Night Suspicions

Prolog
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   Sometimes when I lay in bed late at night, I think about the walls. The walls holding up the ceiling, and the ceiling keeping out the rain pouring down outside. I think about how lucky I am to have these walls and ceiling. But sometimes, when I lay awake late at night. I suspect someone looking through my blinds. Watching me fall asleep.
     I suspect that the man watching through the windows, has friends. A friend under the bed. A friend in the closet. A friend looking under my door. All watching me fall asleep. I try to think of them as the people that give me dreams. And when I would wake up in the middle of the dark night from a nightmare I got mad at them. “Hey! Stop giving me bad dreams!” I would yell at them expecting them to follow my commands. Sometimes I would even ask for a certain dream, maybe about my dead dog or about being a princess. I would beg for them to comply to my wishes.  I was only a little girl when I started talking to the creatures watching me fall asleep, but now I know why there really watching me.
      Their waiting for me to fall asleep because I am one of the few that they can get ahold of. They aren't things giving me dreams, their demons. They can attach themselves to my alive spirit. Imagine this: when you fish, you fish in a area that fish live in that can get caught on your hook, and once a fish is on the hook, you start reeling him in, once he's out of the water, you chop him up, cook him and eat him. Well in this case I am the fish, and the demons are the fishermen. And in their world, there's only one small pond that A LOT of fishermen are fishing at, and let me tell you, their hungry.

Wonderland Annie's point of view
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       Beep beeep beep beeep
       The alarm clock takes me from the dream world with no fear and I roll out of bed. I open my drawer and there's no shirts in there that will match the last clean pair of pants. So I decide to wear dirty jeans and a shirt that is pink with a blue jay sitting on a branch in the middle. I can't find any clean socks either so I decide to go to school with no socks and don't think about when the snow on the ground melts through my shoes I won't be able to feel my toes.
        My mom gives me my lunch as I walk out the door and wait for the bus, stepping in knee deep snow that my dad didn't shovel yet from last night's snow storm. According to the news people there's gonna be another one tonight, worse than last night. On the bus, my friends and I hope that we won't have school tomorrow and plan on playing in the white, frozen wonderland that looks like a dream.
        When I leave school the snow already started again. I headed up to my room when I got home and started on my homework. When I finished, I decided that I was tired and just wanted to relax so I put on some music and laid in bed just looking out my window watching the snow fall.
       I started to doze off right before my mom came in. “I'm going to the store honey, I'll be back in a little bit. Ok?” She told me in her voice that made me feel like a baby. I nodded. I heard my door shirt and I turned back to the window. Then I heard the front door creak open, and creak shut.
       I'm home alone.  I thought to myself sitting up and paused for the music. I hated being home alone. I don't even really no why. Just something about the emptiness, the silence, herding every noise. I told myself that I couldn't fall asleep cause if someone or something comes in to hurt me I would never no. I can't take a shower for the same reasons. Then I turned on all the lights in the whole house even though it was only 4:15. I go down stairs cause I figure if someone comes in it's better to be down here than being trapped upstairs. I grab my cat Fluffs. Short for Fluffers. I hold him in my arms knowing that he would not protect me.
       But wait! What if somebody's already in the house! Now the silence is really getting to me.
      BANG! I hear something upstairs and scream. I grab my phone and hold on to Fluffs and run to the kitchen. I open the pantry door and go in and sit on the floor. I dial my moms number.
Ringggg ringgggg she picks up. “Mom” I say in a whisper voice. “There's someone in the house.” A tear rolls down my cheek and I realize that my hand is shaking uncontrollably.
       “Ok honey, stay quiet I'm coming home right now. Don't move from where you are you don't want anyone to hear you.
      “Ok mom. “
       “Annie, listen to me very closely; you're going to be ok. Just stay quiet.”
       “Mommy, someone is coming down the stairs”
       “Oh God! Ok Annie, I'm going to hang up and call the police.stay quiet. I love you.”
       “No mommy!”
Buuuuuuuuu
She hung up.
      The footsteps grow closer to the door. Fluffs jumps off my lap and goes to the door. I try to tell her in my mind to not make a noise. The light in the kitchen seeps through the crack under the door. Then something gets in the way of the light. I hear the footsteps stop. A man's boot is standing right in front of the door. I try to hold my breath. I see Fluff trying to reach he paw under the door to get the book. He's so small. All white fluffy hair, so soft. His eyes are like what you imagine ice and the blue sky together would look like. They kinda make me think of an explosion, like an ice ball with blue paint inside blew up and made his eyes.
       The boots keep walking. But this time in the other direction. He's further away now and I feel safer.
      Until the phone rings. My first instinct was to pick it up so the ringing would stop but when I answered it, that told him that someone was there.
      “Annie are you ok.”
      I don't say anything cause I don't want to make anymore noise. But then I hear the footsteps walk so fast towards me that I start to panic.
      “He herd! He heard the phone ring!” I start panicking. I stop even trying to stay quiet and I stand up. Push myself against the back wall and the handle jiggles. I take a deep breath. This is it. “He found me mom! Help!
     “NOO ANNIE NOO!” She's sobbing. I think I can here her speeding in the car. My heart sinks.
       The weird thing is that I don't feel scared anymore. I feel sad. Not even sad like I feel sad that my life is so short, I feel sad that my mom is gonna miss me. I don't mean to sound selfish but, you know, you've seen the tv documentaries; the parents become depressed. I just feel so bad that my parents are going to lose their only daughter.
       The door swings open so fast it's like a blink.
       But know one is there. I sit there for a few moments then stand up. Still trembling. But know one is there. I tell myself I should feel relieved but I really don't. I just feel more scared. Did I just hallucinate that?
        That was the first encounter with the fishermen.

A Flower to the Rain narrator's point of view
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       The rain trickles down the window and sounds like bullets to Annie as she try's to fall asleep. Her back faces the window and she begins to feel a presence in the corner. A dark one with sinister plans. She imagines the shadowy figure shine a flashlight up on his face from under his chin. She fears that when she turns around to see if her suspicions were right she will see that they are, and see a creature with a green face, with small horns going up his chin like a beard. With eyes as black as night. The face slowly begins to smirk. It starts to crawl closer, the flashlight flickers out right as the creature starts to sprint towards Annie.
       Annie turns around with one quick twist. She reaches for her phone on the desk next to her bed almost falling off in the process. She quickly turns on the flashlight and moves the light around all the corners. She sits up in bed and decides whether or not she should get up and turn on the light, but the light switch is on the other side of the room. She fears that when she stands up the creature will grab her ankles and pull her under the bed.
       So she stands up making sure not to fall off the wobbly mattress. She pictures in her mind the creature licking his lips under the bed, elbow at his shoulders and his hands with green goop drooling off them wait to grab her. She leaps off the bed and sprints to the light which is only a few steps and switches the light. Clubs back in bed and imagines the creature dieing like the witch when water is poured on her in the Wizard of Oz. only instead of water, it's light. She falls asleep.

       After school she comes home and wastes her day watching tv on the couch. It's about 9:00 at night and her mom is making lunch for tomorrow for school. “Honey,” her mom announces over the volume of the tv, “go down stairs and grab another peanut butter jar in the cabinet.” Annie agrees without complaint and goes downstairs without thinking of the rain pouring down outside. She passes the back door on the way down stairs. It's a big brown wooden door with 6 rectangular windows from the top down.
        On the way back up the steps with the jam in her hand, the wooden stairs creek more than usual. She stops at the door and realizes the rain. Right as she turns around to go back up the stairs she hears a soft cry of a little girl's voice, “Help me”
       Annie is startled and quickly looks out the window for the girl. Her heart beats rapidly because it didn't sound like it came from outside. It seemed like it was whispered right in her ear. As she looks outside, she notices something unsettling. Out in the yard. She sees something shine. Very dim. She turns on the light for outside. She focuses on the sight and sees it's a white lily. She loves those flowers. Especially the white ones. She goes outside in her bare feet forgetting about the voice she herd. The rain beats down on her head but she doesn't care. Nothing matters to her but the lily. When she gets to it, she bends down to pick it, she stops for a moment and watches the water droplets hit the petals and the flower twitching. She plucks it.
       She turns back around and walks back inside. Shows her mom the lily. She places it on her desk and sits on her bed to read a book. She falls asleep.

       Waking up, she puts the book down. Out the window she sees it's morning. She remembers the lily when the bright sun reminds her of spring, when she picks it up, the petals stay of the desk as if they were glued, leaving Annie with just a stem. When she looks a the stem in her hand, she sees a beautiful little girl in a white dress with her head down with curly brown hair. In her hand, the lily. Annie seems to be in the same room as her. The little girl slowly lifts her head, meeting her eyes with Annie's. As her head comes to a stop, a moment passes and the little girl blinks. And like a trigger, the wall behind her shatters and flies towards Annie.
        She awakes from her trance. She doesn't feel the girl was scary, almost as a friend. She decides to call her Wall Breaker, and hopes to see her again.

Horror of the Rats Annie's point of view.
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       Did you know, that rats travel? They travel on boats, like fishermen. Well, they travel with fishermen. They're not wanted by the fishermen, So therefore they're not good. Well actually that depends on how u look at it. If the fishermen are fishing fish, and obviously the fish don't like that, and obviously the fishermen don't like the rats, well then the fish and rats are kinda on the same team.
      So in my case, as you no I'm the fish, the demons are the fishermen, and the rats? Well the rat in my case is the little girl. So when the rats jump on the fishermen's boat, they help out the fish. But how? Well from the boat, the rats can basically through little hints to the fish of how to get away from the fishermen. The rats surprisingly learned a lot from the fishermen’s observation.
       Wall Breaker started visiting me more often. The first hint she gave me was barely a hint at all. Well I guess if knew it was a hint when I got it I would have understood why I was in a room with no windows, no doors. All I had was a small mirror and a piece of wood. I had in my head repeating over and over. At the time, I was still being introduced to the spirit world. I still thought that the “house invasion” was a hallucination, the frequent feelings of some creature staring at me from the corner, and the flower and little girl, I had no idea what to think about it. I just thought of it. Playing the scene over and over again in my mind continuously.
       When I landed in the room I was at school, in math class, then the next thing I knew I was waking up from lying on the floor in a plain white room with a light sores that wasn't there at all. No doors, no windows, nothing. I stand up and in my hand was a mirror. Actually it was a jagged piece of glass that happened to show my reflection.
       I look around the blank room and my eyes focus on a single piece of wood. I walk towards it and get there in three steps but it looked like how far it was it should have been at least ten. The wood is dry, tan with a black dot at the top that was breaking from the middle. The black dot looked like a Cosmo stretching thinner as it goes down the cut piece of wood.
      In my head, all I hear over and over is get out, escape, help me. The little girl's voice rings in my ear.
     I think for a moment. I remember from something that light reflected off a mirror can catch fire. I look for where the light is coming from. And almost right as I'm about to think of something else to try to get out a single bulb on a string appears swinging from the ceiling.
     A moment passes and the light stops swinging. I try to arrange the mirror to shine a light on to the wood. Telling myself that this dream is so dumb, this will never work. And again right as I'm about to give up. The wood bursts into flames. I drop it fearing the heat. On the ground, the fire dances like Peter Pan and his crew celebrating with the Indians.
    With nothing to do, I blow on the fire expecting it to go out. But instead I become a fire breather. The whole room is on fire and I tell myself again; Wow this dream is odd, what is even on fire this room is empty? The walls melt down like lava going down the mountain. On the other side Wall Breaker awaits. She walks in towards me this time not creepy but happy and innocent.
     “You did it. You got loose from the hook. Now swim away fishy. Swim away.” With one last whisper before I wake “before they reel you in and get ya!”
      I thought about what she meant, really I was thinking one if that was even real and two trying to figure out what it even means if it is.
       After that, the next hints were more clear like, “the lights don't help” and “focus on me not them,” also “don't try to talk to me” what came next in this hint was more chilling “because when you call out to one of the dead. All of them can hear you.” This also told me that she was dead.
      After time passed the night suspicions got more intense. They got closer to me, instead of hiding in the shadows they stood right where I can hear them breath.
      I still needed to learn more about how to get them away and stop fishing in my pond, but only the rat can help me there.
     The girl taught me that during a night suspicion, I am somewhere in the middle of life, and afterlife. She also taught me how to start one myself, to get a better view of the boat, without them seeing me through the water. I had to concentrate so hard, I have to lay down on my bed, close my eyes, and picture a rope hanging over my body. I have to imagine my soul pulling myself out of my body. My soul is heavy. One I'm out, I can walk around anywhere I want, but no one can see me. I can look back at my body. I can see the demons clear. When I'm in their zone they can't tell me apart. They never talk. And the fishermen on the boat I learned were not friends. It's every man for themselves.
     Makes sense  though. How can u split one fish between 10 people. Especially if they're all greedy.
     I had to learn one very important thing on my own though. That when I make myself go into a suspicion, my soulless body is up for grabs, it's just a fish stuck in a trap, can't move. I see Wall Breaker in there but she doesn't seem to recognize me when I'm there. The fishermen hate her, as I suspected, but they kick her and she falls, whimpers as she hits the black floor. But she just gets back up and continues walking to no destination.
    She has friends. I think they are her friends. They are all children around 5 or 6, all just gather in clumps, they stand facing one direction with no emotion.
      The first time I saw her friends I tried to talk to them for a second then like a flash an older women wearing a white and black striped shirt, is standing behind them with a slight smirk. She children slowly moved their heads up and look at the women, move their heads back facing me, and all smirk at the same time with a tilt of the head.
      When I get back to my world I decide to call the children all rats. And to the fishermen, they were a horror, because they are helping their only meal get away.

The Grey Wolves Annie’s mom’s point of view
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        Annie is still a little shooken up from when she thought someone was in the house. She is quieter now. Doesn't seem to come out of her room as much. I guess it's just because she's getting older. I did have a strange experience recently too. I had just gotten home from work and just gotten out of my car. When I started walking up the steps, the car alarm went off. I turned it off, then it happened again a few seconds later. This happened almost 10 times in 5 minutes. When I went inside the microwave wouldn't stop beeping until I unplugged it. That same night, the front door alarm went off in the middle of the night. It woke everyone up besides Annie. Our dog wouldn't stop barking all that night. About an hour after the alarm went off it went off again. My husband and I went downstairs and he grabbed the bat, he turned on the porch light and looked out the door window. No one was there, after he turned it off we decided to sleep on the couch mostly because we were spooked but also because we thought it was a problem with the alarm and we didn't want Annie to wake up cause she had school the next day. Even though she didn't wake up from either of the first alarms.
        At about 4:00 AM the alarm went off again and I woke up without fear figuring the alarm needs to be fixed. But when I turned toward the door I was shocked at what I saw. The door wide open. The alarm faded into the background of my hearing and I stood in shock. My husband runs up the stairs to get Annie. She comes down the stairs and they both drag me outside. He calls 911.
      When the police arrive, they check the entire house and find nothing.
      No one slept that night.

Notice the Bee Annie's point of view
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         As I got more familiar with the other place, I wanted to see if I could contact people in the real world. So one day I decided to test it. When my mom got home from work, I pulled on her car door handles a few times to make the car alarm go off, but even though it worked, that's not what I was looking for. Could they see or feel my presence? So I went inside and basically broke out microwave. She unplugged it. So I decided to really spook them. That same night. I set off the front door alarm two times. Each time it went off, I was pulled back into the real world and woke up in my bed, it took me long to fall asleep. So there's my answer. If something happened that wakes me up in the real world, I'm pulled out of the other world and woken up. Seems simple enough.
         So now that I have my answer, now I just want to play with my parents. I open the front door making them really scared. I stranded on right next to the door and cracked up watching my mom freeze in fear and my dad run upstairs, I didn't realize he was going to wake me up. Because then I was in my bed, my dad pulling me up out of bed and down the stairs. I tried not to laugh, he pulled me and my mom outside and called the police. As I sat on the  old grass I pretty much died trying to hold my breath so I don't laugh, my mom came and sat next to me to convert me thinking that my wimped a of laughter were whimpers of fear.
         I saw the little girl the day after. “If you do that to your parents you're not any better then the fishermen.” She said.
         “It was just a small joke”
          “You can not take advantage of your ability.”
      I had never thought of it of a ability befor.

Lion’s Bait Narrator’s point of view
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           It's dark. She can't even see the hands in front of her. 
           A light.
           A light like a stage light shines down on her. She can see herself.
          Then another spotlight. No one stands in the circle of light.
          Annie looks around to find about her spotlight. She decides to walk to the emty one.
          She arrives.
         Standing in the the new circle she looks back at her old one.
          Someone is standing in it.
            A tall man.
              A tall dark man.
                Pale face.
                 Dark cloths.
                   He lifts his arm straight out infront of him with the cracking of his bones.
                     His bony finger points straight at Annie.
                       The man, looking straight at her.
                          Then his light goes out.
            Now it's bright. She looks at where the man's spotlight was and he is feet in front of it, walking away from her. She follows him.
            They arrive at a house. Annie's house.
           There in side. She keeps following him up the stairs.
The hallway. Past the bathroom. Past her parents room. The man stops at the last door. Annie's room. He turns and looks at Annie behind him as if he knew she was following him. Then he continues walking into her room.
           At first Annie is startled, but she walks into her room to see what he is doing. When she gets to the door, she sees him standing next to Annie's bed, looking down at something. 
         She is shocked at what he is looking at. Smirking at. He looks back at her with one final stare. And he is gone. Annie laying in the bed. Annie standing over her own body.
          She asks herself if this is a dream. It's not.

        She wakes up. Startled. She sits up in her bed. Looks back at her pillow. And can't comprehend what she sees. Her face. Still on her pillow. Her body. Still relaxed in its sleeping state. She lifts her hand, she can see it, but it's almost transparent. She goes to her parents room and tries to wake them up, she can hear herself and feel herself, but whatever she touches she goes through. What ever she says, no one can hear.
         She goes back to her room. Lays on top of her body in the same position. Sits back up, looks back at her pillow, and still her body lays there.
         Someone comes into her room. Wall Breaker. “Something's wrong” Annie admits.
         “I no” Wall Breaker says like an all knowing wizard. “Last night, you went too far. Imagine a string attached to you and your body when you travel in the other world. Well it broke. And that string is the only thing that keeps your body not being inhabited by another spirit.”
        “So how do I get back” Annie asks
         “I'm sorry but I really don't know how. I'm here for the same reason, some other spirit is living in my body right now. Living my life.”
         “So that's it? That's my life? I have to be here for ever?” She starts to panic
        “We can try to get you back,” Wall Breaker tells her.
        The lights dim and Annie and Wall Breaker stand in separate circles of light. There is a light on Annie's body too.
        Then a light appears further away. The tall pale man wearing dark cloths walks into the light. Looks straight at the body. “He's going to try to get in.”
         “What do we do?” Annie asks.
         “Let me” Wall Breaker says without explanation. Wall Breaker appears in the body's light, then disappears. The body sits up. Annie is horrified. She sees that her body has been taken by the man, but the man is still in his circle.
          The body's spotlight turns off.

Sitting in the Wrong Picture Wall Breakers point of view
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        This is what it feels like. What it feels like to be alive. The heart beat. The heart beat beating. The blood, rushing through my veins like cars on a race track. No. Not my veins. I can feel everything. The sunlight bouncing off my alive skin. Soaking into me like a sponge. This is it. I'm alive. Alive as I was 20 years ago. Befor my body was taken from me. My toes. My fingers. I can feel the blanket rubbing against them. Soft little bristles. It's strange. But a good strange like when you don't know if a food tastes good and you try it for the first time and you love it. Taste. I look at the glass of water on the desk next to me. Gulp. The river flowing down my throat feels as if I was a flower getting watered for the first time in months. I am alive. I jump out of the bed.
       My knees give out when my feet hit the floor. After a few moments, I'm walking fine again. “Good morning Annie” a man says.
      Who is that? Who's Annie?
      “Good morning?” I say out loud without knowing why. My voice sounds odd to me. Something new, but yet formilor. I go down the stairs and sit at the table. A white fluffy creature jumps up on my lap. I put my hands above my head.
       “What did Fluffs do, scratch you last night? You're acting like you never seen a cat in your life!” He laughs.
       The look I give him makes him give the same strange confused look back at me.
       “Annie?” He's concerned and I feel it. But I'm sure the response I have him did not help.
        “Who's Annie?” He says nothing but his face is grim. “Oh,  Annie! That's me” I giggle but it's fake. “Sorry I just have a lot on my mind. My dream last night was…” I glance behind him and see what reminds me what I'm here for. A picture of their family. Christmas cloths. Dad, mom daughter, so cliche. So happy together.
         The girl, she looks familiar.
         No. It's coming back. Annie. I'm in her. Should I stay here? Stay alive? But what makes me have that right more then the man who took my body. I can't leave her there. But I don't want to go back to that hell of nothingness. Darkness. Loneliness.
         “Honey, are you sure you're okay?” He puts his palm on my forehead. “Well you don't have a fever. Are you feeling okay?”
          “Yeah dad of course I am! Why wouldn't I!” I say in a cheerleader way.
          Picking up my backpack, heading out the door, I'm interrupted. “Annie, where are you going?” He sounds concerned again.
           “School of course! I think you're a little off today not me!”
           “Honey, it's Saturday.”
           “Is that right,” I pretty much panic, “Oh my teacher got me all mixed up! She told us we have a test tomorrow!” I say it so enthusiastically he must see right through it.
           “Ok sweetie but your teacher is a man.”
           I have no clue what to say now so I pull a typical teenage girl act. “Ya know dad can you stop interrogating me! UHH! Just leave me alone I'm just having an off day!” I stomp my feet up the stairs and slam my bedroom door shut with a bang.
           Ok how am I going to get back to Annie?
           I got it.

Paper Thin Annie’s point of view
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         “Help!” For the hundredth time I cry out “Wall Breaker Help!” All around me are men and women in black, their faces and skin stained grey. Some old some young. But all of them can sense my alive soul. As if I was a big juicy steak just out of reach of you as you starve.
         I feel helpless. Alone. Angry. The endless nothingness of darkness. The nullity goes of for as far as I can see. There's no floor, but somehow I'm walking everywhere I look. Up, down, right, left, straight, or behind, either black nothingness or a demon looking straight at me. Some pointing at me, some have a tilted head, some so close to me I can feel their eyes burning on the back of my neck.
         Something flickers in the corner of my eye. A spotlight. I run towards it. My bed. My sheets. My body. The demons don't seem to realize the spotlight. Only me. Wall Breaker sits up from my body, another spotlight follows on her as she walks towards me.
      “You have to get me out of here! Please!” I beg of her.
      “I will don't worry. But it may take some time.
       “I can't wait much longer!” I'm angry and almost in tears. “This hell plays with your mind. It rips you down till your paper thin, as if one blow could cave me in like i'm just a frail house of cards!” I'm really crying now.
       “I no, I get it.” Wall Breaker says with a lift of her eyebrows. She looks as if she reads my soul and wants to help it, but can't.
       “How do you get it? Are you here, living alone in this darkness?” Pain in my chest of frustration makes my voice break.
        Wall Breaker looks at me grimly. Her eyes tell a story of sadness, shame, and anger. “Do you really think that? I have been in this place for ever 20 years. And you think I don't get it? I'm the one who's alive right now, I don't have to help you! I can live your life just as someone is living mine right now. So before you make me give back my sacrifice of coming back to this hell. Think before you speak. Before you can't anymore.”
      “I'm sorry. I forgot.” I stop thinking about the creatures surrounding me. “So what should we do?”
       “I'm still figuring it out,” she says. “For now, stay here, don't bring more attention to yourself than you're alive soul already is. I'll come back don't worry. I'm going to help you.” I think she realized I was about to scream and cry cause I really couldn't take it anymore.
        “Ok.” I tell her. But I don't believe her.

Window Shades Wall Breaker’s point of view
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       I really have no clue how I'm going to get her back. Not only that. I have no clue how I'm going to willingly go back there. Why should I go back? And let her live? Isn't it my turn to live?
      No. No I can't. I couldn't live with myself. Knowing that I left someone in there. Alone. I would be no better than any of the demons that took me.
      “Why aren't you up? You have to leave for school in 15 minutes!” A woman's voice yells from the bedroom door. “Annie? Why are you looking at me like I have three heads?”
      I shake my head out of confusion. “Oh sorry mom. I'm just really tired.” I jump out of bed and start to look in Annie's dresser.
      “Ok well I'll make your breakfast to save you some time but hurry up.”
      “Thanks, mom.” The words rolling off my tongue feel unnatural.
       She hands me my lunch out the door too. The bus that's waiting for me at the end of the street brings me a weird feeling of joy. Like I just need to giggle.
       The feeling is gone when I step on the bus. A girl sitting all the way in the back, immediately catches my eye. Something about her is so wrong and out of place, yet so familiar. I decide to sit next to her.
       The walk to the back of the bus felt so long, a couple people saying hi to me like I knew them, it took me a few moments to realize that they all think I'm Annie.
       The girl doesn't say a word to me when I sit down. In the corner of my eye I try to see what she's doing. Her legs spread out, slouching in the seat, one knee is bouncing up and down rapidly. Something about her, her body language or something, is so mammalian. But her face is so precious and full of youth. I can't put my finger on it yet, but I know her.
       At school, I keep a good eye on her. Finally at lunch I sit next to her. She sits at the end of a table with a couple of other girls. I ask her her name. “It's Kim, what's yours.?”
       “Um, Annie!” I tell her trying to sound convincing.
        “Annie? I no you. Why are you sitting with us and not with your popular friends?” She asks me with a shy tone.
        “Um I just thought maybe I could sit with you today. Is that ok?”
         “I guess.”
         “I'm sorry but you just seem so familiar to me. Have we met? Like not in school like, some other time?” She probably thinks I'm weird now. The look on her face looks concerned.
         “I don't think so.” Her voice gets lighter.
         “When were you born?” An energy fills me. I need answers.
        “Um… I don't know.” She sounds embarrassed. But how do you not know when you're born? Well actually technically I don't know when I was born cause I'm Annie. So the only way she would not know her birthday is if she was like me and living in someone else's life.
      Ah! I'm thinking too much into it. Probably nothing.

      At home, I go and lay down on my bed so I can go to Annie. When I get there, it's dark, but immediately I see her spotlight. As we walk towards each other, I see that Annie doesn't look scared anymore.
      “I have to tell you something.” She says to me. She is smiling but I feel nervous. “You have been trapped in this place for over 20 years. Now you have the chance to live again. Take it. I know it sounds crazy but you deserve it. You were willing to come back here for me and stay here forever while I get to live. But no. I can't have that. You go and live my life.” A tear rolls down her sad yet happy face. “I no I will miss my life.  My mom, my dad, everyone, but maybe one day, 20 years, 40, maybe even tomorrow, I will be someone's white Lily that they find out in the rain. Maybe I'll be their Wall Breaker. Maybe they will do the same for me as I am for you.”
      “Thank you Annie. I can't think of words to describe this.”
       “Then don't” she says with one final tear.
        “Thank you.”

Red Roses on a Red Road Wall Breaker’s point of view
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         Sometimes when I lay in my bed late at night, I think about the walls. The walls holding up the ceiling, and the ceiling keeping out the rain pouring down outside. I think about how lucky I am to have these walls and ceiling. But sometimes, when I lay awake late at night. I suspect someone looking through my blinds. Watching me fall asleep.

        Those things are still after me. But I'm kinda over it. After I say goodnight to my mom and my dad,  I lay awake, staring at the wall. I start to think about Kim again. Thinking and thinking, I look at the time on my phone. I've been thinking for over two hours. But now I got it. I no why she looks so familiar.
       She is me. That body that she is living in is mine. Someone else is living in me.
        That explains why she looked so mammalian on the bus.
          It's ok. That's not me anymore. I have a home now. I am Annie.