(Part 1)~In The Shadows

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The light shone brightly in the dark night. The sound of rain audible on the pavement outside.
There lay a girl. Small in stature. Long, chestnut brown hair spread around her as her head lay on her pillow. Nothing but her thoughts engulfing her on this most peaceful but cold night as she slowly drifted off to sleep. The dripping of rain soothing her into a deeper slumber. Her parents had gone out for the night. Leaving her all alone.
Or so she thought...

In the darkness of this house, just outside this girls bedroom, stood a boy. Peering in through the crack in the door he had opened. He watched her for a minute. Just watching her as she dreamt. Then he decided to venture into the girls room.
The door made a loud creak as he opened it. In fear he woke her,  he stepped back out into the hallway, out of sight from the girls bed.
She did not stir and remained in a deep sleep.

Once the boy was sure she hadn't awoken, he slowly crept into her room.
Again, watching over her as she slept, as if she was the most magnificent thing he had ever seen. His eyes lowered from her face to her chest, where there lay a locket with a ruby red gem. A thin silver chain wrapped around her neck so gracefully it didn't look possible for someone to sleep in such a perfect state.
The locket really caught this boys eye. Slowly, he moved his hand towards her, the locket laying flat in the centre of her chest. Right under her collarbones. His fingers held it by the sides, as to make sure he wouldn't wake the sleeping girl by touching her skin directly. He was so tempted to rip it from her neck and to use to sell it as a means for him to get by. That's why he was there after all.
To steal.

The more he thought about the locket he held in his hand, the more he continued to look back at the girl.
Realising the locket was most likely a sentimental piece to her. Explaining why she wore it to sleep. Laying in such pristine condition.

A loud crash echoed throughout the house. A crash resembling a glass object had just been broken.

That crash was what woke the girl. She awoke with a jolt and sat upright.
No one appeared to be in her room. But what really made her believe she wasn't alone in the house, was that her door was opened and she always slept with it closed.

She began to hear footsteps and a low mumbling of men talking.
She could hear these men were further down the hall. Towards the living room by the front door.
She climbed out of bed. Turning to grab the large red cloak she kept under her blanket at night for extra warmth. The house completely dark as she slowly moved down to the opposite end of the house. Knowing exactly where to step as to avoid the creak of floorboards.
She moved swiftly and quietly to the furthest room away. Her long, black nightgown flowing behind her.
That room was the family's library room.
But what she didn't know was that the boy that had previously been standing over her, watching her while she slept, was now watching her from afar as she tiptoed to the library room.

As soon as she stepped foot into the room, she turned to try close the door, but not only was the knob broken. The door creaked tremendously.

She knew the sound of the creak had alerted the intruders that there was someone home. And more specifically. What room they were in.

She ran to the bookcase that stored an array of beautifully bound leather books. Behind a black one with golden embossed lettering, revealed a small latch on the underside of the shelf above it. Once she had pulled on it, the bookcase moved outward,  making space for the girl to open and glide into the safe room it held on the other side.
Without hesitation she ran in and pulled the case behind her to close. And just as she did so, three men entered the room.

The girl pulled the opposing latch on the other side to lock herself in.
The bookcase was built with a crack in the backboard, so the girl could see exactly what the men were doing while remaining hidden.

The two larger men rummaged through everything in the library room. Pocketing small trinkets they found on display such as golden bookmarks and crystal statues.
The girl could see the smaller man, clearly in the moonlight that gleamed through the window. He wasn't a man at all. In fact he was a boy. About her own age.

She could see a look of confusion plastered across his face as he looked around the room. Not seeing the girl in sight. That was when the girl had realised, he had seen her leave her bedroom and enter the library room.
She held her locket in fear, hoping he didn't see her walk into the room behind the bookcase.

He strode towards the bookcase. Looking up and down at it.
The girls heart thumped heavily in her chest.
Did he know she was just a mere metre away from him?

"What about this stuff?"
He said to the two larger men as he studied the titles of books stacked neatly across each shelf.

"And what exactly do you suppose we do with books?"

"Maybe we could sell them too" The boy said.

"Books aren't valuable!" One of the men stated.
"Jewelry is valuable. Gold is valuable. Gems are valuable. Those are the things we're looking for! "

"I don't think there's anything else available to take than what we already have"
The boy spoke.

The men with him agreed and made their way out. Leaving broken glass from a mirror near the front door and the door cracked open as they exited the house.

The girl was still too afraid to leave the safe room. Even after hearing them walk out.
She sat on the floor in the far left corner of the room. Wrapping a red cloak around her to keep warm in the cold night.
She didn't leave the safe room until the next morning when her parents returned home. Hearing them call for her frantically after seeing the dishevelled house.

This girl..... If you haven't already guessed.....

Was Red.

-
AUTHORS NOTE -

Originally written 24th March 2015.

Updated and Changed 16th August 2022.

(Reading your comments from when I first published this at 13 made me realise.... Yes......the singing while there are intruders in your house is so cringe and would've literally gotten Red unalived. 😭

- R

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