Victim

• Lucinda Chien, Grade 7
• Short Story
• 2021

The metal digs into my wrists, unyielding and unbreakable. Its cold touch is a welcome sharpness, one that keeps me tied to reality. One that suppresses the interminable pain inside. One that makes everything numb and relieving.

After days of rain, I haven’t been outside for a week. The precipitation has turned everything a shade darker, imitating my mood. My surroundings are plain, the same as usual. The small trees allowed to grow in the middle of the yard sway stiffly in the breeze, their trunks like weak, bony fingers. Their leaves droop, many already fallen on the ground, brown and lifeless. The bleakness makes my confines feel even more isolated.

The grass is wet beneath my bare feet, but I would rather be here than on the path. The concrete plays host to nightmarish shadows cast by the tall electric fence, painting a picture of a nefarious world. I’ve visited a place like that, a place deep in my mind, and have no interest in returning.

Paint peels off the bench I sit on in deep crimson flakes. I look away when some ends up on my hand - it looks too similar to blood. But the sight in front of me isn’t welcome.

The grey building looks almost normal at first. There are no windows, just simple, painted bricks. It looks harmless, seems safe enough. There is nothing suspicious, or untrustworthy about it on first inspection. It is inconspicuous. That’s until the gunshots ring the air.

There’s a courtyard behind the building. One where the solid greyness of the building is disturbed by large, scarlet stains on the cobblestone ground. The sounds catch you off guard, barrelling through the silence, turning someone’s whole world black. It takes less than a second.

It’s going to be my turn soon.

I was never supposed to end up here, never supposed to be trapped on a path that will end any day. There’s nothing I can do but sit, and watch, and wait. I wasn’t innocent, but I wasn’t guilty enough to spend the rest of my life where I am now.

The bench turns as cold as ice. I know it’ll be me tomorrow. How I can tell, I don’t know, but my gut is always right. That’s how I ended up here.

A puddle on the ground in front of me displays something I fear to see. Blonde tresses are dulled by the dirty water, dangling in tangled locks around a thin, pale face. Freckles that look like splatters of mud surround hollow hazel eyes that once glowed with a comforting warmth, but are now dark and hazy.

My gaze turns upwards, as bloated clouds glide slowly over the amber streaked sky. Savouring the last, beautiful sight I’ll see. Before I leave to reenter the place of unbreakable stone. Because in the end, the whole world is a cycle. One that goes round and round. And everyone in it is a victim.