TERRORS AND STRATEGIMS by KATHI HARRIS

TERRORS AND STRATEGIMS by KATHI HARRIS


I tensed, waiting. Then the door was flung wide.

The next several minutes were the most horrific in my short life. The enormous phantoms were now real. How had they come into the room without me actually seeing them make their entrance? Now they were crowded around me. What the hell was going on?

One had me by the throat. I could not breathe. Another held my legs…I was fighting for my life. The wind howled malevolently and lightening flashed blindingly. The thunder was explosive. The Goliaths’ offensive that accompanied this show was ferocious.

I was kicking and hitting and trying to scream. I wrestled and rolled, bumping into things that poked my arms & legs. How could this be? I had just searched this room for something to use as a weapon and found nothing. Now there was stuff poking me in the behind. I didn’t understand it. I felt as if I was a character in an episode of The Twilight Zone.

My movements were becoming more and more restricted. My struggle was flagging. I wondered if I was going to die. I wondered what it would be like to be buried. Would many people attend my funeral? Would many people cry for me? What type of headstone would be placed on my grave? “So you are just going to give up?” I asked myself. “Hell no!” I answered back.

I renewed my wriggling silently, seemingly futilely, refusing to give in to my attackers. I intended to resist until there was no breath left in me. It was a valiant but vain attempt; all of my air was almost gone. I could not fight much longer. I saw black dots before my eyes in the strobing lights which continued to flash. I was fading fast.

Jill threw open the door and switched the light on. “Bliss, Bliss, are you awake?”

“Help me! Help me!” I whispered hoarsely.

“What? What did you say?”

“Bliss, Bliss, what’s wrong? Where are you?”

She followed my voice, suddenly noticing me on the floor, she rushed to me. “What are you doing down there? C’mon, let me help you back to bed. Whoa! Let’s get this off. What were you trying to do, kill yourself? It’s wrapped so tight. You know you almost strangled yourself with this scarf you had around your neck? How did you get the sheets wrapped so tightly ‘round you? What happened?”

Don’t know… was fighting … kicking…” I croaked.

I could breathe now that Jill had taken the scarf off; things were now swimming back into focus. I looked at Jill in shock. She had on her usual night attire which was a t-shirt. I glanced at my now bare legs; I was also clad in a t-shirt.

“What or who were you fighting? What were you kicking? Didn’t you hear the storm? It woke me up. Why didn’t you close the window? It’s getting wet in here.”

All that noise was just a storm? We had not been under attack by monsters? What was wrong with me? Was I losing my mind? My brow knitted in puzzlement as Jill helped me off the floor and back to the bed.

“Let me close this window before all the rain blows in and drenches the whole place.”

I listened to her chatter on. Was she serious? Was I at home in my room? Had I been here all along? Could this all have been a dream? But it was so real! Mind you, I would be relieved beyond words if this was really a dream. But a voice in my head kept saying … it’s not a dream! It’s not a dream!

“I guess I must have had a dream,” I said uncertainly. “But it was so real – horrible, but real… we were fighting for our lives. You would not believe…you had to be there to understand… but wait, you were there.”

“That’s the nature of dreams girl… they seem so real.”

“But this one was more so…” I shook my head in bafflement and gratitude. I was conflicted. Even though I was still trying to understand what had happened, I was ecstatic that it seemed we had so lucked out.

“So what was this dream about that has caused you to be so freaked out?”

“We were kidnapped from the club...” I told her everything about our kidnapping, Sam and Greg, waking up from our drugged state, finding each other, even the umbrella.

“Wow! That was some dream. You should write a book about it, you could make a ton of money. It sounds scary enough that people would really get into it.

“Yeah Right!”

“It could happen, it fact it did happen. That’s how it went down in the case of those Twilight books. The author, Stephanie Meyer, was inspired to write the first book because of a dream. And look how that turned out.”

“Maybe it wasn’t a dream.” I said in a small voice. She looked at me as if I had four heads.

“What do you mean?”

“Maybe it really happened.”

“Huh? How? Are you listening to yourself?”

I shrugged.

“Why would some guys kidnap us from the club, take us to some building, and then bring us home again? How would they even know where we live?”

“I know it sounds ridiculous but- “

“Why would they do that? And how come I don’t remember any of this if I was there?” I shrugged again.

“We were at work yesterday right?” I nodded reluctantly. “When I came home you were already in bed. Remember you said you thought you were coming down with something? And you had that scarf wrapped around your neck because you said your throat hurt and you wanted to keep it warm -”

“But later I felt better and we decided to go to the club.” I interjected. “Remember we wore our skinny jeans, & I wore that new jeans jacket I just got? Remember those two obnoxious guys Sam & Greg? You were there, we were hanging out. Don’t you remember?”

Jill shook her head slowly as she looked at me, concern filling her eyes. “What are you talking about? Yesterday was dress-down day at work because it was Friday, so we wore jeans to work. Don’t you remember?”

I decided to start treating all Jill’s questions as rhetorical. So I did not respond. I just cut my eyes at her. She didn’t seem to notice, if she did, she didn’t react to my display of irritation. She was talking to me as if I were a child or had taken leave of my senses. Perhaps I had, but I stubbornly pushed forward with my argument.

“As I was saying,” I said slowly, giving her a taste of her own medicine and speaking to her as if all of her faculties had fled. “I wore my jeans jacket to the club.”

I rose as I spoke, going towards the chair on which was thrown said jacket. I put my hand in the pocket and it closed around my prize... my proof that it was not a dream. I brought it forth, opening my hand. The strange looking gun gleamed on my open palm.

Jill looked at me dumbstruck. Her eyes went from my hand to my face and then back again. It would have been comical if the situation wasn’t so scary. Then she asked in a trembling voice.

“Is that a gun? What the hell are you doing with a gun? Where did you get it? Why does it look so peculiar?”

“You tell me!” I said quietly.


THE END


- copyrighted by Kathi Harris

- sponsored by Willow at http://www.magpietales.blogspot.com/