Young Writers Society

I know that I've taken forever to post this, and I have my reasons. I was too lazy (and my spacebar was broken for a while). I changed the main character's name to Alice rather than Vicky, and I slightly updated the other chapters, but nothing significant enough to repost them. Hope you enjoy! Also, please critique me! This chapter needs some help.

Chapter 3

A Nightmare Come True

Has something ever happened to you that seemed like a dream? The word used to describe the feeling is surreal. Now, for something to feel surreal it doesn’t have to be like a dream, it can be a nightmare too. Imagine that you had won the lottery, and were able to buy anything you had ever wanted. Wouldn’t it be crazy, unbelievable; surreal? Now envision this: the week after you had won the Mega Millions lottery, you learned that your siblings and parents died. That would feel surreal too.

As Alice’s eyes slowly fluttered open, everything felt surreal. For a moment, one lovely moment, she had forgotten where she was. For that wonderful split second, she thought she was in her bed, and had just woken up from a peaceful sleep. But then, like a ton of stones, reality came crashing down. Her head was pounding from not only being hit on the head with a gun, but also from her limp body being thrown around like a doll. Her back was aching from hours of sleeping in the back a large moving van, and on the stiff, icy, concrete floor she now found herself laying on. Her lips were as dry as sandpaper, and her throat longed for water. Her stomach grumbled loudly, reminding her of the booming music at the party, where all of this had begun.

She sluggishly sat up. Her head was spinning, and her body was weak. Alice looked around- there were a lot of girls, a lot of beautiful girls. She counted about 30, and recognized some from her own class. One of the girl’s names was Emma. She had been the most popular girl at Hoffman Prep. There were more girls, though from other schools. About 5 girls she saw were wearing the same uniform, OLG was stitched into their sweaters. She assumed that was what their school was called.

Aside from the vast number of girls, she noticed her other surroundings. It seemed to be a sort of storage facility. It had rusted pipes visible, and wooden walls that clearly were in disrepair. The only light in the huge room was what was squeezing in between the boards covering the windows. The room itself was very cold. It was not insulated, or heated, which allowed the chilly autumn air to roam freely throughout the area. Alice looked down at her grey t-shirt, and sighed.

“Why didn’t I wear a long sleeve shirt? Oh well, at least I wore pants.”

She was about to stick her hand through a rip in her jeans, when she realized she could not move them. In fact, she couldn’t move her feet either, they were both tied with rope. The rope was uncomfortable to say the least. She could feel the plastic threads digging into her skin. This remined her of something else.

When she was younger, her and her sister used to play this game. It was were one sibling had to try to tie up the other using items around the house, and whoever had the better ‘trap’ won. It was decided based on which took longer to escape from.

Her little sister, Emelia, once tied up Alice so well, with a jump rope, that even Emelia couldn’t undo the knot. Emelia had begun crying because she was frustrated, and Alice had started to panic as well. “What if I’m stuck forever?” Her dad had heard them both, and saved Alice. After that traumatic experience, her father had told them both something. Alice hadn’t thought of it until now.

“Don’t ever panic,” he said, “it will get you nowhere. Instead, take a deep breath an assess the situation. Then-”

“Daddy, what does assess mean?” Emelia had asked.

Alice ended her flashback at the thought of never seeing her dear sister, mother, or father again. She closed her eyes trying to create of picture of her family. She thought of her mother’s short straight blonde hair, and loving reddish brown eyes. She remembered her father’s curly chestnut hair, and blue eyes. Lastly, she recalled her sister’s long curled dirty blonde hair and, as Alice used to tease her sister, ‘poop’ colored eyes. Alice missed them, she missed them so much. She wanted to cry, but, as her father had told her, she instead took a deep breath.

“Assess the situation,” she repeated in her mind, “Let’s see. I’m trapped in an unknown location. I need to figure out where I am, or call- my phone!”

She wiggled her bottom to feel if her phone was still in the back pocket. Her face fell, when she couldn’t feel it.

“Okay. That won’t work. Now what do I do?”

All of a sudden, she heard a voice whisper her name.

“Alice, is that you?”

It was Emma. Her eyes, though hard to see, were red and puffy and her cheeks were stained with tears. Her long, strait, platinum blonde hair was tangled, and her royal blue eyes; sad. Her mascara had been ruined from crying so much, and her strawberry pink lipstick was smudged. Alice had never known Emma very well, the main reason being Emma was popular, and Alice wasn’t. Emma always had a group of friends around her, so Alice never got to know her.

“Emma?”

“It is you! Sorry, I just needed to see a familiar face,” she took a breath, clearly fighting tears, “D-do you know what they’re going to do to us? I don’t want to die.”

“I doubt they’re going to kill us, if they were, they probably would have already done it.”

“Okay...”

She was clearly still unsure.

“Why us?” Emma asked.

Alice paused. She had wondered that question too in the brief time she had been awake. Why me? What did I do to deserve this?

Things will happen to you that you dislike. That you wished never to happen. These things, however, shape you into who you are. They can help you to become a great person, with courage, strength, and self-fulfillment, but they can also tear you down. Only you can decide whether you’ll let them tear you down or build you up.