I woke up with a gasp and the sudden flood of air into my lungs awoke all of my senses. The first thing that registered was the chill of the weather around me. It froze my joints and my first instinct was to curl myself into a ball to stay warm. However, that simple move to warm myself awoke another sense; I was wrapped in chains and the cold metal links were drawn tightly around my arms and chest and prevented me from moving nothing more than my head and my legs.
In an instant, panic set in and I sat up to make sure I wasn't simply dreaming. To my horror, I wasn't dreaming. The chains were really there, constricting me until I could barely breathe and even then when I called out for help of any kind and looked out towards the circus, the only response I received was the sparrows and robins that chirped and tweeted in celebration at the circus' vanishing. The vast empty lot sat there before me like a nightmare and the only remnants that proved a circus once stood there were the few vendor tents that had been left behind and the pleasant carousel that now stood like a haunting childhood memory.
No, this can't be happening! I thought and in an instant, I was doing what I could to either escape my confinement or call for help through my hellish hallucination. This had to be a hallucination!
I wailed and cried and thrashed around my cage, hoping for anyone to come to save me. I prayed anyone could hear me. I pleaded for a saviour, I didn't care who; anyone who could save me from this nightmare that I was abruptly trapped in.
When no one came, I only screamed louder and longer. I screamed until my throat had burst and my lungs collapsed but when they healed, I only continued to scream. I threw myself against the bars of my cage and rocked it back and forth hoping to topple it over, but it remained rooted into the dirt. My desperation never ceased until I finally collapsed from exhaustion; it was well into the night and I'm sure only the wolves and the owls could hear me but I tried nonetheless. Still, I remained trapped...
I remained... alone.
A month later
I've managed to slip out of the chains. It took close to an hour or maybe even longer but I still did it and now I feel a little more free knowing I can move my arms. It still doesn't change the situation I'm still in though... I was hoping maybe Ivan would return for me. Surely if he loved me enough, he would come back for me. It's been a month, I think... Was it all a lie?
Why did they all leave?
Two months later
Please come back! I'm sorry I messed up! I promise I'll do better just please... get me out of here.
A year later
How much time has passed? I counted four season changes but I'm not sure of myself anymore. It could have only been two and the snow was simply a long hallucination. Maybe everything is a hallucination. I was barely awake during those periods of heavy snowfall; it felt as if I were barely conscious with only short periods in between each blackout to experience the bitter cold that froze my joints and layered my body with ice.
I was grateful when it began to grow warm and the butterflies returned. Or at least, I think it grew warm and the butterflies returned... Maybe the winter was a nightmare I couldn't fight. Maybe I'm still dreaming.
Five years later 1904
I counted twenty more seasons. My long period of sleep to bypass the harshness of winter is how I'm able to remember how many season cycles go by with nothing and no one to save me. At one point, I strongly believed that I saw Ivan running up the dirt path with a smile on his face and I grew so excited... but he disappeared. He vanished before my eyes. That was a hallucination; how dare my brain torture me so.
Still, I pray every night that someone from that circus will return to me. I have hope despite how much time has passed... I have hope...
Five years later 1909
I imagined Ivan was sitting outside my cage again and we talked like we always did. We joked and laughed and I held his hand. It all seemed so real, but when I asked him when he would let me out, that's when his face became distorted and disappeared completely. His hand was no longer holding mine and, in a surreal moment, I felt as if I had been staring at nothing for hours. All I heard was the forest with its whispering leaves in the breeze and the birds calling from the branches high above.
I cried.
Five years later 1914
Finally! After all these years! I saw someone walking up the path!
At first, I thought it was yet another hallucination and I struggled to fight against believing it was true; however, it wouldn't go away, so I gave in and stared the crippled man down until he disappeared from my vision. He wouldn't go away; he continued to hobble up the overgrown path slowly but surely with the help of a tree branch.
He was missing his left leg below the knee and he carried his coat over his head like an old beggar would during hot weather. Who was this man? Was he here to free me? I thought hopefully and drew myself closer to the bars to see this man better. He hobbled closer still, swaying back and forth like a drunkard with his head lolling around on his shoulders as if it were completely disconnected.
Finally, he paused for a moment to focus on me and, in that instant, I felt my mind utterly cease to function.
TomCat...? I thought in disbelief. All those days and nights pleading and praying and whatever God was listening sends me TomCat!? What cruel joke is the Devil playing on me!?
He collapsed to the ground with a pained grunt and clawed at the dirt in an effort to crawl to me. I could only stare, unmoving. I had no clue what to think of this man, crawling to me, dressed in torn dirtied rags with a missing limb and with all his leftover energy being used to fuel a determination to get to me. It was unreal and if it were a hallucination; this was the coldest prank my mind has ever played on me.
Tom dragged himself through the dirt and struggled to pull himself back onto his knees using the bars of my cage for support. He never once broke eye contact with me and the years that had beaten him around, bloodied him, and left him for dead was evident. I thought I looked terrible and I hadn't seen a mirror in nearly twenty years, but it was clear TomCat had seen Hell and back. He looked fifty-five, but I'm almost positive he was barely forty.
The man was covered in blood and dirt. I could only assume he had befallen some terrible fortune on his way here. What did he come here for? A thought clicked suddenly in my head and, almost without thinking, I dove my hand into the first pocket I found and searched desperately for a key. If he had come here on some desperate whim to free me and set things right, he must've brought a key with him. It was obvious he was never going to leave these grounds alive in the state he was in; so if he didn't carry the strength to free me, I would do it myself and take matters into my own hands.
Tom gazed at me wordlessly with exhaustion and death lingering on his eyelids and draining his strength. I searched faster, but with every pocket that brought up nothing, my hopes began to fail and I began to feel the pain in my chest from the heartbreak. Tears bordered my eyelids and when they began to fall, I couldn't stop them; I wanted to shake Tom angrily and scream at him but what good would that do if it didn't fix anything?
I cried more as Tom took my hands in his and stared longingly at me. I was too distraught about his lack of a key to focus on his words. He apologised but it meant nothing to me. How could he come all this way with nothing at all, only to say sorry!? How could he leave me here like this!? My cries grew more intent with rage and confusion and I held back no longer with the hurtful words and curses that I had pent up within myself. Still, even then, no voice of mine came. Only squeaks and gargled whines escaped my lips. I hated everything and everyone and my hands yearned to finish what I had started so many years ago. I could see the scar on his throat. I could do that again.
Tom pulled his hands out of the gloves which I gripped so tightly in my own. Death was beginning to claim him and I could see that in the glassiness of his brown eyes and the coldness of his fingertips on my cheek. I watched with hate in my heart and soul as he gurgled and choked on blood and air until the life completely left his eyes. I savoured the moment as much as I wished it hadn't come so soon. I enjoyed watching him die, it brought me peace. But that was the only thing he brought me and I curse him and damn him to Hell for not bringing me freedom like he should've.
The moment his body fell to the ground and released a heavy sigh of relief from Life's torment, I felt an enraged scream building deep in my gut. HOW DARE YOU FEEL THE COMFORT OF DEATH WHEN I CANNOT!! HOW DARE YOU FIND PEACE!! I screamed at his corpse and wailed my fury until my body burned from the anger within me. No amount of measurement could compare to the hatred I felt for the man who now lay dead outside my cage. Free from society, free from pain, free from life. When will I finally have something he doesn't? When will I be free!?
A month later
He taunts me with his odour but I've grown accustomed to it. He brings in the scavengers for me to feed on and I can't complain about that. His gloves keep me warm now and they smell good, so when the smell of him gets too unbearable, I cup my hands over my nose and mouth and take in the smell of worn leather.
A year later 1915
I can't move, I no longer make noise. I simply sit and stare, hoping that if I sit and wait, Death will come for me. But it never has... and it never will.
Ten years later 1925
The plants are taking over my cage and taking me with them. It's an uncomfortable feeling, but the leaves and vines give me the illusion that I'm being held by someone who cares... so I welcome nature.
I just wish I could be eaten by the animals but they've stopped coming around for food.
Twenty years later 1945
I
Wish
For
Blood...
Thirty years later 1975
I saw a human.
The human saw me.
He ran screaming to his other friends.
I never saw the human again.
Thirty-three years later 2003
"There she is! Aggy! You were right!" a voice in the trees alerted me in my trance-like state and I looked in my peripherals to see who the source was. I saw nothing but darkness, but I could hear hurried footsteps making their way closer and closer to me from the trees. For once, I felt my heart in my chest leap in fear as I listened. What was happening? How did someone know I was here?
Before I could prepare myself, the mysterious strangers were upon my cage and circling it like it was prey. I held my breath and waited for what was to come next; perhaps they came to finally kill me. Maybe they were answering my prayers to end my life.
The sound of the gate was loud and unwelcome in the empty silence of the abandoned circus grounds; However, it was music to my ears, which haven't heard anything new in forever. I wished I could move my head to see who had entered the cage but I was still frozen in time and covered by layers of plant life that had grown inside my cage and decorated every corner and edge.
The footsteps came closer and suddenly, I was greeted by a sight that I had long since forgotten. It was a small girl wearing a tattered lace dress with her brown ringlets done up by rose-pink ribbons. Her stormy marble eyes glowed faintly and swirled slowly like clouds. Her small lips, decorated by a black heart of lipstick parted in a small smile.
"Hello, Tae," she greeted in a soft voice but I only stared back, still unable to move or register the power that I felt radiating off of her.
"I should've come sooner, I know, but that story is too long for me to tell you here and I'm sure you're eager to leave," she continued softly and motioned someone outside to come in. A red-headed girl in a wide-brimmed black hat joined her side and smiled at me kindly. I watched as she brought out a small vial of powder from a bag around her waist and poured its contents in her palm. The particles sparkled in the starlight that illuminated the world around me and I was awed by the relaxing shimmer. To my bewilderment, the mysterious woman blew the odd powder in my direction and I was bombarded by my burning, watering eyes and tickling in my nose. A mere sneeze seemingly knocked all of my long-forgotten, unused joints and muscles into gear and I jumped in surprise when the sneeze escaped.
The redhead chuckled as she pocketed her empty vial and I watched in utter bewilderment and surprise as the vines that had entrapped me began to recede and curl into different directions. The girl must be magic! I thought in surprise as I stared at her blue eyes in awe. She only smiled at me kindly and somehow, I felt protected under her gaze.
The marionette girl put her hands on my cheeks and forced me to stare at her, "I'm so sorry I left you here so long ago... I wasn't sure of myself and cowardly... but... I'm making it up to you now and Rayne and I are here to turn you into the woman you should've been," she said calmly and sweetly and as she spoke, I felt a familiar buzzing reverberate from her hands and throughout my body. My weak limbs twitched as they regained some semblance of strength and, for the first time in a very long time, I closed my eyes and smiled as I cherished the being's empowering touch.
The redhead named Rayne came closer and ran a hand over my tangled, filthy mess of hair and she gave me a motherly smile that made my heart flutter. She gently took my hands in hers and carefully sawed away at the rusted clasps with a small file that she had in her bag. The doll girl worked on the clasp around my neck and the moment I felt the weight of the metal fall from my frail, beaten body, I couldn't contain the tears of absolute joy. I hugged the doll girl around her neck and the feeling of another being in my arms was a welcome memory. She was smaller than I was, but she was warm and the hug she returned made me feel at once indebted to these mysterious girls who had come to save me.
The girl, Rayne held my cheek in her hand and, with a voice as smooth as honey and as warm as a mother's, she said, "Come, you're one of us now, Tae,"
It was a decision I never once regretted making.