𝐆𝐥𝐚𝐬𝐬 𝐇𝐨𝐮𝐬𝐞 [𝟏𝟖+] ✔

42

I've barely slept the past three days.

Every time I fell into a slumber, I was trapped. High bars kept me caged into the corner of a dark room, where I could only see a streak of dusty light shining from a slightly ajar door. Someone was pacing opposite it, heavy footfalls vibrating the metal against my hands.

The first night I'd fallen into the dream, I had been curious, wondering who they were as they paced and paced. I could sense their anxiety eating away at them, hear incoherent voices yelling from afar, not understanding what was being said, but feeling the uneasiness of the person.

The second night, I was in the cage once more. This time, it was shorter, so I had to duck a little, so I didn't bang my head. There was less light, but the voices were louder, mixed with screams as they chanted murderer, killer, and monster, repeatedly. They'd made the person on the other side of the door infuriated as a fist smashed against the door, but the wood did not budge from its hinges.

Last night, I was there again. But this time, the cage was so short that I had to lie on my side, desperate for my lungs not to give up from claustrophobia. My heart raced, but the person was not there. No voices. No pacing. No screams. I had tried to find a way out, panicked, and thinking I'd be stuck there forever. But I was successful when I managed to kick open a compartment of the trap I was in.

I had crawled out, quietly getting to my feet, and feeling the instant chill. I was wearing child's clothing, bare-footed, and my hair hung down to the bottom of my back, unbrushed and knotted. My nails were dirty, and the hunger pains in my stomach nearly had me hunching over.

When I pushed open the door with my small hands, I had been blinded by the light as I stood in the hallway of our old manor, the one we lived in before the dome.

A low sob caught my attention, and I'd followed it, capturing my image in a mirror. I was me, but younger, a ten-year-old Danielle staring back with worry in her eyes. My freckles were more defined, and my forest greens were far too big for my face.

Another sob, and I dragged my widened gaze from my reflection, a shaking hand pushing open a lone door. Before I could pull myself from the hell I was stuck in, a horrifying sound ricocheted off every wall in the room. I had no idea it had indeed come from me as I dropped to the ground, tears falling for my parents as they lay tied up and bloodied on the floor. Dead. Tortured. Lifeless. Their unseeing eyes were on me, pale, gone from this world.

Above them, with the biggest, evilest grin that made every muscle in my body tense, a man turned to me. His fingers were curled around a knife and a handful of my mum's bloody hair in a fist.

Eric.

He'd advanced on me with a look of murder. I knew he was going to kill me next. He was going to gut me with the knife and tear my organs from my body.

I raised my hands and pleaded with him, screwing my eyes shut, waiting for death. But when silence had surrounded me, and I chanced upon a look, my feet were buried in freezing mud. Eric was on his knees in a garden, a gun pointed to his head, begging for forgiveness.

I was me again, older, with a bump that showed I must've been heavily pregnant. I had placed my palm on it, feeling protective of my unborn child as its father stood before me, completely suicidal.

Undeserving, that was all I could feel radiating from him. He didn't think he was going to be a good dad, and didn't think he deserved to have that luxury.

"I love you. I love you," he'd repeated in a shaking voice, tears down his face, a trembling hand on the gun pointed at his head. "Please don't hate me."