A short story by Lakiesha E.

I was awakened by what sounded like squeaky wheels going on a cart going down the hallway. I was tired from the trip here, so I paid it no mind and closed my eyes.

The next day I came out of my room to get a feel of the place. I saw a staff member walking by, and I smiled at her. She smiled as she continued on her way, and I continued mine. I saw other staff, but they were all busy doing other things. I was a bit concerned about the strange way the ones that did look at me were looking at me and whispering to each other, but I figured they’d worked here too long.

I walked into a huge, dark, musty room full of books. I got excited, seeing I can go a million places right from this room. I was happy to see the books, thinking that seemed to be the most entertaining here. There was one man sitting in there, but he seemed to be focused on writing. I figured I’ll go over to introduce myself and see if he was a regular here and I’d let him know he’ll be having company.

I tried calling out to him quietly with my response, so I went a little closer. I began hearing what sounded like whispers. I finally made it up to him, trying not to startle him. I called out again to him, but this time the whispers stopped. I started to get a bit spooked because it was sort of dark and the room seemed a bit spooky, almost out of place.

I reached out my hand to touch his shoulder to get his attention since he wouldn’t look up. When I was able to get a real look at him, my heart sank, and I began backing away slowly. The man turned around and looked up at me, and for some reason, I was frozen where I stood. He was carving his body with his own hands, and his fingers were all made of pencils and ink pens. When he raised his arms, they were off the spines of a book! He stood up, and it was as if he was almost about to stand eight or nine feet tall. Finally, he began to open his mouth, and bloody pages began falling out of his mouth.

When I did finally find a sense of movement, only my arms could move. My feet felt as if I was wading in the water. When I looked, I was submerged in blood filling the room all around me. The more he opened his mouth, the louder the whispers in the room got, as if someone were reading a million books at once. Before long, the room was full of blood, dead bodies, and bloody pages.

I felt myself losing my balance, and before long, I was way submerged in blood and floating pages and bodies surrounded me. I tried to stay focused on swimming, trying to find the door, but I hadn’t any luck. So, I just kept trying to make it to the top to get air, but the further up I swam, the higher the blood raised.

I made it to the top of the blood where I finally saw the man, and the sound was more intense. He opened his mouth and leaned his head back, and all the blood, bodies, and pages began going into his mouth. I hurriedly started pedaling the other direction frantically! The more I pedaled, I looked back realizing it was of no use. I continued towards his mouth’s direction. I blacked out knowing this was the end for me. All I kept thinking was, “THIS CAN’T BE REAL.” Everything went dark!

I heard a beeping sound in the distance. I felt my eyes fluttering, trying to open. From a blurred vision, I saw what seemed to be a hospital. It smelled of a hospital. I frantically tried moving, but I was strapped to the bed. I popped my eyes fearfully and heard what I’d guess to be a nurse’s voice.

“No, no, be still, Ms. Williams, calm down! You’re ok, you’re at Monterey Hospital, you had an accident.”

I was frantic, and I wanted out! “Why am I strapped down? Can you come take this off of me please?”

“I’m sorry Ms. Williams, that’s not my call, I was told to sit here and watch you and make sure you’re ok.”

“Yes! I’m ok, now get this off of me! How am I strapped down like this? Who gave you the consent to strap me down like this?”

I heard a door open and heels beating the floor approaching. I turned around to see a tall brunette standing at about six feet standing beside my bed with a thick folder. Her face was narrow, and fingers were long. When she began to speak her voice was stern, and she spoke with assurance.

“Hello Ms. Williams, Now that you’re awake we can talk. Sensible this time I hope?” She looked at me as if she was expecting an answer from me.

“Where am I and what am I doing here?” She looked back at me as if I should know. Tears began to form in the webs of my eyes because this was all so confusing. “Can you please tell me what’s going on?” The lady seemed to be a bit irritable with me, so she slammed the folder to the bedside table and pulled a chair over to my bed. She sat in the chair with her legs spread and put both arms to her knees and looked at me.

“When you’re ready to talk you let me know, I have all day and I plan to put you under the prison for what you’ve done. Do you understand me?”

I started palpitating, and my machines began to go crazy. Nurses came in, and I began to scream. “No, please someone tell me what’s going on? No don’t do that please, ok, I will tell you what you want but please don’t stick me with that!” I looked over desperately at the nurse that sat in the room with me, and she seemed to shamefully put her head down and walked out of the room. When I looked at the head lady that came in angry with me, she had this evil grin on her face as if I was already guilty without a trial.

I woke up and sat up in bed, realizing I mustn’t have been dreaming about the incident that had taken place. I had no idea what was going on. All I knew was I kept waking up in this place and have no idea why? Nobody will tell me anything.

“Oh, you’re awake!” I looked up at the door and saw the girl from before. “Miss Williams, you really are sticking to your story, you must really can’t remember what happened?”

“No, please tell me what’s going on.”

“What do you remember?”

“Waking up here.” The girl opened the door where I was and came inside. She grabbed the chair that sat in the corner and pulled it beside my bed. “You have to remember something! Flashes of moments? Don’t you even know who you are?” She looked at me with suspicion. I just shook my head saying no.

“No I don’t know anything I keep telling you, tell me something!” I yelled at her.

“Ms. Williams, calm down before they come and put you back down! Which is how you’ve spent half of your time here.” She whispered to me.

“I will tell you about the charges you came in on two months ago.”

“Ma’am, your name

is Destinee Williams, one of New York’s best-selling authors. You were at a retreat in Atlanta, and…” She paused as if she didn’t want to say it. “What? Tell me! What happened?”

“It was said that you killed all twenty-six people that were there at the retreat with you. They said when they found you, you were sprawled out on the floor full of blood with a butcher knife. They said they found notes as if you were writing a book describing all you did to each person. They noted here that you had drugged everyone with a paralyzer drug you put in the pot of food you all ate and even in the wines. Then after dinner, you dragged each person into the library area and stuffed book pages down everyone’s throats! You don’t recall any of this?”

I stood up holding both hands on my head shaking my head no. “That is not true! What’s wrong with you? You get up and get out of here right now!”

“It was said you went into a psychotic state after having a nervous breakdown because of not selling a good book for three years. They said that’s why you were at the retreat in the first place. To try and get your writing edge back.” I angrily started towards the girl.

“Ms. Williams, you don’t want to do that.” I was furious; there was no way I was about to listen to these lies. I charged at her, but before I knew it, nurses were all over me, and everything went black!

About the Author

I’m an Author/Poet/Screenwriter. I moved to Las Vegas Nevada at the age of eight. I’m a lover of words whether it be writing them or reading them, I love creating people, and worlds. I’ve written six books that have been published. I have a very huge imagination that leads my mind to various places. I started out writing poetry, sent my poems to Eber & Wein, and continued, in 2019 I was named as one of their best poets. I now have poems published inside of Eber and Wein’s poetry Anthologies. I’m also a lover of music which I also write. I have two of my paintings displayed in the online Magazine called Thimble Literary Magazine.