Page 165 - The Houseguest

ICE
Brian sat staring down at the floor feeling the coldness of the uncovered concrete slab through his prison garb. He lifted his head for the first time since he’d been thrown into the dim cell block. He didn’t even know how long he’d been sitting there. It could’ve been minutes, could’ve been hours. Time meant nothing anymore. Nothing meant anything anymore.
His thoughts drifted to his sweet sister. That’s what pained him the most about what was happening. What he was living through, though unfair, was something he could accept and resolve, in time, in his own way. But he couldn’t understand why God would inflict emotional suffering like this on someone with a heart and soul like Laura’s, especially since her main ambition, her life’s purpose, was to spread His word and convert non-believers. This one question was enough to block his efforts to become a believer, forever.
He stretched his body out as the coolness of the rigid gray rectangle ran through his spine like a spark of electricity, yet he did not react. It was as though his senses had been deadened. He only wished his mind were as numb as his body because his thoughts kept drifting back to scenes, visions of vivid, random passages of time -- of Laura, of fists, of rage, of tears. He marveled how the human mind is able to suppress certain memories, filling it with tasks at hand so that we are able to function every day. But when those tasks are taken away, the mind returns, involuntarily and unwillingly, to its vault of unwelcomed memories. The most prevalent of those was of a quiet, timid little girl shivering in the corner of the living room. She was trying not to make any noise, so
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The Houseguest by Linda Ellis www.LindaEllis.life