Page 48 - HEF Pen & Ink 2020

squint as my head pounds even harder. The woman looks at me seriously and I take a sip of water. The edge of the cup catches my parched mouth and I taste blood. I open and close my lips a few times to get rid of the taste, but it just grows.
“I was in the sky, in place of the moon. I’m looking down on the clearing. There’s... something written in the snow.”
She sets a pad of paper and a pen in front of me and I take it wordlessly. My hands follow a path as it writes characters I don’t recognize. Long, looping letters cover every inch of the page and I tilt my head as I try to figure out what it says.
When I look up, the woman in front of me is gone. Her chair rattles slightly but the door never makes a sound. I look under the table, around the room, at the camera in the corner and find that I’m alone. The cuff on my wrist is gone so I stand, still holding the paper. My head aches even harder now and it’s hard to look straight.
A thud hits the wall behind me, and I jump, turning around, knocking my chair to the ground where it’s swallowed up like dust. When I turn around again, the room is darker. The table and chair are gone. The only light in the room comes from a small fluorescent bulb that hisses and crackles softly above my head. My heart pounds in my ears as I walk towards the window, the only distinguishing feature in the room. Some- thing taps softly behind it and I hold my hand up to the glass. It burns my fingertips as soon as my skin meets it but I press my palm harder against the window. A tap knocks lower, and I drop my eyes to see the reflection of my writing. Only two words stand out starkly in black.
Wake Up.
Something heavy is thrown against the glass, sending a glittering web of veins racing across it. I’m
———
A voice calls me too, more whimper than word. My eyes part and I see a face below me, grimacing in
thrown back and I’m falling, once again.
pain. Her eyes are dull, and she sucks wind through cracked teeth. My hands are cold, slick with something dark. More voices call around me and I turn to find people littering the ground. Veins snake across the dirt and grow dark, the smell knots my stomach. Someone sobs off in the distance and I want to do the same. My confusion is enough for the victim below me and she wrestles something from my grip before throwing me to the side. Before I fully hit the ground, I see her raise something above me, and lunge.
RED AND BLUE DOUBLE
by Maya Mulder
LIGHTNING
by Sarina Bogy
46