She looked around the crowd, smiling absentmindedly at whoever looked her way, a sense of discomfort dulling her senses. A hazy apprehension clouded her heart, disconnecting her from the happily oblivious people milling about. She recognized a few faces but her mind, preoccupied with a nagging, growing worry, couldn’t…wouldn’t…process it…trying so hard to…
Suddenly it all came into focus.
Where is he?
She wildly searched the room and ran to the next, her heart beating a panicky tattoo against her chest.
Where is he?
The sense of apprehension threatened to overwhelm her as she continued to search frantically.
Kidnapped…
Abducted…
Ransom…
Killed…
People telling her things which didn’t make any sense…
No.
People with concerned faces.
Tears.
No. No.
The fear that had insidiously proliferated now spiraled out of all proportion, paralyzing her. Distorting itself into unbearable pain which threatened to stop her heart. She shook her head violently, vehemently denying their lies…
Someone found him.
She ran through the house, into the garden, pushing people aside. Gritting her teeth she fleetingly wondered why they looked so nonchalant. The fear that had knotted her stomach, making her want to vomit, leaving a bitter taste in her mouth.
She saw him.
His messy black hair tainted a rusty-red with clotted blood that had dripped down his face leaving a bloody trail barely discernible amid the battleground of cuts and bruises his face was. The parts of his body his bloodied clothes revealed were mottled with blue bruises contrasting with the deep glistening red of the myriad cuts. His right leg…broken…bleeding profusely…evoking intense pain which made him writhe and cry out in agony…
She screamed.
The piercing wail merged into the suffocating blackness that engulfed her…
Christina De Silva
15 April 2009
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