2. Mia
TWO
MIA
I struggled to breathe with the weight crushing my chest. Sinking my fingers into the thick pelt, I tried shoving the monster off, but it wouldn’t budge. Blood dripped onto my cheek, tickling on its way down my neck. I wriggled, trying to wrestle my arm free to dash the liquid away, but couldn’t get loose. My heartbeat drummed in my ears, frantic and panicked. If I continued flailing under the beast like this, I’d run out of energy and end up a corpse via suffocation.
I stopped trying to escape. Closing my eyes, I took a few deep breaths to get myself under control. The large chest shuddered and a rumble, different from his earlier aggression, shook its chest. The sound reached out and gripped my throat. Such pain in it . . .
Now that I’d stopped thrashing, the weight wasn’t as unbearable, at least not suffocating. Straightening my leg as much as it could go, I inched it over until I freed it. It let out another whimper and with the vibration, the beast shifted over, loosening the weight on my arm. With the same little movement and a wiggle to the side, I managed to get my other arm out from between its chest and mine. Fur rubbed against my exposed arms. Another move of my hips and I was free. Rolling to my side, I got to my knees as I scrambled away from the monster. It continued to breathe with loud rumbling huffs. As if it took great effort.
My thigh burned and I pressed my palm against the wounds, hissing from the sting. I turned my back to the monster and pushed my bloody palm into the wooden leg of my counter, using it to quickly push myself to my feet.
Another low, guttural sound of pain rumbled in its large chest, the sound resonating until I could feel it to my bones. The hair on my arms lifted and I whipped around, expecting it to be coming for me again, but it remained lying there, trembling.
As scared as I was, it seemed so pitiful and broken, splayed on the cold ground. Poor thing looked like it’d been sliced and roughly sewn back together.
Blood continued leaking into the ripped, jagged edges of my pants. I needed new clothes and a plan. Sitting here feeling sorry for something that had just tried to kill me would get me nowhere.
With nausea twisting my stomach, I ran from my shack. Descending the stairs hurt more than I expected, but I didn’t slow in my dash through the woods. My leg wound stung with every step, and since the shack was a distance away from the house, it took me a while of trekking through the woods. I broke free of the forest, and the towering house was still quite a distance away. Red had spread into my jeans, soaking the material down to my knee.
Eventually, the creature would muster the strength to get up, despite the severity of its injuries. And from there it would come for me . . . for us.
I’d heard stories of what monsters were capable of and how their cruelty knew no bounds. Maybe I could bargain with it?
Help it as long as it left Jason and Pam alone. They’d done so much for me by taking me in after they found me alone in the middle of the woods. I was too young to remember how or why, or maybe trauma blocked the memory from me, but either way, they were all I knew. I knew Jason and Pam would not leave their home no matter how much I begged, even if I said it was only for a little while. They were prideful people.
If I brought it food to fill its belly, maybe the wolf-like monster would not eat us?
The leaves and foliage I stepped over became dirt with patches of grass sprouting from the ground. I followed the winding path up to the front wrap around porch. Pam told me it was a colonial style home, which meant absolutely nothing to me. It had something to do with how it was built and the specific structure from decades ago, before the Rift. Or something like that. Honestly, I wasn’t too sure. I wouldn’t know more than what she told me since this world full of monsters was all I knew.
Each step of the stairs leading up to the door tugged at the injury on my wounded leg. I sank my teeth into my lip to hold back a whimper. I reached the landing and kicked off my tall boots to slide my feet into my indoor slippers. The metal screen door creaked, making me wince. Pam and Jason’s bedroom was on the first floor, just past the kitchen, but hopefully they were deep enough asleep that they didn’t hear it. Tiptoeing over the gray carpet, I crossed the thin hallway leading into the living room where the stairs went up to my room on the second floor.
I hurried past the unused bedrooms until I reached mine across the wall adorned with fruit paintings, shutting the door as quietly as possible. Once inside, I grabbed my first aid kit from under my bathroom sink and quickly discarded my jeans. I perched on the edge of my mattress only in my underwear. The gashes were still fresh, raw and bloody, but the blood that stained my skin had dried and begun to flake. Grabbing the disinfectant spray, I spritzed it over the wound. It immediately began to bubble. I hissed a breath out between my teeth, fanning my hand over it to send waves of relief over the raw, stinging flesh.
I worked on dabbing the crusted blood away and cleaned it so I could wrap it. I rolled the bandage around my thigh, tightening it until the edges snuggly hugged my leg. Once done, the white roll of cotton protected and covered the entire wound.
Wood creaked outside my room. It was that third step climbing up. I made sure not to set my weight on it if I wanted to keep quiet.
Quickly closing up my kit, I shoved it under the bed and climbed under my sheets. If Jason or Pam saw me, the questions they’d hit me with would out me. I couldn’t lie even a little. I clenched the cotton of my blanket and peeked out from under my eyelashes.
The door slowly creaked open. I could hear my heartbeat pick up pace, but I worked to make my breathing normal, like I was sleeping.
Jason’s wide shoulders were outlined in the entry. He stood there and I kept as still as possible. He was checking in on me.
After a few beats, he backed out and shut the door, leaving me in a room only lit by the moon. I waited for the creak of the third step and climbed out of bed, walking directly to my closet.
Wearing leggings wouldn’t be comfortable with my leg torn up like this, so I grabbed a white, knee length dress. Shucking off my shirt, I slipped it on.
I’d collect food and some things to clean up its wounds before sneaking out again.
The creature was hurt, and even though it almost ate me, I had to try to save all of us.