I was running for my life, being chased by some murderous guy, his face was covered with a mask that I could never make out. I ran into a locked hallway, and tried helplessly to open the door, screaming ,panicking, sweet rolling down my face.
What was he? Why was he chasing me? This was my home this man had entered my home! He got closer and I could just feel his anger and knew he was going to hurt me. As he reached for me, I woke up!

The nightmares never stopped, ever since the death all I had was the same nightmare. I came home one day to find police outside my house and in, then I saw a body bag. I don’t know what it was but it seemed like I was shaken, that’s the image I can’t get out of my head. Now I’m here, after two weeks, I am a runaway sleeping inside a building full of other runaways, -some that have stories like mine, some that just had to get away- in Flint. I knew what I did was wrong, but I couldn’t stay there, I couldn’t live at a crime scene. Somehow I knew I had to go back home, I had to return to Lum, Michigan. I couldn’t go back to that house, I just couldn’t. So instead I went to the cemetery to their tombstones. It didn’t seem right, nor fair. A sixteen year old shouldn’t have to see his parents name on a tombstone, yeah it happens but why did it happen to me?






I turned around to find the one person I had left in this world, my sister Ali.
“We should get out of here.”, Ali said to me concerned.
“Where are we going to go? Not home..”, I cut myself off from saying that word “Home”, and replaced it with house. “I know a place we could go.”, Ali looked at me. She led me to a tree house that was in the backyard of that house that held all the pain. We climbed up to it, a little too big for it, but we still sat in looking at all the old junk we left in there since the age of six. I looked at her, I had to ask the question that I know we both wanted to ask. “So what do we do now?”
“Well I’m going to go into our home and pack you a few things.”, she looked at me as if with her eyes saying, don’t make me go in their alone. I grabbed her hand, and we climbed out of the tree house, and made our way across the backyard. The feelings became strong, I was shaking, Ali stopped and squeezed my hand, as telling me it’s okay I’m here. We came to the door, and then she opened it we both froze. Then we took the first step inside. Looking around Ali asked me, “What do you want to do first.”, I looked at her and started crying.