Viking Girl Scribbles

A cold wind tore through the trees, snapping twigs and scattering leaves. It dropped to ground level and toppled the bicycle on the lawn in front of the red brick house at the end of the lane. Spinning the wheel it rose to the sky and set off north. The house lies in darkness, the unlit porch light and the pileup of leaves in front of the door gives it an almost abandoned feeling. The door is unlocked. All the curtains are drawn, leaving the rooms in a perpetual twilight. The sink in the kitchen is stacked with crusty dishes, seeming to defy gravity in their crooked piles. There’s a sweet smell in the air. It sticks to the roof of the mouth and the image of white lilies comes to mind. Creaking noises send chills up the spine. The house is settling, the cold wind outside and the curiously warm house have it sighing and moving. More sighing. Or is it breathing? Wheezing breaths come from a room at the back of the house. Fear closes its hand around the throat. Swallowing gets di...

Night makes the skin pale. Bleeding under a full moon. Lying there, sleepless. Watching the dark sky. Following the cold moon’s path. Fingers cold, mind numb. Slow crimson trickles.  Night is long, never ending.  No dreams, only death.

The morning mist swirls around my feet, soaking through my trainers and chilling my bare legs. I’m trying out a new path through the forest. If I manage to not get lost I should be able to make the round in a little under 30 minutes.  It’s very quiet. Not a bird or squirrel moving in the trees. An uncomfortable feeling settles in my stomach as I lengthen my steps and try to remember how the path twists and turns before it hits the road. Maybe I’ll cut it short today. Find a new path for tomorrow.  Giggles. I spin around, nearly falling. The path behind me is empty. Stumbling I set off again. Running faster. Faster than ever before. This time the giggles come from the left. Something is moving in the bushes. Fast. I can see the road through the trees.  It catches my foot. I fall face first into the dirt. The air gets knocked out of my lungs. Things crawl up my legs, around my torso, my neck. The giggles reverberate through my body. Something turns me onto my back.  Th...

Moving. You gotta keep on moving. Don’t stand still. Not even for a second. Only if you’re in the shade. Yeah. The shade is safe. They can’t do anything in the shade.  Thing is, people don’t know. Don’t see. People haven’t got a clue of how much danger they’re in. All the time.  My feet beat out a quick rhythm on the pavement. I feel the sun on my back. In front of me my shadow moves with me. It looks just like me. Like I feel. Blurry and black and not quite there.  But I know. I know the truth. I can’t stop. Not until I’m in the shade.  It’s tiring. This half-running. I wish I could slow down, but I know that they’re ready to pounce as soon as I relax. They know that I know. I’ll get no reprieve. I catch the door to my building before it shuts me out. It’s cool and dark and I can breathe again.  In electric light my shadow is my own again. They can’t survive inside. They wait outside in the sunshine. Waiting for us to stop for a while and in that moment they fu...

It was the first day, last year of school. We passed each other in the hallway outside the cafeteria when she stumbled and bumped into my shoulder. “God! Sorry, I’m so sorry!” I never had a chance to say or do anything before she ran off towards the stairs leading up to the library. But I remembered her. The smell of lemons and that impossibly long hair, the color of moonlight. I had to know her name! Days went by and there was no sign of her. I sometimes thought I had made her up. Then one day I saw her as she passed through the doors to the guidance counselor. I almost followed her, but the bell rang. If there was one class I couldn’t afford to miss it was Calc. Mr. Grabowski made it perfectly clear that I needed to up my game if I wanted to pass. Calc bores me to tears. Second bell sounded and Grabowski rolled up the sleeves of his crisp white shirt. “As you all remember from last week…” The door opened, and there she was, clearly uncomfortable being late enough to in...

A funny thing with school buses, no matter the country, was that they were so similar. Old and smelly, invisibly divided seating arrangements and crude messages scribbled all over. Matilda had let the other kids scramble on board before she slunk down on an empty seat in front. She leaned her head against the window and let the voices of the other kids wash over her, even the drama and the gossip were the same, only this time everyone spoke English. There was a buzzing in her pocket. Her most recent best friend Amanda had sent a snap, but it included at least four other people so Matilda didn’t bother to answer. Most likely Amanda had sent that snap to most of her Snapchat friends. Pretty soon the snaps would become less frequent and eventually stop, and even though Matilda had experienced this too many times to count it still hurt. Her parents soothed their conscience by telling themselves, and Matilda, that living in different countries gave life experience and an open mind. A...

They always find me. I suppose I let them, fall in love. I accept the bodies they offer and their flame warms us for a night, a week, a month. Their laughter, flickering like lightning bugs in the dark. Brief moments of now. They see what they want to see in my eyes, take my silence for acceptance and hold my hand when we go out. They show me off, I smile politely. Never encouraging, never discouraging. They think it's true love. The true love they've been waiting for, for a lifetime. What do they know about life? About time? I can always tell when they… wake up. They'll look at me with these sad eyes and they all say a version of the same thing: “I don't think I love you anymore, you don't seem to care about me. Did you ever, really?" And they pick fights over everything, willing me to fight back, to prove there was something between us, that there is something left to save. I don't react. I don't look at them. Their pain is their own. I won't an...

Every Friday afternoon I sit down at my kitchen table and write you a letter. In the beginning they were all filled with how much I missed you, or how miserable I was, or how unfair everything was. In the beginning I would reread all my letters. Let my angry, sad, hurt words wash over me again. Now I just reread them after I'm done. Check for mistakes. Over time they've changed to me writing to you about my life. I tell you the little things that happened during the week, about fragments of other people's conversations I've overheard. They used to be stacked on one of the top shelves in the kitchen, always threatening to fall down onto the floor. Now I keep them in a box under the bed. It says “letters” on the lid. I pray to god no one ever opens that and reads them. It's Monday now and my boss is telling me I'm moving offices. They need me over at the main office for an uncertain amount of time and could I please pack up and leave on Wednesday? They'...