On My Way Home While Anger Sleeps

They’re here. Stay quiet. Don’t make a sound.

I spent all night covered by a deranged coating of fear. The noise they made kept me trapped in a permanent and sadistically cruel panic. It was nothing compared to the fear I now feel. This fear cuts through me, grabs at my skin, and forces my heart to pump without mercy.
A different sound. A different cry.
My heart retaliates and pauses once again, desperate for its normal rhythm, and my imagination runs millions of images through my weakened mind. I’m suddenly writing possible futures … my future, my story … thousands of times. They all begin the same way, with the same opening words.

She heard a different cry …

I hold my breath. Unlike in the alleyway yesterday, time does pause for me now. I exist outside of the normal universe, trapped between one second and the next, as the new sound haunts me. Yes, that is the best way to express the feeling. The only way. I am haunted.

I don’t know why the world changed, or what happened to everyone, but they are here now. The anger.

My name is Shayla. I will survive. I will.