Where you belong

Captive

She’s walking in a dark forest, the dense trees letting very little light through. Walking slowly and picking her way through the overgrown forest floor she realises she’s not alone.

Turning quickly she comes face to face with the same golden eyes, in a wolf.

The eyes seem to draw her in like a moth to a flame, and she reaches her hand out towards the wolf.

The image disappears, and Lily slowly starts to open her eyes. Squeezing them closed again, when her head starts to hurt.

With a groan she goes to bury her head under her pillow but can’t find it. As she reaches out for the pillow there is nothing in her grasp. Confused she tries to move her hand around to search for it but finds she can't. She tries to move her other wrist but finds that’s also stuck.

Lily opens her eyes the realisation dawning on her of where she is. Her sleepiness forgotten, she looks down and sees her wrists are still chained, and she is still on the unknown room alone.

As her eyes start to prickle, she tries to hold back the tears. As she slowly sits up, pulling her knees under her chin she takes her time to look about at her, to see if there was anything visible in the surrounding area.

But there was nothing, it was dark, and she couldn’t see anything.

The despair washes over her as she realises she has no idea what time it is or how long she has been trapped there.

Bringing her hand up to her throat and massaging it, she tries to ease the burn from the thirst. Her stomach growls from lack of food.

The tears start to fall down her cheeks, gradually at first but then the gates open and all the fear and despair come through her in waves.

Lily starts to hiccup through the sobs, as she tries to calm herself down.

“Stop crying you i***t!!” she shouts at herself, before slapping herself in the face. “Nobody is going to save you, you’ll have to help yourself.... just think!”

Lily sat and thought for a while. As she sat in the silence and the dark, her mind flitted back over her life.

Lily has never been brave, heroic and the heroine. She’d spent her life hiding from the world, rejected by most and those that didn’t reject her she struggled to associate with.

At school, she’d been good at running and other athletics despite her short stature. She’d been bright and intelligent in her studies.

But failed at group activities as she would just hide herself at the back. Bullied and alone, she was glad when she finally finished school.

She’d always wanted to become a police officer, however struggling with dealing with understanding other people she ended up just landing in a dead end job where she responded to emails in a customer service role for a clothing company.

She hated it, but it meant she could hide herself away on the computer without the need to talk or gossip and pretend she was interested in what others were.

Her home life was not a great deal better, she had her parents and her two sisters.

As early as she can remember, Lily felt left out.

She got the basics of what she needed but that’s it.

She’d watch as her older and younger sisters enjoyed attention and cuddles and love, and yet found herself often sat alone in her room just engrossed in books. Reading stories allowed Lily those few moments of escape.

Lily sighs to herself. She is, and always has been, a nobody, a loser and a misfit.

“Stop feeling sorry for yourself!” she growls.

She slides her legs out from under her and scoots along to try to get a feel for anything. The chain is short, meaning she has to feel with her feet and her arms stretched back and above her.

As her feet move along she can’t feel anything, they come into contact with nothing but air.

She scoots back again closer to the wall so that she can bring her hands down more comfortably.

She brings her hands up to the wall to feel it. Her fingers move until she feels solid up against them. The feel is rough and grainy, almost like “WOOD! The wall is made from wood!” She exclaims before slamming her hand over her mouth and shutting herself up.

“Well done Lily, lets tell everybody what you’re up to” she mutters.

She goes back to feeling the wood, feeling its texture and moving along to see how far it goes. Every bit of the wall Lily can each feels like the same texture.

It is not a flat, smooth wood but felt pitted and scored. It felt old, and full of history.

Lily leans forward and gently snifs it, ingrained in the wood is the smell of a farm, livestock, smoke, country life.

“I’m in a bloody barn!” she exclaims (this time in covered tones)

Her brain starts to tick, and she feels for where the chain she is attached with is bolted to. It appeared to be attached to a ring bolted into the wood.

‘If this is an old barn, then I wonder......?!

She draws her knees backtowards her face and then slams her feet forwards hard into the wall.

A cloud of dust rained down over her head. Unperturbed Lily shifted onto her side so she was laying down, brought her knees right up near her chin and kicked out with all her might.

A sound of snapping could be heard this time along with the dust falling down.

Encouraged she began repeating this over and over again. Gradually a crack of light could be seen.

This crack became bigger when one of the planks fell down.

Lily stopped and listened for any sound in case somebody had heard.

When nobody came after a few minutes she returned to kicking at the wood.

The wood was clearly old, and rotten in places and with the light shining through the gap she could place her kicks more strategically.

Gradually more planks began to fall.

As each piece of wood came down with a bang, she would pause and wait. Listening for anybody approaching.

Being only 5ft 2 and a size 10 she didnt need a huge gap to get through. But she did need to get the boards which held the chain down. Drawing her knees up once more she kicked out with all of her strength with a loud bang the last of the wood came out tumbling forwards and outside of the barn.

At this the whole was more than big enough for her to get out. She rolled onto her back and wriggled herself out of the hole.

As her head cleared the hole, she sat up. Squinting in the sunlight, as they adjusted from the darkness.

Lily looked around her and could see nothing but fields.

She appeared to have been shut in a barn in the middle of a number of fields with woodland in the distance.

“What the hell is happening?!?” she muttered.

She looks down at her hands to see theyre still chained and attached to one of the broken planks.

Knowing she needed to get away before anybody returned, she needed to think quickly. She could make a run for it with her hands still chained just pulling the plank behind her.

But this would be risky, increasing her chances of falling. Or if her captures spot her she would not be able to try and fight them off.

“I need to get out of these chains” she muttered, peering around her. She slowly pulled herself up looking at her surroundings.

“Theres got to be something around here I can use?!”

She started to make her way around the edge of the barn, stumbling slightly her legs weak from being sat down for so long, and the dehydration and lack of food. As she made her way to the end of one side of the barn she peered around the corner to check there was nobody about.

Not a person in sight, however she did see a small open sided shed which appeared to contain tools.

As she made her way over to it she couldnt believe her luck. There hanging up on a nail was a set of bolt croppers.

She pulled them off the wall and sat on the floor attempting to find the best way of cutting the chain.

With a bit of struggling and determination she managed to turn them around and cut the chain between her wrists. With the increased movement she was then able to cut the chain just below each wrist.

She was no longer attached to the wood. At this she stood up looking about and saw the closest treeline into the forest.

Drawing all of her remaining strength she started to run.

She ran and ran, the dryness in her throat burning.

Her hunger forming a stitch in her side. Her breathing felt so loud in her ears she failed to notice the sound of an engine.

She stopped, bent over gasping for breath. Her stomach retching but with nothing in there to bring up.

As her breathing began to slow, she heard it.

The sound of a vehicle, her eyes sprung open and her head darts about until she sees a dust cloud rising the other side of the barn.

Fear grips her insides, and she starts to panic. Despite the stitch and still panting she starts to run.

The only small mercy being that the vehicle was obviously approaching from that side of the barn and so she wouldnt have been seen yet.

The treeline was closer, but not close enough. Drawing all of her remaining strength Lily pushes herself harder and harder. Knowing the need to get into the cover of the trees.

As she hears the sound of the vehicle coming to a stop, and a squeal of brakes she reaches the tree line. Tripping down the sharp bank she hadn’t spotted.

Tumbling down the slope, she brings her hands up to cover her face until she falls with a thud onto flat ground.

With a groan she pushes herself up, knowing that they would likely have found she had escaped by now.

She needed to get as far away as possible. At least within the trees they would not be able to drive, and she was hoping they would believe she took the easy and sensible route following the track they had obviously used to drive to the barn.

Still breathing hard, and now covered in cuts and scratches from the fall Lily started to walk deeper into the forest.