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Betrayal
I shifted uncomfortably in my bed, the sunlight shining through my windows was beginning to get bright enough to the point that I couldn’t ignore it. Stretching my limbs, I slowly climbed out of bed and pulled my curtain closed. As much as I wanted to sleep more, I knew it was probably getting late, and if I didn’t get up now father might be angry.
It might have seemed like a normal day to anyone else, but not for my father and I. One year ago, on this day, my mother had drowned herself. It had been very sudden, and while my father had been sad, it hit me harder than anything. My mother had been young when I was born, so we were also more like sisters than a mother and a daughter. I might’ve even gone as far as to say she was my best friend.
I dragged myself down the hall solemnly, feeling unusually drained. I was surprised to see that my father was already in the kitchen. He used to be up and active like this every day, but for the past year, I usually wouldn’t see him right away. I was even more surprised to see him wearing a nice, buttoned down shirt and unwrinkled pants. Again, a normal thing to see until a year ago.
My father’s hair was pristinely brushed, and the bags under his eyes are almost nonexistent.
“Oh, Good Morning Mira! I was just about to wake you. How did you sleep?” The sleepy voice the man usually carried is completely non-existent.
“Good Morning, Novak. I slept well, thank you.” I mumbled. Though he was my father, he’d always asked that I address him using his real name, saying it was friendlier.
I glanced warily at my dad as I nabbed a peach from the fruit basket. He quietly hummed to himself, seemingly unaware of everything going on around him. I sat down at the table,
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feeling happy that I might actually get to share a meal with my father for the first time in what seems like an eternity.
Unfortunately, instead of sitting down with me, Novak walked across the room and picked up a large bundle of something, but I couldn’t tell what.
“Sorry Sunshine, but I have to go take care of some things today, try not to stay inside all day.” He planted a quick kiss on my forehead, before walking out the door, leaving me sitting at the table, slightly confused.
I quickly finished my peach, and stumbled back to my room to get dressed. Like my dad said, I needed to do something productive today. After pulling on an oversized t-shirt and some cutoff jean shorts, I caught sight of a picture frame sitting on my dresser.
It was sitting forgotten in a shadowy corner, but I picked it up, smudging the dust off of it. I smiled slightly, feeling tears prick my eyes. It was a picture taken a year and a half ago, my mother smiling at the camera. I was sitting next to her, an identical smile on my own face. The endless ocean stretched out behind us, the sun beating down. She seemed so light and happy, so alive.
A small droplet of salty water fell onto the glass of the frame, and it took me a second to realize I was crying. Wiping my tears, I placed the picture back on the dresser and left the room.
Five minutes later, I found myself walking towards the beach. After my mother’s death, I hadn’t come back here a single time, but now, It felt strangely important to visit the place.
As I approached the beach, I started to feel slightly queasy, but shook it off and kept walking. It was just the same as I remembered, pristine, white sands, and soft rolling waves. I
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always used to come to this part of the beach with my mother, as we both liked that the water was calmer and there were hardly ever any other people here.
As usual, the beach was empty. Not many people came to this side of the island, so not many knew of this beach.
I slowly walked towards the salty water, but an uneasy feeling started to wash over me. I tried to keep walking, but the feeling got worse as I got closer to the water. My stomach felt like it was turning inside out and my head was starting to feel fuzzy. As I stumbled across the beach, my vision turned blank around the edges.
A faint buzzing had made its way into my ears, and my hands found their way to the sides of my head, as if I could block out the noise. I couldn’t though, the noise was coming from inside me, my own brain was what was producing the vile buzzing that made me think I was insane.
My vision was fading more. Getting darker and darker.
I woke up in an exceptionally bright place, my head had stopped ringing and everything was peaceful. All my pain was gone, which made me wonder if I was dead.
But no, I couldn’t be.
Still, the world around me looked too perfect to be real. A second glance around me let me know I was underwater. Not like any ocean I’d ever seen before though, this water was completely free of blemishes.
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The currents that swirled around me were perfectly crystal clear, like untouched glass. Little fish swam around me in rainbows of color. I knew these fish couldn’t possibly be real, they were too graceful, their colors too magical.
I started to swim in the direction the fish were going, but something stopped me. A velvety voice swam through the ocean, somehow finding its way to my ears. I tried to cry, but no tears came out. All I could do was listen to the voice that helped me through my entire life. The voice I heard first thing in the morning, and last thing in the night.
My Mother.
I swam towards the sound, but it stayed the same distance away, no matter how fast I went. I couldn’t even hear what she was saying, only her voice. It laced its way through one ear, and out the other.
Finally, I couldn’t swim anymore. I gave up and just let myself float in place. The one imperfect thing in this perfect world. Closing my eyes, I strained to listen to my mother’s words.
“Get away from here. Leave this place, and please, never come back.” Her previous voice of sugar was now made of salt, choked with the tears she wished she could cry. Her voice was cracked and broken beyond repair.
“Leave, leave, leave. Please.” Her sobs would get louder, then quieter, then louder again. My muscles screamed, but I swam and swam trying to get to her. I could feel that I was almost there, but the pain was getting to be too much. The sheer exhaustion was causing me to begin to black out.
I tried to keep going, keep pushing, but everything was getting blurry. I could see her in the distance, her hand reaching towards me. I stretched towards her, almost brushing her
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fingertips, but right before I could, a current rushed towards me and I was whisked away. I tried to scream, but no noise came out. Everything was fading.
“Excuse me, hellooooo? Please wake uppppp.”
I was startled awake by someone shaking me. Squinting my eyes, I was immediately greeted by the blinding sun on my face. A little girl, no older than ten years old was peering down at me, her sandy colored curls framing her face. She looked concerned, and knelt down next to me.
“You looked like you were sleeping, but then you started thrashing. I thought something might have been wrong. You look okay now though.” The girl flashed a reassuring smile and stood up, brushing sand off of her pale blue dress.
I forced a smile back at her, but inside, I felt like crying.
“Would you like to walk back to the village with me?” The little girl asked sweetly, tilting her head ever so slightly.
“S-Sure. I’d like that.” I stood up slowly, and I felt a small hand slip into mine.
“My name is Cassidy by the way, what’s yours?”
“My name is Mira.” I smiled at her genuinely this time, her carefree joy rubbing off on me.
We walked in silence the rest of the way to the village, and when we arrived at my house, I waved goodbye, and stumbled into my house.
Novak was already sitting on the couch and he smiled at me when I walked in. “Hello, sunshine, what would you like for dinner?”
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As much as I wanted to spend time with my father for the first time in what felt like forever, I felt so sick that just the thought of food made me want to puke. “S-Sorry dad. I think I’m just going to rest. I don’t feel great.” My voice was cracking, and my throat hurt from just those few words.
A brief look of annoyance crossed my father’s face, but lasted less than a second. He smiled sweetly at me. “Oh, alright. You go get your rest then. I hope you feel better!”
I stumbled towards my room, and my head barely had time to hit the pillow before I was asleep.
I woke up in the middle of the night, panting. My heart was racing in my chest and I could barely breathe. My mind was going a mile a minute, and when I brought my fingers to my face, they came away coated with salty tears.
I could still hear my mother’s cries calling to me, telling me to leave, to go anywhere but the island. Her choked sobs rushing through the water.
That was the third time that night I’d woken up from the same nightmare I had on the beach earlier today. The third time I’d woken up barely able to breathe, my pillow stained with tears.
It was strange; I’d never had that dream before that day, but in less than twelve hours, I’d had it more times than I would like to count. Somehow, I knew it had to mean something.
Before I knew what I was doing, I soundlessly slipped out of bed and onto the floor. I moved across the room as slowly as I could, so as not to wake up my father.
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My door was open, but that wasn’t where I’d be going. Novak would certainly hear me if I went through the front door, so instead, I went through the wide open window to the left of my bed. My house—as well as everyone else’s in the village—had only one story, so I was easily able to drop into the greenery below without being hurt.
After around five minutes, the place I was looking for came into view. The familiar white sand and glittery ocean should have made me feel safe, but I still had a queasy feeling in my stomach after the events of the past day.
However, when I strolled down towards the water, I didn’t feel sick at all. Instead, I was overwhelmed with a sense of calming and safety.
For what I could only guess to be hours, I just stared out at the dark water, glimmers of starlight reflecting off the gentle waves.
Eventually, I realized I had to go home, and slowly walked away from the beach, leaving behind any worry or fear I had experienced that day.
When I arrived home, I slipped into my bed, and fell instantly asleep. My nightmares were completely gone, replaced with calming dreams that put a smile to my face.
The next morning I woke up to feel a weird, slimy sensation on my leg. I pulled back the covers of my bed to reveal a long, green, snakelike plant. Seaweed. I didn’t know why it scared me so much, it must’ve stuck to me while I was at the beach and I was just too tired to notice.
Still, I couldn’t help but feel unsettled.
When I got to the bathroom, I had to rub my eyes to make sure I wasn’t dreaming. Floating in the toilet bowl were at least three more strands of dark seaweed, and clogging the drain to the sink was another.
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I tried to back up, to leave the room, anything to get away from the seaweed, but I rammed into the door instead, hitting my head hard on the wood. After I somewhat regained my composure, I slammed open the door and ran down the hall.
Novak was already in the kitchen, sitting with a plate of eggs and toast in front of him. He gave me a warm smile as I walked in, and I offered a small, shaky smile of my own in return.
“Hey there Pumpkin, would you like some food? I made enough for both of us.” He gestured at the platter on the counter with more eggs, fruit, and toast.
“Oh, thank you! This looks delicious!” I walked over to the platter, and served myself some food, but I only picked at it. Everywhere I looked, I saw seaweed. After I blinked though, it was gone. I wonder if what I saw in the bathroom was real, or just something of my imagination.
After a few minutes, my dad got up and left for work. I gave a halfhearted wave goodbye before dumping the remainder of my food into the trash. It wasn’t not that my father’s cooking was bad, it was actually really good, but I was too unsettled to consume anything at the moment.
On my way back to my bedroom, I stopped by the bathroom to check if the slimy stalks were still there, and to my utmost horror, they were.
Over the next few days, I avoided the white-sanded shore at all costs. I felt like my visit to the beach had somehow sparked the appearance of the seaweed, which was getting worse every night. Sometimes, I would even wake up with my bed sheets soaked with what seemed to be ocean water, and specks of sand tangled in my clothes, spilling onto the floor.
My nightmares may have stopped for one night, but they were back and worse than ever.
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At times, I could hear my mother’s sobs as soon as the dream started. Sometimes, my mother was being torn apart, limb by limb, by something I couldn’t see. They were all so terrible, and I barely got any sleep, but I still refused to go anywhere near the beach.
At that point, I wanted to go back to the beach more than anything, I wanted to feel that same wave of calmness wash over me. I wanted to watch the waves so badly, but something told
me I shouldn’t. Sure, my nightmares ceased only after I went to the water, but that was also how they had started in the first place.
The longing I felt to go to the ocean was strange, almost as if it wasn’t mine. It felt as though I was experiencing someone else’s emotions for myself.
After almost two weeks of avoiding the beach, I finally can’t take it anymore. My nightmares have gotten so bad, I’ve been getting only one or two hours of sleep a night. I knew the ocean would calm me, but I was scared. No, not scared, terrified.
I spent most of the day wrapped in blankets, curled up on my bed. The curtains were closed, so the only light in the room was a few thin, yellowish slats of sunshine peeking through the window.
By the time night fell, I’d finally built enough confidence, and soundlessly slipped out my window and carefully padded towards the beach.
As usual, the ocean is sparkling with the glint of thousands of stars. I sat down on the cool sand, and before I knew it I’m fast asleep.
I had the same dream I had every night, but there were some subtle changes. The perfect water was still the same, crystal clear and impossible. However, the rainbow fleets of fish were
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in blacks and whites, Everything was distorted, and looked broken. The sight made me want to wake up, but something was different. It was almost as if the mood of the dream was…happy?
The fish were swimming in less perfect, zombielike patterns and more in a fun, playful manner. My mother wasn’t crying, in fact, I couldn’t hear anything. The water was perfectly smooth too, as opposed to the semi-frequent bubbles I usually saw.
I was floating weightlessly for a while until something floated towards me, a small piece of paper. I could tell it was stained with tears because it was somehow still dry even under the water. I reached out to grab the paper, and surprisingly, it didn’t float away at the last second. I turned it over and tried to read it, but most of the words were smudged with water. I could just barely make out a few words though, Leaving. Not Safe. My last chance. Hurry. Who finds this letter…
The rest of the words were too distorted to read, and even if they hadn’t been, the letter was yanked from my hands and floated away before I could look more closely.
I woke up, still laying on the beach. I must’ve only been asleep for a couple of hours, because when I looked around I could see that it’s still dark. My muscles gave shouts of protest as I stood up, but I knew that I needed to get moving. It was going to be sunrise soon, and I didn’t want my father catching me out by the water late at night.
Sure, I might have been doing something crazy because of a dream, but something felt more real than that. It felt like someone was trying to tell me something. And clearly, that something was important.
I checked on my father once I got inside, and was happy to see he was still fast asleep. I creeped back to my room, and quietly opened all my drawers (So as not to make noise every
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time I needed to grab something different) and put a few things in a bag. I carefully closed all my drawers, put my fully packed bag under my bed, and laid down to go to sleep.
When I woke up in the morning, I felt refreshed and fully rested for the first time in a while. My lack of sleep had caught up to me though, and I felt faint as I got out of bed.
Novak was in the kitchen, but he seemed to be in a hurry that day. Instead of sitting down for breakfast, he had an apple in his mouth, and was sorting through a stack of papers hurriedly.
He spared me no more than a quick glance, “Morning, Mira.”
“Good morning, Novak.” I muttered, sitting at the table with a peach. I had just enough time to sit down before my father rushed out the door.
I took a moment to finish my breakfast before going back to my room to get ready. If I wasn’t just going insane, and my mother had really been trying to say something, I needed to get off this island. Of course, I could also just be crazy and I was leaving behind the only home I had ever known for nothing.
Since my father was gone, I could easily leave the house. Pulling on the bag I had packed the day before, I slipped out the door and made my way to the shore.
Instead of going to the beach on the other side of the island, I went to one much closer to the village. It has a view of the California mainland, and the water was lined with docks. Most docks had some sort of boat anchored to them, and a few docks down I saw a boat that seemed good enough for me. It was a small, wooden rowboat with chipped, peeling paint. It seemed more like the type of thing someone would take to go fishing, rather than something to get me all the way to the mainland. I didn’t have much of a choice though, as I wanted to leave unnoticed. The boat was certainly old, but worked well and wasn’t leaky.
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I rowed for a long time, and started to get tired pretty early on. After getting almost no rest the past few days, I had little energy and was already panting after only five minutes of rowing.
By the time I arrive on the mainland, night has already fallen. The beach is much bigger than any of the beaches I had ever seen on the island, and the stars were much harder to see, due to light pollution.
After pulling the boat up onto the sand, I was so exhausted I wanted to collapse. The sand shifted softly between my toes as I walked towards the back of the beach.
I had no money, and didn’t know anyone here, so my best option for sleep seemed to be right where I was. The beach was a long expanse of sand, stretching further than I could see. As I walked further away from the shoreline, lush green plants became very much evident, and after going even further there is a patch of tall palm trees that seem to give decent shade and enough protection if it were to rain.
I gingerly sit down and put my backpack on the sand to use as a pillow, lay down, and close my eyes. It doesn’t take long for me to lose consciousness and drift into a deep slumber.
I woke up hours later, refreshed and well rested. I was surprised to have had a good sleep, without any of my usual nightmares.
The beach was still mostly empty, as it was pretty early in the morning, so I just walked towards the bathrooms near the entrance of the beach to change and brush my hair.
The day went on mostly normally, and I just hung around the beach. With no money, no house, and no one to turn to, it looks like the beach might be my new home, at least for a while.
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I spent the next few days at the beach, stealing bits of food people leave behind and sleeping under the palm trees. I thought that after I left the island I would feel better, but in all honesty, something was starting to feel off.
Back when I was still having nightmares, something had felt wrong, but in a different way. It had been as if I was feeling someone else’s queasiness, someone else’s pain. Now, it felt like I was feeling my own emotions again, and it was a strange feeling.
I was laying on the beach, on my ninth evening on the California mainland when I finally started to really realize what was off.
From where I was, I could just barely make out the island I had lived my whole life on, and when I looked closer, what I saw made me sit up in shock.
At a first glance, there was nothing wrong with the tiny island; it had small, quaint little cottages and was lined with white-sand beaches similar to the one I was sitting on now.
However, at a closer glance, I saw there was no light coming from the houses, and no movement coming from the paths. It was getting late in the day, but at this time there were usually still many villagers out and about, as well as many lights and lanterns flickering.
Even on my first night here, I had noticed the glow of firelight coming from the island, but today, there was nothing. The island was dim, dark, and slightly menacing. I knew that there had to be a reason I needed to leave the island, and whatever was happening wasn’t my business anymore, but I couldn’t just leave everything I’d ever known to whatever was happening, or what had already happened.
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There were still a few people surrounding me, despite the late hour, so I had to wait a few hours before I was alone. It felt like it took years before I was alone, and there was one particular person who didn’t leave until around one or two in the morning.
Once everyone was finally gone, I made sure everything I needed was stuffed in my backpack, and made my way towards my little rowboat, still pulled up onto the sand. I pushed the little rowboat into the water, and jumped in, rocking it slightly.
The water was beautiful that night, glimmering yellows and whites in the moonlight. My little island was far in the distance, and even though I was much more rested than the last time I made the trip, it was still a hard task to go that far, and it would likely be hours before I was home.
I rowed for ages, stopping a few times for a break, floating in the endless void of water. Eventually, the sun began to rise, and the water was reflected with the bright reds, oranges, and yellows of the sun, looking like fire.
Finally, I arrived at my island, my home. Without even bothering to anchor my boat, I ran down the beach and into the village.
The entire place was a ghost town.
Busy paths that were usually filled with booths to buy food, children laughing, and adults rushing to work was now just a long road of cobble. Upon looking into a few shops, I see no employees or customers.
I would have expected to be terrified when I found this out, but instead I just felt empty. I had no emotions at all over this whole thing, and I was left with a numb feeling inside.
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As I walked through the village, I stopped to look at a lot of houses and shops, to find all of them empty. Though I was looking at everything I passed, I only had one true destination: my house.
As I walked towards my house, the lack of emotion I felt went away, and I could feel salty tears running down my cheeks. It didn’t matter though, and I forced open the door, stepping inside.
It looked just the same as when I left, but there was a faint musty smell, as if the house had been abandoned for a while.
“N-Novak!” I yelled, wondering if my father was home. “Dad?”
There was no response, so I trudged slowly through the house until I ended up in front of my father’s bedroom door.
It was only then, after living for so long that I finally realized: I had never been in my father’s room. The door was closed, per usual, but it wasn’t locked, so I just opened the door and stepped into the room.
I wasn’t not sure what I expected to see, but the room looked like any normal one. The walls were a pale, sunny yellow, and there was a large bed in the center of the room. I was about to leave to try to find a clue about what happened somewhere else when something caught my eye: my mother’s jewelry box.
It was strange to see it there, after all, Novak had gotten rid of everything else that belonged to my mother, so why not this? I made my way to the box, and saw the key was in the lock already, so all I had to do was turn it and the top flipped open to reveal a plush velvet interior.
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I ran my fingers over the beads and pearls when I noticed a slight bulge in the velvet beneath the lid. I slid my nails beneath the velvet and began to rummage under the soft exterior, when I felt what seemed to be paper inside the compartment.
I gingerly pulled the paper out and examined it. There was a fancy white book, so thin it was more of a pamphlet, with thin pages yellowing with age. Upon opening the book, I was greeted by a clout of dust. There was a fancy, curly writing that I recognised as my mother’s. I began to read:
To Mira,
If you find this letter, please, leave the island. I’m not sure why I’m writing all of this down, but I felt that if—when—something happens to me, someone needs to know the truth. Novak has been acting so strange lately, seeming almost psychotic. I dismissed any and all
worries I had though, until people started to disappear. Eventually, I caught your father in the act, and I knew something would happen to me because of it. I know I need to leave, and I plan to do so soon. hope you find this and someday can—
The rest of the pages were either torn out or too smudged to read. As much as I wanted to sink to the floor and let everything settle in, I knew I had to leave the island once again. I stood up shakily, and walked towards the front door. I swung it open, and in my path was my father.
He looked down at my hands and, no doubt, saw the book. He gave me a devilish smile and stepped closer to me.
“Mira! Darling! I was wondering when you’d come back” It was then I noticed something in his hand, and I started to step back, but it was too late. I felt an incredible amount of pain explode against the side of my head before everything went black.