The Donner mansion

   For the last hundred years, people had stated that the Donner mansion was haunted. People claimed ghost lived there and that’s why people never went there anymore. Professor Marcus Stevens and his assistant Vanessa arrived in town just to check out the mansion, in order to put to rest the legend of the so-called ghosts. Professor Stevens was not a believer of the supernatural and was decided, in his spare time; to debunk any silly beliefs people might still have around the globe. He had chosen the Donner mansion because it was a very well known place, not only in the region but nationwide. People talked about how real the experiences there were and the professor wanted to end all of that.

 To be honest, he had personal reasons. Silly beliefs had left his grandfather helpless. When he was younger, his grandpa was suffering from a strange disease. He asked his mother and practically everyone in the family to take him to the hospital but they wouldn’t, saying it was the will of God and that if He intended grandpa to be cured, it would be done that way.  Even as a child, Marcus was restless, even trying to sneak into the house a doctor he had picked up from the phone book. But to no avail, as his parents forbid it and his grandpa died days later.

 When he grew up, he decided to study science and prove everything, make the world a more realistic place, getting rid of all the magical creatures, the folk tales and the silly beliefs that took lives like his grandfather’s every single day around the world. Since he was eighteen, he had left home and didn’t talk to any family member but he soon made lots of friends in the scientific circles, so there was no sadness or longing for the past. He hated his pasts, his family’s beliefs and all that had to do with that. He decided he could live very well without his parents or anyone else from his family close to him.

 The first thing they did was travelling to the town of Rensal, where the mansion was locate, and talk to many people there. The idea was to make something like a survey, in order to better understand the phenomenon that people claimed happened often in and around the mansion. They set up their headquarters in a small hotel room and they would interview people in the lobby. It was an old town in the mountains and now it was a ski paradise in the winter but it was not yet that season so there were not many people around.

 Many told them that the mansion got “more active” during the summer, when less people were visiting. This was odd as, in many other towns, the occurrences happened always in the months when tourists were in larger numbers. Anyway, that didn’t mean it wasn’t a hoax, it just meant people in this town were probably not manipulating the events occurring in the house, or at least not in a large scale. In one week, they had already interviewed more than one hundred people and that was more than enough to make a survey that showed which were the most frequent activities inside.

 Apparently, people saw lights inside the house despite the manor being disconnected from the power grid, many people also testified seen people there wearing old clothes and ignoring them and the small group of people that had entered the house told him that the walls were covered in some strange goo, yellow in color and with a terrible smell. Besides that there was the usual: voices, lights that went in and out, strange sounds, the feeling of being touched… Marcus and Vanessa knew them all from their other experiences and were ready to debunk the tales of Donner mansion.

 The following week was used to enter the house. The plan was to go into the mansion every afternoon, three whole hours. They would carry special equipment to detect metals, radioactivity and other events that may seem strange but were very normal in a old house. They had done it a million times. The first day, on Monday, they entered the house with care as the front porch seemed to be damped and the wood that formed it seemed to be in the verge of breaking into several pieces. They went along with Xavier, an old friend of Marcus who loved the whole hunted house experience. He wasn’t a scientist but gladly helped as he thought it was a very cool thing to do.

 The first thing they felt was cold. Despite very warm temperatures on the outside, the house remained as cold as in the winter. They measured the temperature, noted it down, and proceeded to another room, crossing a large hall with care. The place was not dark as the afternoon light entered the house through the high windows all around the hall but it was very strange as the glass was not transparent but had various colors. It was like walking around a circus fair ride.

 The first room they entered after that happened to be the kitchen. It smelled awful, as if someone had left food to rot there. But that didn’t make sense as no one had lived there for the last hundred years. Vanessa put on some gloves and took out the food that was rotting in the fridge. There was a moldy cheese, meat and a chicken breast, all covered in green and smelling awful. However, Vanessa was able to recover a plastic covering from behind the food and put that in one of their own plastic bags.

 Vanessa had been with Marcus for a long time. She started as a student of his in a physics class back in the university but they had formed a nice friendship that had consolidated just after she had graduated. In the blink of an eye, Marcus had hired her to be his assistant in the university and proposed her to be his assistant in these trips too. Vanessa did not hesitate, as she thought it was a very cool thing to do and she confessed that she had always been bored out of her mind when friends started talking about the possibilities of life after death, ghosts and all that supernatural crap. She even had proven to them how the Ouija board was all about conditioned thinking, a fake in simple terms.

 After finding the rotten food, Xavier stepped on a weak part of the kitchen and the floor broke beneath his feet. He twisted his ankle and both Marcus and Vanessa had to help him out of the mansion and to the medical center down in town. It was good that Marcus had asked a local to be there with a car in case they needed help, so he took Xavier away and they had to cancel the rest of the exploration for that day. They spent the night in the hospital waiting for the doctor to tell them about their friend. He was ok but he was going to have a cast and crutches. So there was no way for him to join them anymore.

 The rest of the week, Marcus and Vanessa would go into the mansion and test every single apparatus they had inside. They used the electromagnetic device to prove that the house was actually not fully disconnected from the power grid and just walking around they found thousands of small gaps and holes, which were used by the wind to enter and make strange noises. All very natural.  The cold feeling inside the hosue was explained because of the location of the house, just in the way a small air current that went down the mountain, covered in snow all year, towards the valley were the town was located.

 The only thing that hadn’t been able to prove wrong was the presence of unknown people inside the house; even some wearing old robes, from the times when the mansion was built. They decided to plant several cameras all around the house and stay one more week. Marcus wanted to go away as soon as possible because, although he found it all to be very interesting and even funny, he also wanted to properly rest this summer before the classes began again. He didn’t have much time to spare and this time he wanted to think more about himself than about work or others.

 However, the cameras didn’t show anything. She stayed in front of the monitors for hours, even falling asleep in front of them but they had not picked up anything, not a real person, not a floating person, nothing. On the last day, the moment they were packing, something happened. One of the cameras picked up kind of a shade crossing the front side of the house, apparently entering the mansion. Back in his home, Marcus checked the video various times. He could explain the shadow; it was probably the sun and the surrounding trees. But there was a moment when a face seemed to appear and the door opened a bit, and it was a heavy wooden door.

 For the first time ever, Marcus decided he didn’t care. He didn’t believe he was a ghost and he knew there was an explanation to everything that happened in that place and in places like that all over the world. But the truth was he was tired, growing fed up with filling his life with meaningless things. He had to admit he still resented their family but that, however, he was in need of someone to hug and that feeling appeared to him, like a ghost, every single morning.

 There was nothing supernatural in Donner mansion but there was something missing, something rather natural, from Marcus’s life and he didn’t know exactly what it was or how to get it.

My Right Toe

  Stupidly, I had bumped my foot into a chair. By night, my big toe was a big red ball throbbing and hurting horribly. My beautiful partner helped me a bit but he was too grossed out by it so I had to take this matter into my own hands. Resisting the pain, I tried to make the blood and pus that had formed when the nail got stuck right into the flesh.

 After along time of moaning and panting, I dried my wound, cleaning it with all kind of products and then putting a bandage al around my toe to keep it free from infection. My sleep was not very good and, the next morning, I saw it still hurt a lot. Before leaving for work, Patrick told me to call Laura, a neighbor that happened to be a nurse. Mondays were her day of and she might be able to help on what to do with my toe.

 I called her on the cell and she came right away. We had helped Laura moving in after divorcing her husband and we had become great friends. Also, she left her daughter with us when she had to stay too late at work and her sister wasn’t able to babysit. The little one was adorable and we liked to have her in order to watch a lot of children movies and give her all kinds of bad and good food.

 After examination, Laura told me to call the pharmacy and ask for something to reduce the swelling of my toe that should be good if I stayed a couple of days at home. It would heal eventually but not if I worked too hard on it, and as my work consisted on walking a lot, this meant I couldn’t go anywhere.

 After Laura left, I called my office in order to tell them I wouldn’t be able to go for a couple of days because of an accident. My partner there got very worried and threatened to come home later and, before I could tell her it was all ok, she had hung up. The drugs from the pharmacy took some time to arrive and it was odd, for me, to receive the deliveryman wearing my pajamas barefoot. I didn’t really like not wearing socks or footwear but Laura had been adamant about it. The man warned me that the pills made you sleepy, which I loved instantly.

 When the man had left, I took one of the pills and swallowed it with a big gulp of water. I had never been very good at taking medicine, even the simplest ones. Maybe it was because my mother was so overprotective when I was little and she kept trying for me to take vitamins and codfish oil. She forced me so often; I think I created an utter dislike for anything that comes from a pharmacy or from a doctor.

 Patrick called shortly afterwards to check on me. I told him I couldn’t move a lot, only applying some hot water on my toe every so often. He sent me a kiss and promised to be there as soon as he could, which I knew was not very soon because he was an assistant in a sports team and those people loved to stay in one place talking and arguing for hours and hours and even if they didn’t have an incoming match, they would discuss all the games they had seen during the weekend, which could take some time.

 I personally didn’t like sports that much but when I met Patrick he tried to make me be a little sportier. He failed tremendously although now I can watch a whole football game without the need to check my phone every five seconds or pretending to go to the bathroom. I do get bored still but I guess love can conquer all differences, if one is committed enough.

 It was funny that when I turned on the TV, a tennis match was on. Then the doorbell rang and, slowly, I walked to the door. Strangely, my foot felt heavier, more swollen even. Didn’t the anti-inflammatory work? It was Laura and her little daughter. The little one was carrying a green backpack and a doll in her arms. They both came in and then Laura started talking fast: apparently her sister had a problem with her car and she had to go and help so she wondered if I could take care of her daughter Amanda.

-       Sure.

 To be quite honest, I don’t really get children that much. I mean, I like Amanda a lot but Patrick is always around when she comes in and he’s such a good guy with kids: he knows lots of games (or maybe his improvisation is really good) and kids like him a lot because his funny and just great.

Me, however, not so much. I mean, I can be creative because it’s part of my job but being a only child and having no close relatives younger than me, I never had the experience to take care of any of them.

 My first idea was to change the channel and put on some cartoons. I had no idea what kids Amanda’s age liked to see. Actually, I realized I had no idea how old she was. So I asked. She was so interested in the cartoon that she only put one hand up, with all her fingers stretched. Then I saw one more on the other hand, that she hadn’t put up. So seven years old.

-       I haven’t had breakfast. Are you hungry?

 She nodded, not really paying attention to what I had said. I went, slowly, to the kitchen. I almost hit a counter in the kitchen with my feet and had to cover my mouth to curse. The kid, luckily, didn’t turn to look at me. Apparently cartoons were much more interesting than the limping man in the apartment.

 After a fast look, I realized we had nothing good for a child to eat. Both Patrick and me ate granola for breakfast and I was sure kids didn’t like that. But I did so I poured some on a bowl with almond milk, because I’m weird that way. I found, at the back of a cupboard, a few cookies covered in chocolate. Was she allowed to have sweets this early in the day?

-       Amanda?

-       Yeah?

-       What would you like to eat?

-       Mm…

 She took quite a long time to say she was rather thirsty. Luckily, we always had plenty of fresh orange juice so I poured some for her on a small glass, which I thought was best for a child. I put it in front of her, in the coffee table, but I didn’t know if she had seen me. Her eyes looked as if she had been hypnotized or something. Then, the doorbell rang again.

 Apparently the doorman let anyone in, as it was a man handling pamphlets for a new Chinese restaurant. I told him we only needed one menu but he forced a bunch on my hands. As I couldn’t move, that was most probably a crime, or so I thought. I closed the door but then it was the intercom ringing. My toe was throbbing more than ever when I answered: we had bought a new dining table and I had totally forgotten about it.

 So for the following thirty minutes, I had a child drinking juice and watching TV, two men trying to get everything in the tiny elevator and then out, a bunch of useless restaurant menus and a toe hurting like mad. I was already cursing my luck when an older lady, a neighbor, came to complain about the noise the guys from the furniture store were making. I tried to be nice but then the old bat put her cane right on top of my foot.

 I don’t know if it was on purpose but I pushed the lady aside and made her fall on a chair by the door. Then the man in the living room dropped the table heavily, scaring the life out of Amanda, who screamed loudly and starting crying noisily. The man dragged the chairs in, as I helped the old lady up. I then screamed at them for damaging my floor and the lady fell again and I almost fell with her but apparently faith hates my foot as one of the guy’s dropped a chair right on it.

 I cursed so loud and hard everyone stopped making a noise and just stared at me, like I was mad or something. Then, I saw Patrick’s face and he was visibly confused by everything.

-       I got the day off… What’s going on?

 Behind him was Victoria, my partner at the office. She looked worried.

 Done with the world, I just decided to fall onto the sofa and let him deal with everything. Finally, with a huge pain on my foot and the sounds of people crying and screaming and talking again, I fell asleep. The medications had kicked in.

Afterlife

He wasn't stopping, not even to breathe. It was amazing and awful, incredible and horrible. He had entered the church, were members of the Cataclysm Circle had come to take shelter after the Alliance had pushed them from one side to the other of the Arno river.

We were exhausted but he, the Creature some called it, seemed to be unstoppable, never being tired, not thinking his actions more than once. He was driven by anger, despair and grief. Just pain, that was it for him and it showed.

No one really knew how, but he could use all the power of his mind. With only thinking of it, he elevated people from the ground ant threw them across the room, not caring if they broke their necks or their legs. He was merciless and no one tried to stop him, at least not us.

He had been known as Adrian. He was a legend of the war as he and a rather small group of people had died activating a bomb inside the castle were the supreme chief of the Cataclysm Circle lived. They had been able to destroy the core of the organization but that didn't seem to hurt them as much as everyone had thought. Not all members of the Alliance had died back then, some of them knew who he was and that's why some still referred to him as Adrian.

Now, that dead man was throwing people from one side to the other, choking them with his mind and stopping their hearts. In the storming of the Circle's castle, many people he loved had died. His most beloved person in the world among those. He had never wanted for all of them to be there. He had actually told the Council that he had a way to get inside without being detected, nor the bomb, and that he would use that in his advantage to destroy them

But the Council saw it as a way to become a hero and they didn't wanted any of that so they formed a team of six people to penetrate the rebel base and a latter group of thirty to knock out any remaining machines or communications of the Circle's core with the rest of the organization.

Thirty people died that day, high in the Alps, so far away from anything. Including him, or so it seemed. His body was sent to Vaduz, as the Alliance closest base was there. So many bodies, from so many parts of the continent. And there was word of so many more elsewhere.

But Adrian was not a normal human being. A week after his death, he woke up in a huge storage building. No bodies had been buried yet as there was nowhere to do it. Luckily for Adrian, anyhow. He stood up there, in the middle of the place and cried in silence. He knew he was never supposed to come back but he did anyway. Before guards realized he was inside, he saw the familiar faces he had loved so much and his tears were simply not enough for the pain he felt.

And now, he had already finished his raid on the church. Fellow soldiers entered the place and scouted for survivors or men Adrian had maybe missed. But no, that wasn't the case. Everyone there was dead and he knew it.

Without saying a word, he had vanished. No one worried though, because he always came back.

Weeks later, word was that he had meet with the Council. If gossip was to be believed, they were not very happy to hear he had massacred all the Circle's soldiers inside the church. They told him that the Alliance didn't wanted the world to think they would do just about anything to stop their enemies. They told Adrian that they couldn't be linked with a person which such a particular background, so he needed to calm down in order to join them in future missions.

Well, the rest was not gossip as many people heard Adrian himself speak. He exited the room were the meeting was being held and got to the main hall, were many people were working with wounded or preparing strategies. He told everyone he would be leaving the Alliance to work by his own account. He encouraged everyone to defeat the Cataclysm Circle, fast and with little or no casualties.
Adrian told them he had to much hate inside and that no person working to accomplish a goal should be driven by hatred.

What happened after, again, was subject of interpretation and depended on the information people received from few that claimed to have seen Adrian. Some fisherman in Norway, claimed he had travelled by foot to Bergen. There, a fish saleswoman claimed he had worked for her for some time until he decided to leave for the Americas, or so she claimed he told her.

But no one in that side of the world ever said anything about a man with extraordinary powers. Many, even after the war had ended, insisted on finding him. They were sure he couldn't die and possibly not age, either. So he had to be alive somewhere. Those people looking for him desperately, were the ones disappointed with the new government, which had failed to guarantee basic rights and many other things they had fought for. They believed Adrian could bring them that freedom they wanted, so they looked for him.

Years passed until a farmer in eastern Iceland claimed to have been helped by a man that seemed ravaged by war. He claimed the man didn't spoke at all but he volunteered with signs to work for him, helping with the sheep and the pigs. The farmer told papers that he was the best worker he had ever had. When asked what happened with that man, the farmer said he didn't know. He just disappeared on day, after finishing his chores.

Almost a decade after that event, even less people remembered Adrian and his exceptional mind. Only a small group of people insisted on finding him. They would travel around with their own money to look for clues of Adrian's whereabouts.

They finally found an old fisherman that claimed to have been saved by a merman, off the coast of Greenland. The small group of investigators flew to Kangerlussuaq and spoke with the fisherman but they soon believed to have been duped. The story did not make sense and the man was so old he might have been just inventing nonsense.

The fisherman's son told them he always told people that story, and he frankly had no idea why. He even said the merman took care of him for several days but that was ridiculous.

The fisherman's cottage was a little bit far from the main town so the small group stayed there to rest before their journey back home. The fisherman's son prepared a delicious fish stew and they all talked and joked all night long, drinking liquor, having fun without thinking in nothing else.

They left the following morning. After they did so, the fisherman's son went back to his usual duties: caring of the man that had actually saved him before becoming senile. He had saved him from drowning and the man responded by giving him a home and support. Adrian would never forget that.

Dear diary

Day 1

Hey book! Well, I'm kinda wasted and you're my birthday present so let's get it rolling !!

God, I'm bored. Is it ok to be bored when you've had like thirty screwdrivers? I mean, I kinda get all horny and crazy when I drink but now I'm just so bored, you know?... No, I mean, how would you know. You're a book. What an idiot.

Well, besides this stupid thing, I only got this cute blouse and some earring and bracelet. And not much more. Oh yeah. My man gave me a surprise. Get ready for it... HE SLEPT WITH SOMEONE ELSE ! What a fucking shocker, isn't it? And you know what is the worst, besides IT ALL, of course? The fact that I found him in bed fucking someone else. The bed we had shared many times. How fun is that?

Do you want even more fun? Cool. He was fucking a dude. Yeah, like you heard it. I so his ass and dick before he hid from me like a fucking weasel, as if I was going to attack him or whatever. Well, no. I'm a lady, dammit! I behave properly in all social events, even in those where my boyfriends, or ex boyfriend to be more precise, is banging a guy. Yeah, I'm a queen of the people.

So yeah, that's my beautiful, awesome, fucking present. Great, right? I can't wait for Christmas. Maybe I'll get vaginal warts or some shit. Or maybe I'll be hit by a truck. From now on, everything goes downhill, right?

Fuck, I'm tired and bored and whatever.  Bye, diary.

Day 2

Hello. Well... it's weird because I feel I have to apologize for what I wrote last week. I was so down in the dumps, so hurt and angry and I wanted to kill with my bare hands. I didn't wanted to write again because, who cares about this in the end. But I realized it may be good for my mental health if I get things out before they start poisoning my brain.

I normally don't curse that much. Only when I'm really pissed or drunk. Last week, I was both. Then again, how do you handle it? I ask myself over and over again: "How are you going to cope with this and move on?". Well, tough luck for me because it ain't easy. That's the truth.

Thank God, and my social skills, I have many good friends and they have all said something different: some think I should forgive him, others that I should have revenge, others that I forget what happen and move on to the next one. But I can't do any of those because it feels unnatural to just do something without really thinking what it means.

I think I should note that Gary and I had been together for a little more than a year. I never noticed anything strange or particular and he never told me he liked guys. I mean, I even asked him once if he would ever have sex with a guy, even in a threesome with one girl, and he said no. That was like a chance for him to tell me the truth but he didn't.

I don't know what to do as he has called me, asking to see me to explain but I don't want that. I'm hurt but I try to understand and it's hard. I'm heartbroken, yes. But, mostly, I'm disappointed by the lie. I felt like he was my friend and the fact that he didn't tell me something hurts much more and the cheating part.

Well, I guess things find their way to correct themselves, and slowly fade away... Let's see what happens.

Day 3

Fucking day... Sorry, wrong way to open a... conversation, of sorts. But I'm so pissed right now. My boss has been asking both my legs and arms and then yells at me like a mad doh in front of everyone because I dare to demand I raise. All the work he claims it's his, it all comes from me. And I've just had it so I was fired. Yeah, so, life's fucking me twice I guess.

Then again, work had always been like this but I guess I confronted my boss in a moment he was specially sensitive and man have i been sensitive too these days. So I guess it was bound to happen, something big like this.

I haven't told anyone yet, though. My parents are going to worry and argue with me and my friends will roll their eyes or give me support that, at the end of the day, is all words but nothing to really to hold on to.

And the other thing I should tell is that... Well, Gary called me while I was picking up my things from work and I just bursted into tears and told him what was happening. I know I said I hadn't told anyone but he just called in my most vulnerable moment. He even showed up, helped me carry a couple of boxes to his car and then invited me lunch.

I hate myself for writing this but... I remembered what it felt to love him, to care for him. And right after I would hate myself for thinking of him as a nice memory after he did what he did. I asked him for the explanations he had wanted me to hear and it was worse. Worse because I couldn't blame him. I had met his parents and they are the most conservative couple I have ever met. They go to church and to conservative rallies and the woman is worried every time of what her husband might say and the guy is the biggest bigot you can think of.

Gary told me he always felt attracted to guys but his family almost made him like girls so he dated girls and had sex with them, from high school until now. But his dad had suffered a heart attack recently and apparently that changed it all for him. He told me he wanted to end with me on better terms and couldn't and then met this guy online and invited him to his house...

I mean, I cannot forgive him for lying. I can't because he had choices. But I understand why he did what he did and it's better now that I know some more about him. I love him still, there's no point in denying it. Maybe I would be able to transform that into a nice friendship but, for now, he's just a nice guy that was there today when I needed a shoulder to cry on.

Day 4

Man, I have written so little in here. Only four times and so much has happened during that time. It's crazy... Well, i was fired a month ago. That's the last time I wrote. After that I told everyone about my job, although I only told my closest friends about my encounter with Gary.

Well, first and most important, I got a new job. A friend directed me to her uncle and I'm working with him on advertising for local brands. It's cool, not really what I was used too but it's cool and I do need the money so, it doesn't hurt at all.

I have seen Gary again and I think we can be friends. You know, it's weird to imagine that with someone you have slept with. It seems strange to treat someone like a friend but knowing their "sex face". I actually said that the other day and Gary laughed and tried to do my "sex face" and they I did his and we had a blast.

What I'm certain of is that I don't want to commit to anything right now, other than my job and my responsibilities as friend, daughter and sister. I don't want another relationship. As I said a month ago, I understand Gary but cannot trust him easily and same goes with other men. I'm just afraid people are going to lie to me again but... I guess it's bound to happen right? We're human after all.

To replace to need for attention and love, I got a cat from a neighbor who was giving away kittens from the couple she owns. I named him Snowcone, because he's all black except for the face. I was thinking of Vanilla but he's a male so it would have been kind of misleading to people. He's always close and cuddles with me... I don't know, I need that now. Here's hoping I don't become a crazy old cat woman.

Well dear diary, you have a been a very nice gift after all. You have prevented me from becoming insane and, after all, don't we all need something like this? We need to speak up, loud and clear sometimes in order to make our voices heard, even if it for ourselves. We need to tell ourselves that we are not freaks. We're just people. Right?

One thing

It was dark and rainy outside. It had been raining for almost two days, non-stop. It seemed like it never end.

Inside the hospital, only some patients were aware of the weather. One of them was Alfred, Alfie if you went by what his mom called him. She had been there some hours ago to tell him how the family was going. He had been absent from home for almost a week and things, as expected, had continued without him present.

He was sitting on the leather sofa the room had by the window. He couldn't see much from the outside but he felt better feeling the raindrops and the cold through the glass rather than being laying on the bed. He had no need for more sleep and would have loved to have a book, his computer or something to distract himself from the hospital.

But then again, his books were at home and his father had forbid his mother and siblings from taking anything from the house for him. And his laptop had been destroyed in the "accident", or at least that was what the policemen that had visited him said.

So, he only had the rain to spend time with and, after the first minutes it was already a bore. And the memories of the "accident" settled in every five seconds... Accident! How dare they say it had been an accident. Since when is a brutal attack considered an accident? The laptop was smashed to the ground, that is after they had used it against Alfie. His head was still hurting after that. They had kicked him several times, punched him, hit him with his laptop and they even spitted on him.

He went to the bathroom and looked at his scars, again. It was something of an obsession looking at the scratches on his face, the bruised skin all over his body and his now funny finger. He had no idea how or why but that one finger was always cold, as if it was dead.

A little bit embarrassed with himself, a stupid notion, he opened his robe and saw more bruises and scars from both the attack and the operations. They had told him he had being hit on the pelvis severely so that's why his that part hurt more than any other. Not that he was interested in having children or anything like that but he did plan to use his penis again. The doctor said he wasn't sure of the state of his reproductive organs and that further tests were needed to know if would all work again as usual.

Alfie walked back to his bed and sat there, grabbing his feet. Doctor Mason told him that same morning that he had been in a very frail state and they even feared for his life but, thankfully, the procedures and medications had call worked perfectly. Although he wasn't the fittest guy around, his body had healed almost completely very fast. His immune system was incredible, according to one of the nurses.

But that didn't fixed it all for him. What if those two men had hit him with a baseball bat or cut him with a knife. The police said they normally didn't use guns but who they might be exceptions to the rule.

He wasn't scared anymore. He had no real reason to be. He was more worried about the consequences of it all. His father now had even more reasons to be against him and no so-calle frienda had cone to visit. He felt really alone. His mother didn't count because he knew she too was worried about her husbands attitude and she had no intention to contradict him.

Alfie decided to think about something else, other than his father, but that was to no good. He had just realized of the amount of info that had been lost for the foundation. He had been trusted with a very important report and now all that work was gone. They had destroyed it all: cellphone, hard drives, usb devices and, of course, his laptop.

As he laid down on the bed, he thought that only a few coincidence were necessary to be lost forever. He never stayed that late or liked to be entrusted with so many responsibilities but that week it was all different because he had decided to go on and live by himself. He knew the costs were barely affordable but he didn't mind at all. He jus wanted to be a bit more free, more in charge of his life.

He stepped out of the Rainbow Foundation at ten o'clock at night and walked to the nearest bus stop. He had sensed someone close or watching but he ignored it until a tall, bald guy stopped him a block away from the bus stop, asking for the time. Well, he wasn't really interested in that.

The rest was all a blur. He remembered parts and pieces but not the whole puzzle. Then he woke up and they told him he had been on the hospital for three days.

His father had always been against him working for such an organization and now he had all the reasons to hate all about it even more. He disapproved of Alfie and that hurt him every day. But there wasn't much to do about that. Alfie had moved on from trying to impress his dad, to not caring what he thought of his son. It just didn't mattered any more.

Two days passed until he was allowed to leave the hospital. When got home he told his parents about moving out. He wasn't asking for anything, just letting them know.

He did move out a month after after the attack. The foundation had not blamed him for the lost data and congratulated him for his work and effort. It was no.mystery all of it was a good thing for them as fundraisers began to invest money in them in the light of such a vicious attack on "the foundation".

He didn't really care about all of that. They gave him a big bonus on christmas, gave him a raise and a better position. He was happy for all of it until the police came back, in order to interrogate him. They had captured a group of skinheads that had been blamed for various hate crimes in the city and they wanted him to see them, in order for them to be sure they were the ones.
Well, at least one of them was. Alfie confessed he only saw one of the guys, so he could only be sure of that.

After that he went home, his new home and thought of the face of the attacker and all the good that one bad action had in his life. The guy had no idea but he had made him better, stronger to face life's many challenges.

The Hunt

He let his body fell into the water. It felt like ice surrounding him but he didn't mind at all. He spend a whole minute below water, before he had to emerge again, a bit less dizzy.

The lake was almost pitch black at this time of night, only the moon casted some light over the water and the nearby trees.

The man pulled out of the water, on the other side of the lake, and stripped down, entering the water again, now naked. The water felt less chilly now but he shivered anyway, his teeth chattering also.

He swam a few meters away from the shore but came back after his buttocks and feet started to hurt from the cold. As he had no way of drying himself with a towel, he remained naked, sitting down on a big rock, waiting for the water to slide down his body.

As he stroke his skin to get the water off, he heard the barking of dogs, far away, on the other side of the lake. So he had run far faster than them but they were still looking for him. He kept drying himself with his hands, making a special effort to hear every single sound on the forest.

Again, he heard the dogs, nearer. He grabbed his clothes and hid among some trees and waited there. Sure enough, a group of five men, each with a german Shepard dog, scouted the area, walking fast all along the shore. The dogs seemed puzzled as his scent ended there, in the edge of the lake. They were there for almost an hour, even checking the water with a flashlight.

After the hour, they left, entering the forest on the other side. The man could finally breath at ease and came out of the trees again. He left his clothes on the floor and sat down. He began to think on all that had happened that night. It was unreal to him, it seemed like a really bad prank. But it wasn't. Somehow, all of it happened.

He gazed at the clothes and saw that they still had stains of blood all over. Even if he got rid of the stains, he knew the police was aware of his clothes when he escaped their custody, so he decided to dig a hole and put them there. As he covered it all with dirt, he watched the sky: the night was clear and beautiful. He could see all the stars above and the constellations. He finally found the North Star and stood up.

He pointed at the star and moved his hand down, to a point behind the trees he had been hiding on went the dogs and police came. He then washed his hands, stomped on the ground to make it seem natural and then penetrated the forest.

The man walked for several hours and when he finally got to the edge of the forest, he encountered a road. No car was visible. it must have been really early in the morning and he knew it wasn't wise to be a naked guy near a road as it would be very suspicious.

He decided to cross the land, away from all roads or paths. His skin got scratched and hurt several times by barb wire and other elements that separated every single lot on his path.

That night, he didn't sleep. He just couldn't and wouldn't either. He decided to keep walking and when he got tired, he just lay on the ground, preferably on grass or against a tree, were shadows protected him.

The next day, he passed by a house that appeared to be empty. He grabbed some sweatpants and a hoodie from their clothes line and then stood by the back door for several minutes. He doubted if he should go inside or maybe try some other site. He needed shoes and socks, if he could find them. His feet were in very bad shape.

He finally decided to go in, as he was desperate and waiting was not an option. He knocked on the door and shouted "Hello?". He preferred, if people were inside, to be believed a homeless man and not a crazy killer or something.

The first room was the kitchen and his stomach growled instantly. He looked on the cupboard and grabbed some bread and drank milk that he found in the refrigerator. When he was done, he walked to the next room, the dining room. Connected to a sitting room.

Everything was so well done, so well decorated. There were pictures too, of a happy family: Mom, Dad, an older son and two younger daughters.

 - Who are you?

Scared by the voice of a young girl, the man dropped the picture and the glass shattered into a thousand pieces on the ground.

The girl was standing not too far from him. She was holding a knife. She looked 14, maybe older. She was wearing pijamas and slippers.

 - What are you doing here?
 - Please...
 - I'm calling the police.
 - No! Please. No...

The girl did not move from her spot. She got closer as he walked back to the kitchen. There, the girl opened a drawer and pulled out a gun. She left the knife on the counter. Pointing at him, she talked again:

 - Why did you took our clothes?
 - I was... I don't have clothes. Just, let me go, please.

The man gave a few steps towards the back door but the girl charged the gun and yelled " Don't you move!". The man, too weak to argue, fell on his knees and begged her to let him go. He swore he wasn't a thief or a murderer. He only needed clothes as he was escaping.

 - So you belong to the police. What innocent person escapes?

He gazed up and looked her, straight to her eyes.

 - Someone who is desperate.

On that precise moment, the girl flinched. The guy took advantage of this and stood up fast, pushing the door hard and running as fast as he could. The girl stood on the door and fired three times but she seemed to have failed her target.

When her parents got home, she told them all about the intruder. Her dad called the police and officers scouted the area but no one was found. However, some blood did appear on some corn crops belonging to the family's neighbor.

No one ever saw that man again. Months after his intrusion into that house, they found the clothes he had taken in a bin inside a restaurant located 20 kilometers to the north. But they never stopped looking for him. He was believed to be the killer of, at least, six people in the most brutal way possible. but the truth was even more twisted and difficult to believe. It was easier to hunt him down.