<<>>
My father picked me up by the arms, swinging me around in a circle. My younger sister, Kelsey, laughed, singing 'ring around a rosie' as she skipped and jumped around with Nik.
My mom was inside. I hadn't seen her for a while, but I wasn't worried. She was a really busy woman and sometimes stayed cooped up in her room for days, working on her latest story. I just hoped she'd let me read it once she was done.
Nik had just come to us one day, slinking on along the side of the road. He was secretly following my little five year old self who was carelessly swinging around a meat sandwich in one hand, the other one laced with my mother's as she led us through the busy market.
I had seen the energetic little fluff of fur and immediately given him the meat from my sandwich. My mom had scolded me, but I gave him the bread as well after he kept begging.
<<>>
I had my bag with me, so I shoved the two peaches inside of it. The turkeys however, weren't so easy to carry.
I quietly snuck back into the undergrowth of the woods, my bag slung over my back and the turkeys clutched to my chest.
One of the boys turned to whisper something to his brother, punching him lightly in the arm.
Apparently the hit wasn't so light though, because the boy bent over holding his stomach, before dramatically falling to the floor.
And his eyes locked with mine.
Shoot.
He didn't look at me for long, flinching away with disgust at my obvious deformity. His eyes searched for anything, anything else to look at so he wouldn't have to look at my hideousness, and his eyes landed on the turkeys.
That was even worse.
Gasping in air, I dropped Nik's leash and sprinted into the woods, Nik running with me and the two boys running after me. I could hear yelling, probably the dad, but I couldn't make out what he said. My eyes had focused on the space in front of me, making sure I didn't run into the trees or trip over a stick and break my ankle or something.
My legs were fine, taking on the rough terrain with ease. My lungs however, were a different story. I was panting, gasping for air. There was a sharp pain forming under my left rib cage, and the place right in the middle of my chest ached, my heart beating faster than normal.
At this rate, I would have to drop one of the precious turkeys.
I looked down, Nik was keeping up well. He was panting as well though, and I felt bad. Nik was old. I wasn't quite sure how old he was when we found him, but he had to be at least 10 by now, which should be about 70 in human years.
I had a 70 year old sprinting behind me.
If I was having problems, I could only imagine how Nik was feeling. I made a jerky turn to the right, trying to lose our pursuers and head in the direction of home at the same time.
I looked down at Nik again. It was a good thing we played the touch the banana booth game, or this would be harder for both of us.
I drew another huge shaky breath, my lungs using up the air in mere seconds and reverting back to the original panting.
I took another right. I think I was heading in the right direction.
~
Nik and I sat panting behind our closed and locked front door. I quickly got up and opened one of the plastic water bottles we had saved up, pouring the liquid into a plastic container before I set it down on the ground for Nik.
He lapped it up like there was no tomorrow. Which I realized that, for us, there might not be.
If we had been caught, Nik would have been thrown onto the streets and I would've been thrown in jail. Nik would have either made his way home or waited at the jail for me but either way, the three peas in a pod would be alone without an adult figure. (unless you counted Nik the 70 year old) I probably would have been executed because as somebody who had been affected by the disease so badly, the officials of the city would probably think they were doing me a favor.
~
"Let's go see mom," a seven year old Kelsey suggested.
I looked at her in disbelief. "Kelsey!" I scolded, even though I was only nine. "Mommy is writing," I told her. "If we disturb mom, she might never finish the story!" I cried.
Kelsey huffed. "I don't care about the book, I wanna' see mom."
I looked over as Nik started yipping, running over to me and barking in my ear. They were fast, high pitched barks and I knew Nik was trying to tell me something.
He pushed me with his nose, making me fall to the ground.
I'd fallen off my bed.
Kelsey was gone, leaving me with just the little dog standing above me on my bed, barking as if his life depended on it.
And when I smelled the smoke, I realized his life did depend on it. All of our lives did.
I jumped up, running into Nora's room. She was gone. Running to her window, I saw her, Jeffry and Max, all huddled outside. They hadn't thought to wake me up? Did they start the fire to kill me?
At the moment, it didn't matter. Grabbing Nik and hugging him close to my body, I ran down the steps, trying not to trip. The house was old and made mostly of wood, making the whole place heat up extremely quickly. Nik was panting underneath all of his fur while I looked down at my feet, terrified that one of the steps was going to be halfway burnt from the bottom up, making Nik and I go tumbling down into the fire below if I stepped on it.
Luckily, I got down the steps without a problem, but immediately turned and ran in the other direction when I saw the door frame on fire. Back door it was.
When I made it out of the back door, I ran to where Nora and the others were. I pulled them close to me and hugged them to my body despite slightly wanting to accuse them of starting the fire. I was just glad they were all safe.
And it was a good thing I did hug them too, because over the shoulder of Nora, I saw the two boys from the booth I'd stolen from earlier that day, running in the other direction.
It wasn't the sibling's fault.
It was mine.
~
- k-seA
