My favorite song came out of my mouth, trying to find some kind of comfort. The vehicle jerked as the chunky tires hit another giant dip in the gravel road, created by a lack of upkeep over many years, distorting my sound. My big hair offered little cushion as my head smashed against the thick wooden lid that concealed me in the tiny crate.
Sick filled my mouth; bile had risen from my empty stomach.Was it hunger? Was it fear? Was it dread?Or, just the travel sickness, caused by the driving skills of the man up front.
A cold tear dropped from my eye, a tiny splash landing on my bare foot, close to the chipped nail paint staining my toes. Toes, I’d excitedly painted with the new gels my dad had gotten for me, in preparation for our trip. Now, I hated the color—red, like blood.
The color brought reminders, brought pain. The look on my dad’s face as he bled out, knowing he couldn’t save me. The shade matched his blood as it stained my hands while I tried hard to stop the bleeding from his fatal gunshot wound.
He died in my arms. In a warehouse, where we’d been taken to in the dead of night after being trailed all day. Empty, like the hearts of the men who’d transported us.
I stared down at my feet, barely able to see them, but I still scrunched my toes up, hiding the peeling paint.
I pushed the pain from my mind, focusing on the days before these monsters ripped apart my life. I focused on every happy time, on every smile I’d ever smiled, thinking of a better life, before I tucked the memories away into an internal box of sacred recollections, where my father could rest in peace with my mother—the love of his life.
Silent tears fell, so many that I thought my tears would flood the box where I sat.
I prayed the wood would rot before they filled the space and drowned me.
It was only a minute later when the speed faltered and the vehicle–I think, a van—rolled to a halt, on the poorly maintained road.
Multiple voices surrounded me, some with familiar accents, some with tones from across the sea. Voices that teenage girls would havedreamed about, whispering sweet nothings, in any other circumstances.
These voices would haunt my dreams.
They’d bring me nightmares.
I felt a strange kind of nausea as my wooden prison lifted into unsteady arms. Arms familiar with the maneuvers, but with no care for the fragile items they were transporting–human beings.
I was carried up the steps of what I imagined to be a nice house—vast and once adorned to perfection. I tried to see through the gaps in my crate, but the haze of tears covering my eyes disallowed it.
I never got to see the fading beauty of the house as I imagined it, or the trees in the distance, turning pretty shades of auburn with the oncoming of fall. I never saw the stream, or the little bridge that rose above it, allowing feet to cross safely to the other side.
I never saw the daisies that covered every inch of this land.
I only saw darkness.
I played with my hair—involving myself in an action that always brought me comfort as I tried to distract myself from oncoming fear.
The balance shifted as one of my handlers slipped away to pat his heavy knuckles against the front door of wherever the hell we were. It was only seconds later, a creaking welcomed my presence.
A glass door protected its wooden companion from weather damage it probably wouldn’t receive in this state. I had no idea where I was, but the heat from the fading sun was creeping through the paper-thin gaps in my crate, along with the scent of grass, earth, and pretty flowers, that crept right up my flaring nostrils.
“Hello!” the man at the door sounded happy; his southern accent lifted the heaviness pressing down on me. He sounded nice, bringing me a small reprieve from my most awful thoughts.
Maybe he’d be my saving grace.
Maybe I was more naïve than I ever thought.
“I’ve been expecting you,” the southerner continued.
“Traffic.” One of the men on my left was blunt. He had no time for greetings, pleasantries, or small talk. He wanted business dealt with, and then he wanted to leave. “Where do you want the package? We want to get back on the road. . . other deliveries going out in the morning.”
“Of course. Please, take it into the kitchen.”
I was carried over the threshold and into my doom. The journey to the kitchen was steady. . . nothing like my nerves. . . nothing like my heart or rattling bones.
The men trucked me past a doorway to what I assumed was the living room. I recognized the voices of the cartoon playing on the TV.
A small child laughed—a little girl. She giggled out the words, “Oh, Woody.”
