The Main Character

I’m awake again, at least I think I am, it’s hard to tell, I have no idea how long I’ve been out for… It’s hard to tell, it could have been a day, it could have been an hour. Still nothing, no sound, no light and no food. I’m starving. I pull myself to my feet and stagger to the door, shouting, begging to be heard, acknowledged, I just need to know that I’m not alone, I need to know that someone is there.

Hours pass, I don’t know how many… I pounded on the cell door until my fists were bloody, let me out! please! The chalk on the wall is mocking me, it is incomplete, unfinished and I hate it, I grab my thin mattress and slam it against my artwork, the light filtering in is dull and I can see my target; I rub the mattress against the wall, I will wipe away this chalk, I will erase it all if I can’t finish it. My first attempt proves unsuccessful, I won’t be defeated, I spot the toilet… Why didn’t I think about this before?

I kick at the tank, two birds with one stone; I’ll saturate my mattress to wipe away the chalk and I’ll have a drink, I’m so thirsty.

The tank cracks and water leaks out everywhere, I destroy what’s left of it, I’m so thirsty I drink until I almost drown, choking and spluttering before I go back for more.

The floor is quickly being flooded, my mattress saturated, exactly as planned! I swing it into the wall and get to work, the chalk smudged and my artwork destroyed, again and again I lift and slam the soaked mattress into my work, I want it gone!

It took less than an hour, what remains is nothing more than a black blur, a blob of nothing, it feels good to smile again, I feel like I have accomplished something, this feels like a victory.

The toilet is still leaking and I am still hungry, the momentary feeling of triumph is fleeting, fear is setting back in, I don’t even care now about why I have been left here to die, I care not for explanations, all I know is that I want to survive this.

Again I bang on my door, I shout and scream, nothing.

The panel below leads to the outside, if I could get it open there might just be something in range I could reach, anything at all, any hope I can get.

I push the panel hard, trying to create the right amount of friction to slide it open, even just a crack. The panel slides, I almost cried out in delight, I pry it open the rest of the way with my fingertips, open, now I need luck, anything in reach on the floor outside, a key, a gun, a pipe, anything.

My hand finds something, small but heavy, pointy; a rock, I don’t care I’ll take it and work out what’s next, it feels a little bigger than the opening I’m reaching through, but that doesn’t mean I’ll give up!

I finally get a good grip on the rock and clutch it tight, it feels like a piece of concrete, a brick, part of a wall, I yank it toward me but as I expected the rock is larger than the hole, it catches the outside of the opening and I stupidly bring the cell door straight into my face…

…

The door opened. The door was UNLOCKED! I’ve never been so happy, even with the blood now dripping down my forehead, I’m free!

I stand and pull the door open, it was unlocked the whole time! What an idiot, I even laugh at myself, but the levity doesn’t last long; outside my cell, everything has been destroyed, the hallway walls are gone, nothing but rubble, every other cell is open and empty, no inmates, no guards, just me, I’m still alone, what the hell happened here?