Young Writers Society

They never got used to the pink haze which engulfed Kingsland. Yet it wasn’t Kingsland, it was something words couldn’t begin to describe, Kingsland is just what the residents (or were they prisoners) remained to call it. It was everything Kingsland was, but at the same time they could never understand what it truly was, why they were truly here. Randall’s house was there, of course there were little changes here in there (that was all down to the man at the top), alterations, but everything was there in one way or another. Julies perfect garden was there, all her roses and various other flowers were still there in their perspective rows, the way she had carefully constructed it. ‘Gerry’s Goods’ was still there, but it was locked. They had all met the man, the Victorian man, the top hat man, the man with no face, and now they were trapped. This was his world, he was in charge and he had brought the pink haze, this was their new home, it was the Pink District.

Thirteen days had passed since they arrived. They had achieved nothing in that time. Every day was the same, nothing changed. Randall had seemingly been appointed the leader, but the leader of what he didn’t know and nor did he want it, it just happened naturally he had guessed; still he tried to pretend it wasn’t the case, tried to do his own thing, find a way back. Every day from the start he would scour the town, looking for something of which he had no idea was. They had all woken up from their respective places; and so, Randall had awoken in his house to find an unnerving pink glow intruding through his window. Even now, every time his eyes were forced to look upon its menacing aura he would get that swishy feeling in his stomach, the same horrible uncomfortable swishy ship swaying back and forth. They very first thing he did, even amongst the confusion about the pink glow seeping into his eyes, pulling at the cords inside his head, the first thing he did, was check for the letter. In his bedside draw, on the left side of his bed, secured in the safety container, he knew where it precisely was, where it had always been. He had opened the draw, readied the little silver key hanging around his neck, only to find it missing. The container wasn’t there. Everything else was, his father’s watch, it was still broken but it was there alright, along with littered junk of various bits and bobs; he remembered now that he had swatted a pair less battery aside in anger, why that had stuck with him he did not know.

Present day, Tuesday, 2024, 6:39 am.

They had all decided nest themselves in the town hall, like a family of rats just trying to get by, the thinking was to hold up there for a while, Randall had suggested that, that way they’d all be together. After what happened to the boy Ricky, nobody wanted to be alone, they each needed someone, wanted to be close to someone. Randall with the help of Ned had ransacked the town as best they could and as much as they could, Filling the hall with bags and bags of food, medical supplies, everything they needed really; despite everything and the situation they were in, the town was almost as it had always been, except there was no one to stop you taking what you want. That had both pondered on the idea of one by one squeezing mattresses into the hall, but in the end they decided against it and settled for as many blankets as you will ever see, pillows and sleeping bags.

Lucy hadn’t slept at all that night and when Randall woke up, he find her staring wishfully into the desolated streets; still the pink haze drifted. Walking over reluctantly, he didn’t like these situations Randall was pondering what to say, he should say something, but he knew nothing he said would make any difference, wouldn’t make it better. Carefully squeezing through the slightly ajar double door of Kingsland town hall, (briefly, only briefly though, he had often seen the mayor walk with that limp he had out of these doors, he wondered where the mayor was now…and then he wondered where everyone was, then that shit swishy came back) he walked out alongside Lucy, watching her staring emptily into the barren streets. Not even tumbled weeds passed them the honour of rolling on in here, they wouldn’t dare. It was august, and Randall did his best to curl up in his jacket as the icy wind jumped at him, icy wind in august? That was a question Randall would ask himself and everyone else later, but not right now, now was the time to lend his shoulder as best he could.

In the softest voice he could, he said “Didn’t get much sleep then?” he of course knew the answer it was fairly fucking obvious he thought, but he didn’t know what else to say really.

“No, not much.” Lucy replied, trying to force any sense of a smile, but it wouldn’t come.

“Lucy come back inside, you’ll catch a –

“No, I can’t believe it yet, he’ll come back. He will find a way, I just know he will.” She didn’t make any attempt to meet Randall’s eyes as she spoke to him, eyes firmly fixed ahead. Randall noticed a tear slowly trickling its way down her right cheek, creating a damp smear down her face. In that ever so cautious and caring voice he could call upon, which to this day was alien to him, he tried to make her feel better, snatch the guilt away which was burying itself in her.

“It wasn’t your fault Lucy, me, the others none of us blame you. Ricky was always a hot head, it –

“Was!? No, he still is a hot head, he isn’t gone.”

“Sorry Lucy…you know that’s not what meant, but you know Ricky he’s ways been like that, he was just trying to help, find a way out of all this shit.”

“I...I let him go Randall!” Lucy cried, and then she let everything go and Randall braced his shoulder, he really hated these situations. Her face erupted in a flood of tears. It had been building for a few minutes now, and now the memory of last night had broken her defence again. She still wouldn’t turn and face him, and he had to use more force than he intended, just to get her to turn and face him. He positioned her so she was standing face on in front of him waiting for her water coated eyes to meet his gaze which was honestly sincere. He tried pulling her face level with his with both hands but she resisted with an odd strength.

In a voice as soft as feathers falling, he said ‘Lucy look at me.’

He waited a few seconds for her to raise her head, even just her eyes would be enough he thought but she remained face down, tears slowly streaming on all sides.

“Lucy!” this time he spoke with a forceful tone careful not to lose her but strong enough to bring her back. She looked up, not fully raising, but she looked up nevertheless.

“Don’t you dare blame yourself.” Randall continued. “He was always going to go, whether you held on or not, he would’ve gone Lucy. He’s a strong lad, fire in his heart, you’ll see him again.”

A lot of what he said then was as blatant a lie as he had ever told and he didn’t enjoying skipping the truth, but he liked Lucy enough to say what he had to, just to bring her a fraction of comfort.

“I want him back Randall.” She said through her trembling lips, with her hair drooping over her face in straggled mess and a vulnerable face blotched with wet smears.

“I know, I know. Just…just be strong, keep that head up aye.” He said, smiling softly at her, hoping it would spread her own one across her face, but to no avail. He continued. “I mean you should keep a brave face, even if it isn’t real, do it for yourself more than anything else. Don’t give them the satisfaction of seeing you like this. Bastards already took Ricky, don’t let them take you as well.”

“Randall I know…it’s just all too much at the moment, I need to be alone for a while.”

Just as she finished her sentence, Randall noticed a glimmer of movement through the gap between the doors, and then a flash of dying hair confirmed what he already suspected. Lucy was already thinking about leaving and was preparing to, but before she made the first crucial step, Randall stopped her and said something to her in a hushed voice, Lucy only just managed to hear it. He brought himself closer to her, stepping around so that the door was facing his back; he felt better knowing that his lips couldn’t be seen moving, even though he spoke quickly in a voice almost silent.

“Lucy. There was another thing I wanted to mention. Don’t let Mary see you like this. Don’t give her any more ammo with which she can load that waspish tongue of hers. And seeing you almost at breaking point will give her that last push she needs, she’s cracking.”

He hurried the last part with uncanny speed, before giving her one last smile to say everything’s going to be alright, even though he knew it wasn’t, it really wasn’t. Randall felt a shadow shimmer past the doors behind him. Lucy quickly stepped back from him and headed for the door, head down. She had meant to say thank you, but her thought was blocked by the presence at the doors and that word ‘breaking’ lingered with her; it would do so for a while. Lucy pulled the left of the double doors open and hurried past the looming figure within, careful to hide her tear stricken face as best she could.

The figure in the door barely saw the women as she whisked past her, but it was the person outside and the ever glow of the pink haze was what she was more interested with. She stepped forward into to the haze filled street, her worn and thin cardigan was seemingly enough to resist the sharp cold air, or maybe she didn’t even notice it.

Randall knew who it was even before he turned around, and now that he had, he braced himself. Oh what wonderful questions are you going to ask today He thought to himself as Mary Cuthert slithered within touching distance. Then she spoke.

“What waz that about? Is everything alright!?” She interrogated, rolling he eyes towards the doors to signal what she meant. Randall knew what she meant without any signalling, but it was just her way.

“Nothing.” he replied bluntly, another lie on his growing list. Even after he had planned to, and finally said it, he couldn’t decide if lying to Mary was a good idea or a bad one. For now he stuck with the assumption that the less she knew and the less he talked to her, the better. Escaping her watchful eye and draining attention was easier said than done though, a lot easier.

“Hope you are not lyin' to me are ya Randall?” she quizzed.

“No.”

“What was that about?” she repeated.

“Nothing Mary. Now if –

“I’ll find out soon enough Randall, you can’t hide thingz here.” She said enough as if it was spelt with a double F on the end, Randall and the others often wondered if her strange accent which they couldn’t lay a finger on was the culprit behind the way she spoke. They had asked her and of course she had ignored them, she said she had grown up in Kingsland. That was a lie. Randall believed it was just her way, Mary’s way. And as for the ‘You can’t hide things here’, they could, and Randall had, and he had succeeded. She knew what Randall wanted her to know ( which wasn’t much) , some things he even kept from the others, since the first day he had found things and asked questions about this place; and he had gone deep. Randall stuck to the plan which he had spontaneously crafted upon the first glimpse of her shadow in the doors; a trait which he was increasingly growing in.

“Then there wouldn’t be much point in me lying to you would there Mary, and I’m not.” Mary made a small sniffle of an utterance in response, to which Randall neither heard nor paid attention to.

“There was something I wanted to ask of you Mary…if you don’t mind, wouldn’t want to impose myself.” He said to her in a voice that skilfully hid all tone of sarcasm and enjoyment which he was revelling in his own head, small amusement; if only for a while.

“What is it?” Mary asked with real signs of genuine interest, she liked to be involved in things. This last idea had come to Randall barely seconds ago and he hoped the fish would bite the bait.

“Can you go to the pharmacy…the one near the school; the one across the block is all cleared out.” That was all true, but its purpose wasn’t for the welfare of the others, that was a mask behind a mask.

“That’s a long way, nearly a mile if I walk by myselff”

“We need medicine, pills, it’s all but gone.”

“Someone zick?” Now was the hard part but Randall was confident it would work, it had to because if it didn’t he would be in a spot of trouble.

“No, no one’s sick, well –

“Who’z sick Randall, it contagious!?”

“It’s…Lucy. And no it isn’t, just a migraine, she’s not been sleeping well.” It was closer enough to the truth but never quite the truth and when it came to its reliability it appeared to have fooled Mary.

“Lucy aye, so thatz what you were talkin’ bout, why did ya lie Randall?”

“She told me she didn’t want to worry anyone, the night before she came to me she said it was getting pretty serious and she was worried that’s all.” Now this was all a lie, but it was fitting the story like a piece to a puzzle and it was working which was the important thing. Mary was biting it.

“Shoudn’t of kept it to ya selves.” She said with an irritated and slightly sharp tongue. Randall could see the annoyance of being lied to in her eyes, and could feel the dissatisfaction glowing off of her.

“No I know, but will you go then, for Lucy?” Randall asked with that eerie calmness and softness that was so strange to him, he said it in such a way just to clinch the deal; in which Mary was the money tight customer and he was the lying seller.

“It’z that bad then?” Mary said, constantly pushing and pressing the deal.

“That bad.” Randall replied, eyes never breaking form Mary’s, willing her to accept his story and trot along with the task he had laid ahead.

“Ok.” Mary answered, the deal closed and she the customer had cracked.

“Ok you’ll go?” Randall checked, with a hint of dangerous excitement escaping in his voice.

“ I’ll go.”

“ Good I –

Mary wasn’t done just yet.

“I shoud go check on her.” She said with certainness about her voice, her tongue slithery like a snake.

“No she’s sleeping at the moment and would do no good in waking her, she needs rest. Besides it would be a nice surprise for her if she woke up to find nice little box to ease her pain by her side, wouldn’t it?” Randall pressed, desperate to see her on her way, so he could attend to what he had planned form the minute he woke up and his eyes were forced to look upon the pink glare once more. She had wavered to Randall’s persuasion slightly, which was encouraging, he was itching to leave.

“Hmm perhapz.” There was three second pause which felt like it would never end to Randall as he still constantly silently willed her to submit. “Give me minute, and then I be off.” She finally said, causing a brief wave of relief to flood over Randall which was shortly replaced by anxiety again.

“A minute for what?” Randall asked full of suspicion, which wasn’t shown in his voice.

“Not your buziness, I’ll said I go aint I?” Mary replied swiftly with that sharp dagger like tongue again, out to cut through anything Randall said. Randall had asked deliberately, he wanted to make sure everything went the way it had gone inside his own scheming head. He would stay until he saw the back of Mary walking away behind him and up the street which after a mile or so would lead to the school and then a short curved walked to the pharmacy.

“No I know it’s just…I was wondering if you were going to let anyone know where you were going. Best you keep it to yourself, don’t want the others worrying, you know how Ned is at the moment…” Randall explained. This part of the plan had only just materialised but he liked it, although he wasn’t concerned about the others, but if he could keep them unaware then all the better he thought.

“I need the loo Randall.” Mary said bluntly with a little crescent of smile creeping out, which was joined by Randall’s own little fit of gentle laughter, which to his surprise was the most truthfulness thing he’s done all morning.

“ Oh, oh right!” Randall said with a relief which he didn’t care to hide this time. There was no need he thought, as she believed he wanted her to be secretive which she of course jumped at; she enjoyed feeling important and with a degree of control and knowledge of things which others did not.

She passed him an awkward glance before she turned her back and headed for the lady’s room which was shrouded in shadows and pushed at the back of a narrow corridor on the second floor. The strangest thing perhaps, which had to be enormously off scale if you were making a comparison between weird and the pink haze which stank of a ‘we really shouldn’t be here’ smell; would be the fact that not one of them, not even Randall had explored the hall. None of them had ever been in the hall before yesterday, yet neither did any of them seek out its corners. They had just made a little home for themselves in the main section of the hall, which was only separated from the outside by small reception, and then a double door later, that pink haze would swarm you again.

Not even Randall, who had been caught up in his own plans and little secret missions, had thought to check the hall, which all in all was fairly huge. Gregory Polanski kept too much to himself and had drifted a fair distance from the others now in terms of group collectiveness. Ned wasn’t Ned anymore so he wouldn’t have looked around. Lucy was broken. That left Mary, who walked silently pass the others who still slept (Ned was nowhere to be seen) and crept up the staircase to the second floor.

Randall was pacing around on the edge of the steps of the hall, waiting. Ides, theories and plans running chaotically like sugar run children in his head. Surprised and foolishly fooled at the time, it now occurred to him that Mary could have simply been lying. Of course she was. Maybe she was just going to the ‘loo’ as she put it, or maybe she was doing something else entirely. There was no way to know, all he could do was wait and hope she was sitting on the toilet this very instance and about to be on her way back.

Mary reached the top of her stairs, slightly worn out, she was getting old and weary and staircases certainly didn’t do her any favours. With her flat heelless shoes placed squarely on the perfect brown carpet, she took a moment to catch her breath and in that moment she thought of a number of things.

The first thing was a sly thought of happiness circling around inside her twisted head; Randall had thought she had gone to the ‘loo’ which on memory caused her to snigger quietly. Indeed the toilets were on this very floor but she had no intention of using them, they would serve only as silent witness to her real reason for being here. Then she looked around carefully and thoughtfully, her head acting as watch tower trying to remember what she had seen.

The second floor wasn’t as big as the first, but it still provided a degree of trouble if you weren’t used to its layout. The stairs opened up to a room around half the size of the main hall, filled with rows of tables each holding deliberately placed cutlery, and surrounded by chairs accordingly. However strange it was, what Mary was seeing was most certainly a dining area, which was further strengthened by the fact that at the back of the room, to her left, was a small bar, which presumably led to the kitchen.

After a moment’s pause, and a small lapse of celebration, Mary left the top of the stairs and walked amongst the tables, letting her skeletal hands slide over the expensive looking white cloth covered oak tables, feeling them, sensing what they had seen and what they were hiding. She knew what she was looking for, it had come to her in the middle of the night, whilst she slept, not quite a dream… it was something else. She weaved her way to the graveyard like bar, treading silently and deliberately carefully.

Mary could feel eyes on her. There was no one here and she knew that, she was completely alone and she and the room mirrored a little dot in space, never before had she felt so isolated, and Mary had been to isolated places. Even for her this was unnerving, and little bugs crawling all over her skin were telling her to get out, to go as far away as she could. I hidden presence in the room, was calling out to her its whispers filling her head, with thoughts of horrible things, yet this things didn’t form any images she recognised, they were all faceless and lifeless but they stared at her, and they controlled her. Mary’s head was snapped sharply to her right, looking out of the window she saw a tree the colour of evil, sitting in an island of pink mist. Her eyes narrowed and widened at the same time, following the crooked branches to the left and then they popped. There was a man in a long white coat stained with blood, his neck bent on its side hanging from a frail rope which didn’t look like tearing. It looked like snapshot in time. Mary recognised the man, blast from a past is what they say don’t they, and she gazed with horror and odd curiosity at Doctor Teal hanging on the arm of a dead tree. Then his eyes beamed open and locked themselves onto Mary. There was blood drooling out of them and the sockets began to decay and then both eyeballs gradually slipped out and snapped off their optic nerves, leaving two wretched holes. Still he was cocking his head this way and that, still looking at her. Then a deep cackle of laughter erupted from his mouth which was sown up and strand by strand he snapped the threads free, revelling in the gush of blood swamping through his mouth and down his lungs.

Then as soon as the horror show had started, it ended, and Mary was no longer looking at that nice fellow Doctor Teal drowning in his own blood, she saw the pink haze and the pink haze only.

She reached the end of the tables and stood within touching distance of the bar, and then it came to her like a video reel dropping down from the ceiling and projecting its story all across the dark and glistening wooden boards of the bar.

She saw a faded and wobbly image in which she saw a very tall man walking through the tables and around the back of the very bar situated before her. She could see all but his face, as he strode around to the bartenders side wearing a long black outfit which she didn’t recognise, and the only thing she could think of relating it to was a suit. He wore a sharp rimmed top hat which looked cemented to his head as he looked around, and then he was looking directly at Marry, though the boards of the bar and the rolling film, and into her eyes. And then she became the man who wore a top hat.

“Shit” Randall mumbled to himself. She wasn’t coming back and he knew it. He stood at the bottom of the steps, letting all the possibilities of all sorts of webs Mary had been and was casting this very second, run riot in his mind. He made a small muffled sound of discomfort as wind caught a push from somewhere unknown, and cut into his jacket like shards.

He knew what Mary was like, and the dangers which could surface in her at any given time, yet he ha let his guard to down if only for a brief second. But a brief second is all it takes and he strongly suspected that this place was the very catalyst to bring what was buried inside Mary, to surface. He also now suspected that it had most definitely been successful in doing so. Which further brought to his attention that he didn’t have long left, he had no idea what Mary was doing, and standing her, alone and being shredded by a wind which had no right to be here, was wasting time.

He checked his watch, it read dead on 6.59 am.

Randall was shocked by the fact that it had been only not even twenty minutes ago, that he was standing at the top these steps, comforting Lucy. Time doesn’t work as it should here he thought to himself and then thought, that nothing is as it should be here, winter winds in summer burst onto his thoughts again.

Although certain Mary was conjuring something up, that golden conscience which he had tried to lock away, crept back, as it always did in the most inconvenient times when he was sure he didn’t need its caring approach. But it was here now, and he was helpless to do anything about it. He had to make sure he was right about Mary.

Randall put one foot on to the first step, intending to go and check up on Mary, but his free foot would never reach the next step, and what he saw in the corner of his eye then at precisely 7.00am, would change everything.

Mary was now looking through the eyes of the tall man. It was like looking through a video camera that was jittering all over the place. The camera dropped a good few feet and she guessed the man had bent down, and she could big hands in front of her feeling along the inner wooden panels of the bar. Then as his extraordinarily sized hands brushed over a panel that seemed somewhat different to the others, slightly protruding out, she saw herself push it forward. There was a loud click as it the panels was sucked inwards, and then it slid to the left revealing a small compartment. Reaching in, Mary latched her lanky fingers around a small brass key, and then after restoring the panel to how it was, she rose and then it was like she had been spat out, and she found herself staring blankly at the dining room side of the bar again.

Mary had no idea what had just happened, or if any of it had actually happened, it was some sort of outer body experience. But she had never been in control for any of it, it was if she had really been sucked in to someone else’s body, she had become that faceless man and he had shown her what she needed to see.

Mary had one little look around, to make sure that no one awaken and had drifted up here by mistake and most importantly she was making sure Randall hadn’t come to check on her. She had no idea how long she had been gone, or if any time ha passed at all in her time up here. It all felt like a dream.

After comfortably assuring herself that she was most certainly alone, she shifted around to the barman’s side. And bending down she moved her hands thoughtfully along the panels just as she had or the man had, done only moments ago. Perhaps if she hadn’t just been through it all, it would have taken her more time, but she quickly spotted the odd looking panel, the black duckling of the lot, and gently pressed on it. It gave way to the left with ease like cloth on smooth wood. And there it was a shining light in small rectangular black hole. Her eyes were drawn to the brass key.

Meanwhile…

Gregory awoke to find himself alone in the hall.

He had woken up earlier and although he pretended to be asleep, eyes shut he had sensed Randall and Mary conspiring (probably) outside. The door to the reception had been left wide open and invited the chilling weather to intrude the hall. He would have opened his eyes and got up slightly to have look, and had he done so he would have seen Mary a crying mess clinging to Randall through a gap in the double doors. But no, he didn’t move, he felt another presence stir within the room. He knew it was Mary by a little sniffle and murmur to herself as she got up and scurried to the door like a rat from the back of the hall. As her feet scuffed beside him and paying no attention, only fixed on the two outlines outside, she spoke something. She barely whispered it but Gregory had a keen sense of hearing, and most definitely heard her say “ Key! Randall mustn’t know. Whatz he doing out there. Cold!”

It made no sense to him then, and he ignored it and let the crazy old bat continue doing whatever it she was intent on doing. When he sure she was far enough ahead, he allowed his eyes to open a fraction, like two slits of light escaping in darkness. He saw she was a few meters away from the reception, and then she faded away as his eyes withdrew heavily and then nothing.

Gregory got up and instantly felt sick at the sight of pink drifting alongside the window to the left, on the exit to the reception side of the hall. He longed to see the rich blueness of the sea again, fall of secrets and wonders. Of course he could go and see it now if he wanted to, but here it was a stain upon the memory he had of the ocean.

He wondered where everyone was, everyone’s things were still scattered around the hall, blankets and food rubbish were in heaps of which he was sure Ned would attend to whenever he got back from wherever he was. No. Not everyone’s belongings were here, Lucy’s, it was all gone. Any sign that she had ever been among the group had vanished. His first instinct was to firstly find Randall and then tell him, and then he thought that maybe that was what they were talking about last night, that maybe they had both left.

Gregory hunted for Randall’s stuff like a hawk zoning in on its prey. He saw a shade of red peeping out from under Randall’s pillow, where he knew Randall kept a 9.mm Ruger. How he had ever came to be in possession of such a thing here, was an unnerving mystery to Gregory; who had many times come close to confronting Randall about, or even taking the gun himself, but neither idea had become a reality yet.

As long as that bag was there, there was no chance that Randall had left and also posed the thought that he had to be nearby. So with that thought in mind, and with half an eye teasing him to take the Ruger in Randall's little private red bag, he headed for the reception.

Then as was pulling the doors open, a piercing scream cracked his skull and he instinctively spun around like lightning, tensed up and prepared for anything.

Mary heard the scream, and the key dug itself deeper into her dead hands as she hurried along the corridor leaving the others and the dining room behind her.

She didn’t care for the scream, she cared only for door, the door which she knew was locked yet did not know why and the door which the key sinking deep into her hands would open. She sighed as she looked up and down the corridor, roughly two meters wide and it was filled to the brim with doors on either side. Although she did spare an amusing thought as she rounded a corner and passed the ladies toilets, and then she was focused again, more focused than she had ever been. A determined woman, she wasn’t to be stopped.

Her eyes not through her own will, latched onto a painting on the right-hand wall (of which was a dark red colour throughout the hall), it pictured nothing, it was just an image of dark swirls, and blot of pink in the middle which looked like a mistake more than it did a deliberate brush from the artist. There were a dozen paintings hung up all along the this corridor and even more in the one she had just passed, so her stomach dropped a little when she felt herself being drawn to one in particular. Had she been a different state of mind, or had it been one of the others to see this painting, they would have realised its peculiarity and they would have feared it.

She turned right again, and then she saw it. It looked like one of many many doors she had just passed; they were all the same, plain light brown, with a gleaming golden handle. A rush of pure excitement ran its sparkling fingers all over her, sending a chill snaking down her spine. She was stood in front of the door, and she could feel it, it was alive, there was something behind the door and it wanted her to come in.

She raised the key up like a bronze trophy, looking at it with glory glistening in her pupils. Slowly and enjoying every second of it, she lowered it to the key hole, which was inviting her, begging her to come in. She slotted it in and it gobbled the key up, and then she turned the key as if to lock the door, nothing. She turned it again the same way, click. Mary pulled the key out, tensing up, nerves and adrenaline coursing through her body, slipped it into her cardigan pocket, brought the handle down, and went in.

It was at this point that Randall really thought it was just all one big cruel dream. He was frozen to the spot, a helpless statue as he watched the shimmering red figure move closer. He forced his head to turn and face the person coming towards him, from the left of the steps coming from the road which snaked off from around the back of the hall. It was a women and he unmistakably knew who it was. With that scarlet dress which she had so commonly been associated with and those dagger like heels clocking on the concrete. The wind blowing away her long hazel her, and when he never thought he would again, Randall saw those judgmental eyes once more.

She had come within a few metres of him now, he had been too stunned to say anything before hand, and even now it was struggle to form his words which came out as stuttering nonsense every time he tried.

“R. Ros… Rosie!?” That was all he could manage, his tongue had wrapped itself and wouldn’t untangle.

“No. Randall baby, it’s me. Who’s Rosie!?” She answered. And then a bomb went off.