Chapter 1
The stillness of a calm winter’s night was interrupted as an expensive, black five door car pulled to a sudden holt up in front of my house. A young, athletic, tall man stepped out effortlessly and made his way up the copper pebbled path. His smooth long strides quickly covered the distance to the front door. He wore dark blue jeans and shoved his white hands into his thick black double breasted coat, shielding himself from the cold. His broad shoulders filled out each corner of the material, making him appear sharp and smart, even though he was in casual attire. His chiselled jaw outlined his equal proportioned features. It was obvious that he was a very attractive and confident man who clearly grabbed the attention of any girl who was lucky to catch a glimpse of him. He was so handsome in fact, that when he wanted something he could normally get it without a second’s hesitation, especially if he threw the unsuspecting victim a heart throbbing smile.
The Tudor styled house was semi detached, recently painted white with black beams, and a carbon copy of every other structure on that street. As the mysterious man reached the big black front door, it surprisingly opened with ease, welcoming him in. He didn’t even have to take his hands out of his pockets as his black converse trainers stepped into the darkness. The door gently shut behind him, locking out the icy wind as he casually walked down the silent corridor. He flicked his straight hazel brown hair out of his bright green eyes, making it easier for him to see the black framed photographs on the creamy magnolia walls. They were the same size and sat equal distance from each other, decorating the plain hall classically. In each picture was one of my family members, love beaming from each smiling face into the heart of anyone who bothered to look. The photographs showed that this house held a single mother who supported her two children, my brother and I. We both had warm blonde hair like hers and the same thin body frames. But I looked more like my mother because we both had soft delicate features and my brother was more defined.
The stranger silently made his way across the rich white carpet till he reached the staircase. Each stair was covered in the same white carpet as the hall to match with the rest of the pure clean theme. He could have walked into the living room as the door was open wide and only two steps to his left. If he glanced in he could have seen the big plasma television against a maroon red wall. It sat defenceless on its stand, with a Sky box below it and a fairly new DVD player, each lit up like a Christmas tree. You would have to be blind not to see them. He could have easily grabbed any or all the items and sneaked from the house without a sound. But if he didn’t want to do any heavy lifting he could have ignored the electrical devices. He could have avoided the stairs and carried on down the hall, past the white banister and into the kitchen. The room was easy to see in the dark because of the reflecting black marble counters that sat on white cupboards which stood in a line across the right hand side wall. The floors had a pattern of black and white tiles that spread under the cream wooden table and chairs on the opposite side of the room. At the back of the kitchen were French double doors that opened up into a reasonable sized green garden, cornered off by a tall grey fence. Along the edges of the perfectly cut grass were squares of brown soil which in the summer were always filled with an array of beautiful coloured flowers. My mother and I would spend our weekends just before spring planting all the different types of plants, in an attempt to make patterns, and somehow with my mum’s special touch, it would always turn out perfectly.
If he just looked through the draws in that kitchen he would have quickly found silver cutlery that he could have easily sold on the street. If he glanced in the cookie jar on the island in the middle of the room he would have pocketed a reasonable sum of money that would have bought anyone a few weeks worth of food. But he wasn’t looking for money. He just stood at the bottom of the stairs gazing up to the landing. The narrow corridor held three white doors that sat firmly shut. A smaller door was at the bottom of the corridor and was left ajar, exposing the toilet. My mother, brother and my rooms were equal distance apart and there was no way of telling them apart. There were no sounds that made any room stand out. No label saying ‘keep out’ or our names with a cheesy sign attached in pink or blue writing to show the intruder which room to avoid or enter. But he didn’t need visual aids to help him find what he was looking for; he could already sense where it was. He closed his eyes and swallowed the lump in his throat as he began to get second thoughts about what he was going to do. They had never asked him to do anything like this before and after he did, there was no going back. He thought about how everyone in my house and anyone connected to my family would be affected.
The neighbouring family, that gave mine a polite nod when we saw each other from time to time would be putting an extra lock on their door tomorrow night because of this. The old lady that has lived alone across the road for the last fifteen years would move within a month because of the incident. The local news would be at my front door reporting on the tragedy, giving the public an update on the situation, until they became bored and another great story replaced it. All my family would gather together trying to support each other. My grandmother would move in to help through the disaster; trying to give my mother answers that she didn’t know the answer to herself. It would take my brother weeks to stop crying and he would only start feeling something other than numbness, after months of morning. He then thought about me. He had been watching this quiet, innocent girl go to and from school each day, content in the normality of her routine. He knew that the person that would be most effected by this was me. He looked to the ground and a sickly feeling hit his stomach as he acknowledged that if he did this I would never recover. He knew that I would never be that innocent happy girl again, and it was because of him. But none of this stopped the man from looking up, gripping his fist and making his way up the stairs. Before anyone in the house took a second breath he was in my room and standing over my bed. I lay safely curled in my thick light yellow blanket blissfully sleeping.
The white carpet from the hall also coveted my room and the matching white walls made it seem bright and welcoming, even in the dark. My single bed was on the right hand side of the room, placed in the corner, next to a window. The thin yellow curtains moved softly from the breeze that squeezed through the crack in the window. I had left it ajar to make sure I didn’t overheat in the night. I had begun to wake randomly, in a pool of sweat. Only in the last few months, but enough to make me notice, disrupting the otherwise oblivious observations of myself. So the feeling of the cool air on my skin was keeping my temperature at bay. My body was resting on its side and made it easy for him to get a closer look at my calm expressionless face when he crouched down. The floorboards under the cream carpet by my bed creaked under his feet. It was the first sound he had made since invading the house and his shoulders tensed as he watched for my reaction. But I didn’t move, and there was no indication that anyone had woken in the house. He promptly relaxed, realising he over reacted because a few seconds later my computer made a loud gurgling sound and I still didn’t respond.
