Cardboard mattresses

[chapter 10]

The floor was very comfortable.

June lay on the carpet, eyes shut but she was awake, she lay there daydreaming, thinking about the events of the day and pondering at how she'd managed to end up in this situation. Trust her to completely screw over the plan of running away from people.

The sun had long since dipped below the horizon. The shadows it had left behind were long and cold. An inky darkness sprawled across the sky, creeping it's way into the atmosphere, the only semblance of light being a cool milky one that the moon was begging to lay down across the land.

Laying on her back from where she was she could see out the windows across the lake and when she opened her eyes she was bathed in moonbeams.

June had always loved the night sky. Even though the night had meant the cold and darkness would absorb everything it also meant that the stars would come out. June spotted her favourite constellation, Orion, the hunter, just like she'd been even if her hunting ground had been Walmart she'd always felt weirdly attached to the little arrangement of stars, Something magical and secure about the way they would always be there. Unless one exploded of course.

Suddenly a knock came from the door startling her from her day dreaming.

"Come in" she called out

Pepper pushed open the door and furrowed her brows slightly when she saw the girl laying on the floor, "you know there's a bed there" pepper smiled softly

"Oh yeah, the floor is comfy" June said sitting up.
Pepper was holding a little tray of food, what looked to be some kind of vegetable soup and bread and she put it down on the desk,

"I made everyone soup so I thought I'd see if you were hungry" Pepper said sweetly, still standing by the door as if she wasn't quite sure if June would run out if she saw the chance, but she didn't. The girl just smiled at her.

"Thank you" June said standing up and walking over to the table, "mm it smells good" she said and broke off a bit of bread to dip into the soup.
"Mmmhgidandittastesbetter" mumbling over her words she shoved another mouthful in, she hadn't quite realised how hungry she was. Having your stomach pumped will do that to you.

Pepper gave her one last smile and left the room, carefully shutting the door behind her.

Finishing the soup and bread quickly she left the tray on the desk and retreated back to her blanket she'd been laying on, on the floor. Although the urge to run far away from this place was strong, she felt weirdly grateful for the hospitality from the odd group of people, even though she'd broken into their home she was somehow being cared for even after she'd tried to overdose.

They'd saved her life and brought her soup, why?.

This question swirled around Junes head for a while mingling with a cocktail of other intrusive thoughts and baseless questions before she felt restless, it was early, a glance at the clock told her, 1:08am.

Great no one will be awake and there's no way they'll actually know if I leave the room she thought.

She pulled open the door, it was quiet, the building was clearly quite new and so there were no creaky floorboards although she'd become a bit of a professional at navigating old wooden floors without making a sound.

Tiptoeing out of the door she made her way quietly down the corridor, her bare feet padding lightly on the cool floor and the shadows of light from various small windows caught her as she passed, following her body before she could dip out of view again.

Controlling her breathing steadily as so not to make a peep she peered around the corner, no one was there so she slipped out from behind the wall and continued her journey.