Almost 14, by Kally Jo Surbeck

There are many, many things they say of what you did before they locked you away.  They say you killed more than thirteen girls. All pretty little things with long, soft curls.  Blue eyed women were the best. You lost only one of your captured guests. She ran three miles on busted feet.  She flew through the underbrush, the devil to beat. Half-way to the Sheriff’s place before you noticed Marie had fled your place. Her bloodied shackle lay on the basement floor where other ladies had been slain before.  Scarlet footprints led out to the yard. You searched for her. You searched real hard. So involved with your own mess, you never realized she’d passed the test. She’d reported you, your house and location. The Sheriff and six deputies brought you in to shouts of jubilation.  I hear tell folks listen to whispers and weeping. In your old house, as they lie sleeping.

I don’t think the ghosts of the girls are there.  I’ve searched for them with no fruit to bear. My feet, you see, have never healed.  And through the judge, your fate is sealed. The problem is, I can’t let go of the terror and pain I harbor.  Always scared of each tomorrow. You may be the one they locked away. But I’m the one still trapped in that day. Day and night and night and day I feel your presence and I’m unnerved.  Tomorrow we’ll see if that ebbs away. Today, I run as if I’ll die. Endorphins flow, they make me fly. I run and run, this blue eyed girl. My hair’s now short and no more curls.

They say you’ll die and never be free.  I pray the opposite is in store for me. I’ll keep searching for the other girls, the ones I know you took. You took their innocence and their lives. I saw the trophies you didn’t bother to hide. The pictures you took, the police found those. It’S just the bodies that can never be laid to rest, and until they do I can’t either. It burns me up, like a fever. I’ll find them, I know I will. And give their families closure still. I don’t need your confession or direction. I know you’ve left clues in that house on the mountain. Thirteen graves, I need only find one. You’re a creature of habit, but lazy too. That’s how I’ll find them. It’s how I’ll beat you.

Again.

So when you shut your eye tonight to sleep, remember me – what’s that? You weep? Don’t play a fool. Not now. Man up! You wanted this so suck it up.  What’s that you say, I sat upon them? The concrete basement is where you sealed them!

Your maniacal cackle may scare some, but that’s not what has stopped my heart. It’s knowing now the best is truly yet to come. I get to tear that offending building down, foundation and stone and recover those girls and end this all. With no one to blame but your pride for your fall.  

Image by Enrique Meseguer from Pixabay

 

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Kally Jo Surbeck is a multi-award-winning best-selling author of several genres.  She has over thirteen books, including participation in several anthologies.   A few of her accomplishments are Colorado Author of The Year, the EPPIE (Excellence in Electronic Publishing) Action category.  Ms Surbeck, was, at that time,  the first woman to have written and won in said category.  She is also the winner of the Daphne duMaurier in thriller/suspense.  Her poetry was her first writing sale at the tender age of twelve.  Her works are in several different anthologies, commemorative additions, and one is even in the Holocaust Museum. https://www.facebook.com/Kally.Surbeck.Owren