, because of all the sounds that had ricocheted into my thoughts all night, it was by far the most vivid.
Beyond a shadow of a doubt, I snatched the knife and held it out. The long, perfectly sharpened blade shone in the light. It was shaking. My hands were shaking. From upstairs, the noise had come from upstairs.
Dagger in hand, I stepped steadily down the hallway, until I was standing at the base of the stairs, staring up as though the portal to hell would open up and suck me in, were my foot to make contact with the first step.
Push past the fear, and you'll find you were ten times as strong as you thought you were.
With such graceful footwork that not a sound emitted, I climbed up, not breathing until I touched the final platform. Still holding the weapon with a sturdy grip, ready for use, I moved towards the first door and stopped just next to the opening before pushing it open. Once I turned on the lights of my mother's bedroom, I searched it, thankfully finding nothing.
The next one was the bathroom. Silly as it seems, I had to check behind the shower curtain. After my brothers' bedroom, the only one left was my own.
With my heart in my stomach and fear in its place in my chest, I swept forward, guardedly. I pushed the door open with my foot, and scoped the area. It was empty. No one was there. Somehow, this was more unsettling than finding someone ready to murder me.
I was going insane with all this 'sixth sense' business. There wasn't anything there. There was never anything there! Tears threatened to spill over at the thought of how much sleep I had lost in the past week just because I was scared of the dark.
This wasn't normal. And I couldn't help but think that this was getting out of hand. Living in a big house all alone wasn't helping very much.
Before another shadow could jump out and scare me, I bounded back down the stairs, rushed into the kitchen and grabbed the keys from off the counter. Running out the door, I climbed into my mother's car and gunned the engine.
The knock echoed down the street and all over Orlando as I rapped on the door. I might have stood in the cold for hours for all I knew, knocking, before the knob began to turn, making me look up. "Willa? What-?"
"Phil…" I muttered, the tears finally winning.
"Oh…oh, hey," He pulled me into a hug, holding me so close that I could smell his cologne. "Don't cry, sweetheart. Come on, just try and be quiet. My parents wake up and we're both dead."
Straddled into his side, we walked into the dark living room and sat on the couch. And I told him. I told him everything.
How I couldn't sleep. How I still remembered the way that they tortured us. How I couldn't get the guilty feeling to go away, even though Amanda was perfectly safe and sound now.
"Shh…Wills, it's okay. I promise." He leaned me on him, so that my head rested on his chest, as it moved up and down with his breathing, and my legs were spread across the cushions. "Go to sleep. You're safe with me."
He kissed the top of my head, and the faintest of smiles crept onto my face. And, in his arms, for the first time in the past week, I felt like nothing could ever hurt me.
Aww, how sweet! Phil is always going to be there for her, isn't he! I wish I had a Philby! Haha my very own RHBNWRHA (redhead british nerd with rock hard abs). I'll try to be back with more tomorrow! Virtual hugs and chocolate cupcakes for all.