Escape
Well... This is sort of uncharted territory in terms of what I've written so far. Putting such a young human girl in a position to have a tortured past. I usually reserve such bad histories for my non-humans. Either way... I wrote this for creative writing class.
The moon shone high in the starry sky through the branches of the trees, yet to grow out their leaves for the spring, illuminating the land with the kind of glow only the night of a full moon could bring. The air was chilled as a breeze flowed through the woods, out in to the nearby town. It was a small town in Vermont, commonly called Middle-of-Nowhere Vermont by its residents. This small town with barely a hundred residents was surrounded by nothing but forested mountain, the nearest town being miles off through twisted, winding roads that few dared to traverse save for those who lived there. While the town was in many senses a modern New England town, the buildings there were the same ones that have existed for a few hundred years on the outside, merely renovated internally for modern comforts and restored on the outside. Walking through the town would give a good image of the past, if anyone dared to make the journey towards the town. The streets of the small community were empty and dark, most of the windows of the houses and businesses dark, with only the moon providing most of the light. The sounds of the woods were the only things heard, the river flowing down the mountainside nearby, the nocturnal creatures making their calls on and off, the gentle motion of objects caused by the breeze. The clock on the church struck midnight, and the bell gently tolled twelve times, softly enough not to disturb the scene. The sound faded out slowly in to the night as there was little background noise to silence it quickly. Just as the bell's tone faded out entirely, a door was heard, gently creaking open. Opening the door was a teenage girl, sixteen years of age. She was dressed in just a short, black skirt and a simple white shirt, and around her neck she wore a kind of collar-like necklace with a pendant with her name engraved on it: Isabella. She stepped out into the night, her bare feet now apparent, nothing with her but a journal of some sort. She had on an expression of slight worry as she walked towards the street, which slowly faded as she realized she was alone. The moon as her guide, she headed left, down towards the edge of the town only another house past hers, where the forest was pure but for the road that led out of the mountainside village. She walked along the edge of the road, though she knew she would not have to worry about cars driving along the road towards or away from town at this time of night. As she walked down the road, she thought silently to herself of how she had gotten to where she was now. One hand moving up to her neck, she felt the smooth, metal tag on her, and whispered the name of her master, "William". A half hour passed before she reached a familiar bend in the road: a sharp, guard railed bend where the mountain road changed directions entirely before continuing downhill. She walked around, a few meters from the edge of that bend, to a fallen log where she sat down. Soothed by the sounds of the forest, she looked around to make sure she was alone. The road was as empty as always of cars, and everywhere she looked, she could see, other than the road, only wilderness. Not even her town was in sight. Once she was safe, she opened the journal and flipped to the next blank page. A shiver was sent through her spine by a sudden gust of cold air brushing against her exposed skin as she took a pencil from the binding of her journal. She wrote...
March 28, 2013. It was around evening time, and the sun was setting through the trees. It gave the kitchen a natural light as I prepared dinner for my master, who was due home any minute. The meal I cooked was a simple meal: a lentil soup to warm him up after a long day of work in the cold first week of spring, and some fresh bread baking in the oven to go with the soup. The cat leapt apparently out of nowhere right near the stove I was cooking on and startled me. The black and white cat looked at me with its feline eyes, sitting on the counter. Though I had lived here ten years, I had never understood why the cat always seemed so obsessed with me. Around ten years ago was when I first met my master. It was the end of winter, or the beginning of spring. I was only six at the time, so the details are sketchy and hard to remember. I was an orphan, but I could not remember why or how I became one. He came to my orphanage, seeking to adopt a little girl. He seemed like a nice man to me, and the head of the orphanage seemed to trust him, so I was soon sent home with him. He walked me outside as I held everything I owned in a small bag, towards an old car. I still remember the first words he said to me in the car, as I left the orphanage in to my new life. "Isabella, you are not my daughter, but from this day on, you are my pet." I was completely confused as to what he meant by that, but I would learn with time what that entailed... The oven timer's ding broke me out of the contemplative trance I was in, shaking me from the past back in to the present. I gently shooed the cat away then retrieve the oven mitts that were hiding behind him. As I opened the oven, the smell of fresh, hot bread mixed in to the kitchen along with the scent of the soup. I placed the bread on the cooling rack nearby the stove to cool off, and then turned the stove down on low to keep the soup warm as I waited for my master to return home. My timing could not have been better, because no sooner than I had gone to the door to wait to greet my master, his car pulled up. I prepared myself for the worst, yet expected the best. He came to the door, and I opened it for him. He walked through the door, holding the mail. "Hello, master. Did you have a good day?" My questioned was answered as he greeted me with a hard slap across the face. I was thrown towards the wall by the blow, and the sudden and intense pain almost brought me to tears. I recollected myself and forced myself to refrain from tears, knowing I would be punished for crying. "I-I'm... Guessing not..." As I took his coat and led him to the kitchen, he was silent, and his expression revealed to me he was in a bad mood. I hung his coat and immediately went to serve him the meal I had spent hours preparing for him. "I'm not happy with you..." "Why not, master? What have I done to displease you?" Normally, I know exactly what I did, if anything, that he would dislike, small mistakes I would make out of distraction or sheer exhaustion. "You know exactly what." He threw the mail on the table; a letter from a website with free online high school course I was taking appeared on the top. "There's a reason I forbade you to go to school!" "But, master. I was just -" "You were just nothing! You are my pet, and pets need no education but how to cook, clean, serve, and please their masters. Anything else is a waste of time." "I just wanted to gain more knowledge... I made sure all my chores were completed before each lesson..." As I tried to defend myself, I went to the stove and poured him a bowl of the soup I had made, and sliced him off a piece of the fresh, still warm bread. I placed it on the table in front of my master. "And I suppose you used my electricity, my internet, which I pay for, to take these classes? You know you need permission before you can do any luxury activities using my resources." I was silent for a moment as I thought about what he said. He was right to be mad at me for that logic. I was just a pet, his property in any sense. "I'm sorry, master... I'll cease my activities on this site." "Okay, then... I can tell you're truly apologetic... So, I'll give you only a small punishment... No dinner tonight, and you are no longer allowed to attend any of the town events." That last part hit me hard. The rare town wide parties, dances, and events were the only thing my master would let me leave the house for, other than getting groceries. I was about to speak up in protest, when he interrupted. "Not a single word, Isabella. I am your master, and as my pet, you are to do what I say, and follow my rules, no matter how much they displease you. If you break them, you must accept the loss of privilege that comes with." "A-at least let me attend the contra dance tomorrow!" Angered by my outburst, he stood up and grabbed me by the arm, letting his fingernails burrow in to my soft, weak arm, and pulled me close to him, forcing my face close to his. His expression was one of an almost demonic anger. "Listen here. You're in NO right to speak up to me... I took you in from that orphanage... You owe me your life, body and spirit... You're my pet until you die, whether you like it or not..." The fear and pain I felt in that moment got the better of me, for my eyes betrayed me, a few tears formed in my eyes, and one fell out. I learned from an early age that crying was never rewarded kindly. As a young child only on my second day here as his pet, he found I had brought a doll with me. It was my only possession, given to me long before memory could form, so I am unsure who gave it to me and assumed it was my parents. He came in my room to check on me, and upon seeing the doll, he took it from me. "You're not going to need this anymore, my pet." "B-but Daddy, I-it's mine!" I still had no idea what he meant by him being my master and me his pet, only understanding that legally he was my new dad. For that, he slapped me hard, the pain too much for a six year old to take easily, so I started to cry a few tears. He took me in to the living room, along with everything I had brought with me, and lit a fire in the fireplace. Grabbing me by the arm hard, as he was now, he forced me to stand there in tears, watching as he burned every last possession I owned on this earth, lecturing me on how I should never call him father, never cry, and never defend myself. Despite those lessons, I sometimes wasn't strong enough to stop a single tear from occasionally escaping my eyes, as with just then. Seeing the tears leaving my eyes, he forced me backwards. My back hit the stove with such force, the glass on the stove door cracked behind me, and the pot of hot lentil soup fell sideways, hitting me in the head and spilling the still very hot contents on me as it then fell to the floor, surrounding me in a lake of lentils. The sudden and intense pain almost forced me to cry out, but I forced myself not to. He quickly came over to me and pulled me up by my hair, his strong arms able to lift my thin and weak body with ease. "Now you have something to cry about. Clean this up right now, and then go to your room. And if you dare make another sound for the rest of the day, you're going to be severely punished..." He threw me back down on to the floor, and then left with his dinner, heading to his private study. The dinner I had spent all that time preparing, a meal I wouldn't even get to enjoy now. I waited until I heard him slam the door to his study. I quickly wiped the hot soup off of me, and started to clean the kitchen. Despite the burning sensation all over me as I cleaned, I knew I wouldn't be forgiven for cleaning myself first. The soup was not easy to clean up, as the lake of lentils that surrounded me quickly spread everywhere, and under everything, as I tried to clean it through tears and pain. Once I had finished, I gathered the towels I had used to clean the mess, old towels destroyed by time, and carried them to the basement, careful not to have them leak on to the floor. Once I opened the door to the basement, the cat followed me down there, heading down the old stairs first. It hopped on top of the dryer, where its bed was placed. The whole while as I walked down the basement, it never took its eyes off me. There were hundreds of boxes of things I was forbidden to touch within the basement, though the cat never took its attention off of me for these things. I set the towels in the washer, putting it on high so the soup wouldn't stain. As well, I decided to mix my outermost layer of clothes in there as well, since my master still won't let me buy any clothes. Once the clothing was set to wash, I exited the basement and then quickly brought myself to the attic. It was not much to live in, but it was where he made me reside. It was simply a bathroom in one corner, with a curtainless shower, toilet, and sink, a mattress for me to sleep on in another, and a small dresser in which I could place what little master allowed me to own in the third. Without even taking off what little I had on, I immediately turned the shower on to cold, trying to soothe my burning skin. The shower's sound present to drown out any sound I made, I finally allowed myself to cry for a few minutes, releasing some of the anger and pain from these last events. The cold water surrounded me, chilling my spirit and dulling out my pain, both physical and mental. It allowed me to think back to a happier moment, not too long ago. It was a few months back, when I was last allowed to attend a contra dance. I was standing along one wall as the others dance nervous as to what I was going to do. I wore a white blouse and a long, dark blue skirt. It was the only nice outfit master gave me, which I was only to use for going out. It concealed my bare feet, though a few others were also barefoot, so I would not have been too far out of place had someone noticed. The band played in the front of the large town hall, and many people danced. Suddenly I felt a tap on my shoulder, and I turned over, nervous. A nice boy around my age stood next to me, his skin just slightly darker than mine, most likely due to the fact I'm rarely allowed out. He smiled, and I couldn't help but return it, as an emotion I had never felt before flowed through me like a sudden yet calming wave. We talked a bit, and he told me he was from the nearest town to here, another small, practically nonexistent town, here because his father was the chief of police in our town. Before I knew it, I was with him on the dance floor with him. He led me with skilled, fluent movements, and my learned ability to adapt quickly to please my master allowed me to learn the dances with ease. For an hour, I truly had forgotten of my master, of my pain, and for one moment, I was treated as equal by him. When the contra dance came to a close, I was saddened. I looked at him and asked if he would be at the next one. He told me he would be there, and he would love to have me as his partner once again. And now that master has forbid me to go, I may never see him again... "Isabella. Turn off that water now. I'm not paying so you can take ten minute showers. Now, go to bed." The attic door closed with almost a slam, and I was thrown out of my trance once again. As I turned off the shower, I tried to shake the thoughts of him from my mind, but as I wrapped myself in a towel that was hanging nearby the shower, I couldn't help but feel that if I didn't attend, I would hurt him forever. I felt he could be my only chance at living a normal life someday, as I knew almost no one else in this world. And I was forbidden to go anywhere to meet him. I dried myself off and went to my bed to lay myself down. Almost nude in the poorly insulated attic, I shivered slightly at the cold. I thought of going downstairs to steal a blanket from my master's closet, but decided it was not worth it. I just took the towel I dried myself with it, and used that. As I lay there, I realized I could not sleep. As the time slowly passed, one thought came to my mind over and over again. Escape... I quickly got up and silently went to my dresser. I put on the only thing I currently and which was clean, though not nearly enough to combat the cold of the night. I also grabbed the notebook which I occasionally wrote in as a diary, and a pencil. I thought if I wanted to escape, I would need to prove to someone that there was need to escape. Finally, I waited. I sat on the bed and waited, thinking, scared and excited at the same time. I knew if I was caught, I would face punishment worse than I ever had before, yet if I stayed... I decided it was worth the risk. I cannot believe I have never thought of escaping before, but now that the thought had crossed my mind, I had to go through with it. I knew my only chance to escape would be late at night, so I waited until midnight... Once I heard the bell's first toll, marking the midnight hour, I stood up, and quickly, yet silently, made my way towards the front door, taking one last look at the home that has been my prison for the last ten years. I make my way to the front door, when I see the cat once again, sitting on the small table by the front door. As he sees me leaving, he sits up, and looks at me with its curious eyes. As I look in to its eyes, I realize what the cat has been curious of all these years. The cat's eyes were asking me all these years: why do you stay? You can easily walk out and never return. I am but an animal, but you are more. You can go free. Finally understanding its message, I brought my head towards it, and kissed it gently in the forehead. As if it knew this was goodbye, it purred and gently nuzzled me, glad I finally came out of my fear long enough to notice escape was possible. I heard the last toll of the midnight hour sound, and looked at the cat one last time as it hopped down off the table, heading back to its basement.
As she wrote her last sentence, she looked up at the starry skies through the bare branches of the trees. She then stood up, and looked around. She knew time had passed since she started writing, but she was unaware of how much. Reaching to her neck, she grabbed the tag of her collar, yanking at it. The collar came of easily with her tug. As she felt her bare neck for the first time in years, she looked at the tag. "From this day on... I belong to no one... I just hope he doesn't go and look for another innocent to replace me with..." She held the collar, and swung it around until it gained speed. She threw it as far as she could up the mountain, then resumed her downhill route, the sounds of the night still surrounding her as she was guided by the moon. As she walked, she hoped William wouldn't find her missing until it was too late to pursue her...