EPT(English is not my native language so I excuse for any missspells and bad grammar)
The spider slowly crawled up her arm. A prickly sensation spread through her body, causing goose bumps on her bare skin. She imagined that the goose bumps covering her arm were mountains the spider had to cross to reach her hand where it could rest. But when the spider finally reached the hand, she picked it up with the other, and put it right back where it started. Mary wasn't scared of spiders, not even the big ones her ma' sometimes found nesting in the corners of the small apart-ment. Her ma' didn't like spiders like she did. When she one day discovered one in her hair, she screamed so loud that the neighbors knocked on the door only to find her sobbing on a chair with a broken cup and a smashed spider in front of her. Mary never told her that she was the one who put it there. From that moment on, no spiders were allowed in the house. Mary tried to argue that the spiders were doing no harm, that they actually helped by catching flies and mosquitoes, but Ma' wouldn't listen. But Mary trapped a spider outside in a jar and hid it under the bed. Sometimes she would take it out and play with it. It was not a big spider. It was more of an average sized one so it didn't need a lot of food. But still she tried to catch as many flies, and once every day when Ma' was at work, she would crawl under the bed and feed the flies to it. She had named
the spider Sir Hugh. Hugh was her father’s name, and she had added the Sir because the spider looked so elegant with its white
crucifix on its back. Sir Hugh had just reached her hand for the third time when she was called from the kitchen.
"Mary! It's time for supper, hurry in here!"
She carefully placed the spider inside the jar, spread today's catch of flies in the bottom and put the lid back on.
"Mary! Where are you, we gotta hurry, you know Ma' has to work."
She pushed herself out from under the bed, fast as a mouse and was already sitting on top of it with her hands innocently placed in her lap when Ma' entered.
"Where were you?" She said, her eyes judgingly narrowed down to a small crack.
"I've been here the whole time Ma'" Mary said with a big smile.
"Hmm, well come on then, foods getting cold"
They ate their food standing in the kitchen, the only other room in the apartment is the bedroom where they squeezed in a bed and an old rocking chair that Ma' sometimes sat and read in from the light candlelight. Electricity was only used for cooking food, and to power the refrigerator. Their food consisted mostly from leftovers Ma' could buy cheap from the Diner where she worked as a waitress.
She looked worried at the clock that hung over the stove.
"Sorry sweetie I won't have time to read for you tonight, Mr. Burk demanded that I meet up earlier this month because of the holidays."
"Okay," Mary said, she was sad that Ma' had to leave, they barely spent much time together as it was. These readings before bedtime were something they had always had time for.
"Don't worry honey, tomorrow its Sunday, we will have lots of time then."
Mary nodded and gave Ma' a hug. They held each other tightly, right until Ma' looked at the clock and rushed out the door. Mary ran out to the window facing out towards the street to catch a last glimpse of her. She saw her just as she turned the corner. The street outside was dark, the only light came from the windows from her side of the street, the buildings across were abandoned because of a fire that had happened years ago, no one had money to fix it, so its walls were left to crumble and slowly decay, year after year. She said a final goodnight to Sir Hugh, blew out the last candles, and then went to bed.
The next day Mary woke by her Ma' sliding under the bed sheets next to her, still in her work uni-form. Her cloth smelled of bacon, smoke and burned food. Mary turned just to find Ma' already fast asleep. The light shined through the red velvet drapes, drapes that Ma' had inherited from her own Ma'. She drew them aside and looked outside. It looked like it was a warm day. She went into the kitchen where she opened the refrigerator and found a plate with egg and some ham. She ate half of it, leaving the rest for her Ma', dressed, and went out the door. She was halfway down the stairs when she realized that she had forgotten about Sir Hugh. She hurried upstairs where she quietly snuck under the bed. Trying not to wake Ma' she carefully took the jar out from its hiding place behind an old box of books. She almost bumped her head up in the bed when she saw what had happened. Sir Hugh was gone. The jar was lying down on its side and the lid right in front of it. She held back a little scream, afraid to wake Ma'. Where could he be? She thought, while pushing her-self out from beneath the bed. She searched the entire room trying to be as fast and thorough as possible while still being trying to be quiet. She searched everywhere, in, over, and under the refrigerator, under the sheets, checked all the corners, took every inch of the wall under investigation, even looked under the bed again. But Sir Hugh was nowhere to be found. She knew she was already late for school, but she didn't care, she had to find Sir Hugh. A little light in the dark for her was that Sir Hugh had emptied the jar from flies which meant that he was at least well fed. She concluded that Sir Hugh had left the apartment and headed out on the stairs. She ran up and down quietly repeating his name "Sir Huuuuuuugh, Sir Huuuuuuugh, where are you?"
But he wasn't on the stairs either. She went out on the street where the morning traffic was just get-ting started. She stopped the first person she saw by taking his arm, a man in a leather jacket.
"Excuse me Mr. have you seen my spider Sir Hugh?"
"Get off me nigger!" he yelled.
"I’m sorry but..."
"Go away or ill send you screaming back to your momma!"
She stepped back, frightened almost in shock over this man. Ma' always told her never to talk to strangers on her way to school. But right now Ma' was sleeping, so she didn't know, and wouldn't know. The next person she passed was an old lady, this time more careful than before she stepped in front her.
"Excuse me Madam, my name is Mary, have you seen my spider, his name is Sir Hugh."
The old lady smiled at her, grocery bags hanging from both her arms. The few teeth she had left were yellow and one of them black as the night.
"Im sorry honey I haven't seen your spider, when did you lose it?"
"Just this morning, I woke up and it was gone."
"Hmm," she said, and put down the bags. "Let me think."
She stood there for a moment, looking left and right.
"No I don't think that I have seen your spider, but I do know something that might help you find it."
"What? Please tell me!"
"You see," she says with a mysterious smile, "spiders like to play hide and seek, I know this from a friend of mine who can talk to animals just like you and I are talking right now!"
"You're lying!" Mary said with a giggle, "spiders don't talk!"
"It's true! And you know what else she told me?"
Mary shook her head still giggling.
"Spiders like to hide in the dark! But don't tell anyone else, it's a secret! We don't want the spiders to know that we cheat do we?"
"No mam, thank you for the advice."
"You are welcome sweetie."
"Can I help you with your grocery bags?"
After carrying the bags up to the old woman's apartment, she headed down to the street again, filled with hope about finding Sir Hugh. But now she did face a problem, she thought. The old woman said that spiders like to hide in dark places, but where was it dark in the middle of the day? She sat down on the pavement, staring blindly at the cracked road. She had lived here ever since her dad died and they couldn't afford their old house anymore. She gazed up at the burned out building, trying to recall the night it burned. She couldn’t though, she must have been elsewhere or asleep she thinks. She went back to thinking about Sir Hugh, and then suddenly it hit her. The answer was literally right in front of her. She jumped up and ran across the empty street, very few cars passed through here, at the most five a day, so she had never been worried about getting hit. The only thing she was worried about at the moment was Sir Hugh. She stood in front of the dark tall building casting a long shadow that stopped halfway across the street. As she came closer she realized that she was scared. It had been there her whole life, grey concrete, glass that had either been melted from the fire or broken by kids. But finding Sir Hugh was the most important thing for her. She went to the entrance, the door was gone, leaving only a dark hole. She went through. From the hot and moist inside. Into the dark and cold inside. The difference almost took away her breath. The light barely had any influence in there. She went one storey up, the door in the first apartment was still barely standing, as she pushed it aside, it made a long high pitched squeak as it slowly opened. The inside was bare, stripped from all furniture and the walls were painted with graffiti. Only the pipes were sticking out of the walls, reaching out in the empty apartment, as if they longed for someone to move back in, for people to fill the place with warmth and laughter again. There were lighter in the apartment than in the hall, still, it was very dimly. She searched the entire place, which consisted of a bathroom and a bedroom that had also served as a kitchen. The floors were covered by a thick layer of dust, leaving footprints and creating small clouds where she stepped. She looked through it, just as well as she had searched her own. Looked in every corner and spent a long time just sitting in the middle of the room looking around her, searching. Under a small brick of concrete she found a photo. The photo was of a family of four. It was in a small room, this room she presumed, most of the space was taken up by a large bed, in the picture the mother was cooking dinner, to focused on what she was doing to notice the camera. The father was sitting on the bed smiling with a kid on each leg. They looked happy. She wondered who had taken the picture, maybe another sibling? She put it back where she found it, placed the stone back on top and headed out. As she closed the door behind her it suddenly fell off its hinges. The moment the door hit the floor it made a loud noise that created an echo that went on for what felt like hours to her. When the dust finally settled, she found herself covered in white. She stood a moment, stunned by what had happened, then she heard a sound above her. It was the sound of something breaking into pieces. For a moment she thought about running, to flee from the building, and give up on Sir Hugh. But she knew that her dad would have been disappointed in her giving up on her friend that easily. She moved up the stairs, judging from the sound that it had been at least two storey's up. She went up as quiet as possible, peeking into every room she passed. They were all like the one she had just been in except that for every storey she got up, the more damaged they got. She reached the top storey where the fire had burned through big parts of the walls, leaving huge gaping holes. The holes were emitting a breath like sound from the wind going through them, making it feel like the house was full of people. She got up to the attic, there was lighter here than in the rest of the house, so she sat down on the floor to rest for a moment. She was sad, sad that she had lost her friend, sad that her Ma' always was so tired and busy, but mostly about losing Sir Hugh since he probably had gone forever. She was just about to be overwhelmed by feelings and start crying when she heard a sound that made her shriek. It came from behind a knocked over table that she hadn't noticed before now.
"Hello?" she said, "whose there?"
Frightened, but determined to find out what made the noise she slowly got up and walked to it. Behind the table sat a boy. He looked about same age as her, his blue eyes looked at her big, and frightened. He had blond hair, looked very pale and skinny and he was obviously hiding something behind his back.
"Hey," she said calmly, her heart which had been racing moments before had already slowed down to a steady beat.
He just looked scared at her.
"It's okay," she said while walking around the table with soft small steps. "I'm not going to hurt you."
He looked up, and with a voice as tiny as the tiniest thing he responded. "My Ma' says I can't talk to strangers."
She slid down next to him, he didn’t move, but looked very tense, like he was ready to flee at a moment's notice.
She thought for a while, and then said, "my name is Mary, what's yours?
"Daniel," he said after a while.
"Good, now we are not strangers anymore."
They sat in silence for a moment.
"You won't steal my bear will you?"
She now saw that he was holding a teddy bear tightly in his arms.
"No, why would I?"
"My Ma' says all niggers steal like cats."
"What's a nigger?"
"Well," he says and then hesitates, "someone like you."
"Like me?"
"Yes."
"Who is like me?"
He looked confused now; you could see he was trying to get words out of his mouth, without suc-cess though.
"Black ones!" he finally said, the words stumbling out his mouth.
"Why do you call black people niggers?"
"Ma' says black people are bad, that they are the reason wer' poor. That they steal from us!"
"I don't steal!" She said and made a face at him.
"No... I’m sorry, I didn't mean to...”
But she was already gone, down the stairs and over the road, back home.
At home she laid in bed waiting for Ma'. She's thinking about what the boy had said about her being a nigger, but she doesn't understand, she never stole anything. Well, except for the jar she held Sir Hugh in, but her Ma' didn’t have a need for that anyway! When Mary heard the key in the lock, which she always had to lock when being alone, she rushed up and hugged Ma' right away. But Ma' almost instantly held her out in her arms and looked her straight and very strict in the eyes.
"Lucie told me that Ingrid said to her that you didn't meet for school today."
Lucie was one of Ma's coworkers who also had a daughter in the same school as Mary.
"I’m sorry but..."
"You know you can't do that! You got me really worried, where were you?"
"Just outside... A boy called me nigger today."
She sat down on the rocking chair which immediately started moving.
"Why did he do that Ma'"
"I don't know...” she said her voice barely hearable "some people just are that way."
"But Ma' he said that..."
"It's time for dinner soon," she interrupted "I'll start preparing!"
They ate their dinner, quietly and without any eye contact. When she asked if she wanted her to read for her, Mary refused and starts pretending to sleep.
The next day she woke up before her mom and went to school, she sat all day in the classroom just looking around at the other pupils. They were all black like her, she had never thought about that. She was scared about the idea that someone didn't like her without even knowing who she was. Her world went from being filled with all the colors of the rainbow, to being black and white.
Ma' wasn’t there when she got home, a note was laying on the kitchen table saying that she wouldn't be home before midnight, and that there was food in the refrigerator. She ate the food and then she hid under the bed. Even though Sir Hugh was gone, she couldn't help but like the dark and cozy feeling of laying there. She thoughtlessly rolled the glass from side to side. Suddenly she got an idea. She got out and pulled out a box with her. Grabbed what she needed and ran down the stair, over the street and into the dark building. On cat paws she walked up the stairs, trying not to make a sound. She got up to the attic and expected to immediately spot Daniel, but it was completely empty. She walked around the room, disappointed that no one was there. On the wall hang an old mirror with scorch marks. The only item in the house she had seen besides bricks and the one picture. She stared at herself. They didn't have a mirror back home, so she never really got to see her reflection very clearly. The boy was right she thought, she was black. But she couldn’t see how she could look like a thief. Her thought stream stopped when her eye caught something in the mirror. There was a crack in the wall behind her. She turned around, the crack was barely visible. She had only been able to see it because of the lack of dust in the region around the crack. She put her fingers to it, it was a door. She got the tip of her fingers inside of it and opened the door. It opened without any sound at all. Inside there was another room, it was the same size as the one behind her, except this was actually a bedroom with furniture's. A huge bed stood in the corner with a mountain of blankets on top of it. An old stove which looked like it was fueled by wood stood in the middle of the room together with a small dining table. The walls were black, but the worst holes were covered with planks and rags. She walked around the room, looking at the different items that lay around, a doll here, a pan there. She was so busy with taking in the place that if it hadn't been because of a sudden gust of wind from the still open entrance, she wouldn't have noticed the person in the bed. Lying in the bed were two children, a little girl, and Daniel. They both looked very peaceful and Daniel slept with an arm laid protective over the little girl. She sat down on the bed, looking at them. The change in the mattress when she sat down woke the little girl from her sleep. She looked up at Mary with sleepy eyes.
"Who are you?" She said, curiously.
"I'm Mary, who are you?" She put up a friendly smile, but the little girl didn't look scared at all.
"I'm Elma. What are you doing here?"
"Me and Daniel are gonna play together."
"Daniel can't go out, and he can't talk to you."
"Why not? Her smile slowly faded.
"Ma' says that he can't talk to someone like you."
"Oh, I see." she looks sad for a moment, but then put up a sly smile.
"You wanna play a game?" All attention from Elma is now directed at her?
"A game, what kind of game?"
"Ok, you see, me and Daniel are gonna go outside and..."
"But we are not supposed to go outside!" Elma interrupted her, "Mom says it’s dangerous out there, filled with monsters!"
"Well you see, that's the game, me and Daniel are gonna go outside and find the monsters and catch them!"
"And what am I gonna do then!" Her eyes were now full of excitement.
"You," Mary said and waved with her hand for her to come closer, and then whispered. "You, are gonna stay here and make sure no one of the monsters are getting in!"
She now looked skeptical "But that's boring! I wanna go out with you!"
"Oh you can't" Mary said dramatically, "you haven't received monster training! You can't go out before you received monster training."
"Monster training?" Her eyes lighted up again.
"Yes, it's very important, here, I can show you how to do it, and then you can practice while we are out and then maybe when you get good enough you can come with us."
She jumped up the bed which caused Daniel to wake up with a groan.
"What's going on?" he moaned.
"Mary is teaching me monster training!"
He looked up at Mary, it took a couple of seconds before he realized who was standing in front of him.
"What are you doing here!" He said angrily. "You can't be here!"
"Calm down," Mary said soothingly, "nothing is gonna happen; I just got a gift for you."
For a moment he just looked baffled.
"Gift? You? For me?"
"Yes!"
She took out the thing from underneath her shirt.
"Here"
He studied it for a moment.
"What is it?"
"It's a shirt!"
"I can't wear this!" He said and held it up against his chest, it was true though, and he wouldn't even be able to fit his arms in the hole for the head.
"You're not supposed to stupid!"
She took it out of his hands, and reached out for his teddy bear he was clutching. He took a step back and hugged it even tighter.
"Come on, I won't steal it, I swear!"
He hesitated for a moment but handed it over.
"Now look," she pulled the shirt over the bear. "Perfect match!"
She handed it back, he almost ripped it out of her fingers. He looked at it, rubbed the cloth carefully against his fingers.
"What is it made of?"
"Red velvet! It's very rare and fancy."
"Thank you," he muttered.
"Hey! When are we gonna get to my dragon training?" Elma was now standing with her hands in her sides looking very irritated.
"Sorry Elma!" Mary picked up a stick from the stove, "you have to do like this!"
After having taught Elma some moves with the stick that Mary assured her were a sword, Daniel and her walked out, leaving Elma to poke and hit everything in the room.
"So what do you wanna do?" He said still with the teddy bear in his arms.
"So, you know how you have a teddy bear? Well I used to have a spider."
His eyes opened wide. "A spider? Aren't you afraid of them?"
"Nope, my dad always said that you shouldn't be afraid of anything you know can't hurt you!"
"But.. But, doesn't it bite you?"
"No!" Mary giggled, "Sir Hugh would never do that! He is a brave and fine knight, a knight would never bite anyone! They only kill monsters and rescue princesses!"
"I'm not too fond of spiders," he said, with his head tucked down in his bears fur.
"Don't worry, when you get to know him you will like him just as much as I do!"
He nodded, "so where is he?"
"That’s actually why I’m here! You know the old woman who lives a bit down the road?"
He nodded again, this time silently.
"Well she told me that spiders love to play hide and seek. And that dark places are their favorite spots to do so."
"My Ma' told me she's a witch."
"No! She is a nice lady, she gave me a sweet!" Mary objected with a snapping tone, "She can't be a witch."
"My Ma' says that she poisons kids, puts them in a big pot and then eat them. Maybe you are poi-soned."
"No! That's stupid, I'm feeling very well!"
He shrugged, "maybe it's because you are alike."
Mary sighed, "Will you just help me look for Sir Hugh?"
They searched every storey, in each room Mary tried to come up with a new game. In one of them they drew funny faces in the dust. Their fingers got all grey, even their hair, so much that Daniel said that Mary looked like an old lady. In the room with the reaching pipes they blew into them, making sounds that echoed through the whole building. Daniel recognized the people in the picture, they lived in the building before it burned, and so had Daniels family.
"My Ma' says that it was them who started the fire and killed daddy." he says, whenever he men-tions his mom he gets a far look in his eyes.
"My daddy is dead too." she replies. They look at each other and go quiet. They continue their searching, this time without playing games, but when they had finally searched every room in the building without finding anything, Mary sat down and started to cry. Daniel stood for a moment, tripping from one foot to another before he went over and pat her head.
"It's gonna be OK."
"No it's not," she said through her fingers which were glued to her face. "He is gone, I will never see Sir Hugh again."
"There is one place we haven't searched..."
She looked up. "Where?"
"I don't like going there."
"Tell me, where is it?"
"The cellar." He said it with a frightened voice.
"Oh, there's a cellar?" She wiped away a tear and look up at Daniel, "where is it?"
He looked lost for a moment but then agreed to go show her, "this way."
The cellar was completely dark. Daniel had to run up to his room to find a candle and came back red in the head.
"Elma told me to give this to you."
He handed her a pointy stick. She pricks her finger against it.
"It’s sharp."
They went inside, Daniel holding the candle and his bear, Mary with the stick. It was an old wash-room, no windows and the candle only created enough light to see where they put their feet.
"Do you think that there are monsters down here?" Mary asked him, with a sound of pleasure by the thought.
"I hope not," Daniel said.
"Look! There!" Mary's voice cut through the dark like a knife.
Daniel almost dropped the candle when he turned around to face the monster.
"It's a shadow monster!" Her stick was pointed at Daniels shadow that looks big and scary as it is being cast up on the wall by the candlelight.
"That's stupid!" He said though with a hint of relief in his voice.
"No! Look!" She poked the shadow with her stick several times, "it's wearing armor, I gotta hit it harder!"
She started making grunts and sounds as if she actually was fighting the monster. Daniel started laughing. His laugh made the monster seem as if it was in pain from the fight.
"Look! Its working, it’s dead!"
Accidentally he dropped the candle on the floor which caused it to burn out, but neither of them was scared of the dark anymore. They got it on again it flickered for a bit but then remained steady.
"It's gone!" Daniel exclaimed, the shadow had disappeared from the wall where it had stood before.
"Yep, I killed it," Mary said proudly.
Daniel looked almost adoringly at her.
"What now?"
"We keep looking of course."
There didn't go long before Mary burst out. "Daniel, Daniel! Over here."
"What? Did you find him?" He hurried over to her.
She was standing in front of some pipes, the same pipes as in the apartment above.
"It's the same pipes as up above."
They stood for a moment and studied them.
"Do you think," Mary said grudgingly, "that we can talk through them?"
"Let's try. I will go upstairs."
He left the candlelight with her and ran up the stairs.
She put her ear to the pipe and got startled when she heard the sound Daniel was making.
"Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!"
"You sound like a sheep!" Mary yelled through the pipe.
For a time it was a contest about who could make the most realistic animal sounds. But neither of them had ever been outside the city so it was mostly cats and dogs.
"Vaaaaaaaaaauf!" Mary yelled into the pipe and then laid her ear full of expectation on the pipe for Daniels one.
Nothing happened for a while.
"Come on Daniel, it's your turn!" she yelled into the pipe.
No response this time either.
She left the candle as she ran up and out of the cellar, leaving it to burn down alone in the dark. She ran up the stairs but stopped when she heard Daniels voice, no, there was one more, a woman. She snuck further up so she could see the entrance. A woman was standing, hugging Daniel tight. Her hair was blond but dry, her teeth were crooked and some were missing. Her cloth basically consisted of old rags that had been sewn together by a clumsy hand. She held out Daniel in her arms, smiling, just like Mary's mother sometimes did. Her smile stiffened when she saw the teddy bear in his arms. She ripped it out of his hand.
"What is this?" she said and pointed at the red velvet shirt, her voice was very hoarse.
"It's just a..."
"Did the little niggergirl give this to you?"
Mary got scared; it looked like a monster had taken over the woman. She took the shirt off with such force that one of the bears eyes went off with it.
Daniels eyes had started to tear up, "Ma' please, dont..."
She threw the shirt on the ground and stamped on it.
"Get up! Now!"
Daniel ran up with the rest of his bear in his arms. She followed him soon after, looking furious. But Mary also saw something different in her face, something she had seen in her Ma's when her dad had died. Sorrow.
It was dark outside when she came home, after she had locked the door behind her she noticed that the clock stood on 11:50. Ma' would be home soon. She took out some of the food from the refrig-erator. Leaving most of it from Ma'. She had just finished her food when she heard noise outside the door. She jumped up, happy that her mother was home, she stopped right in front of the door with her hand on the lock when she realized something. Her mother had her own key. She took a step back.
"It's locked Steve," a man voice from the outside, "and are we sure that there are nobody inside?"
"When have some whiny bitches ever stood in your way Steve?" another voice, this one more raw and tough than the other. "Pop them a bullet, the police don't care about us niggers."
"Your right Ben, on three?"
She ran, into the room.
"1."
She ducked down removed a box that was covering her hiding place
"2."
She rolled in and laid flat on the floor under the bed.
"3."
The door gave after for their body weight, and flew off its hinges and landed on the floor. Someone must have heard she thought, someone must be calling the police!
"Come on Steve! Let's put it back on, that will give us some peace to work."
From the sound she could hear they put it back in and locked the door. As they moved further inside the room she tried to get as far into her hiding place as possible. She removed the jar, Sir Hugh's house, and quietly pushed a box aside.
"This place is just full of junk!"
She registered that it was Steve talking now.
"We should just move on."
She pushed herself further in so she laid with her back against the wall. Suddenly she felt goose bumps on her arm.
"Sir Hugh!" She whispered.
The spider was crawling on her bare arm, making it to its favorite spot.
"What was that?" Bens voice snapped at Steve that had been rambling on about some houses he had seen. He immediately stopped talking.
"Hmm, probably nothing. Anyway, junk? What are you talking about? Look at these curtains, they seem expensive."
No! Not Ma's curtains Mary thought. But she didn't get further before a horrible thought occurred in her mind. Ma'. She was gonna be home soon, and she didn't know about the bad men.
"Curtains? Are we goddamn curtaining thieves now?"
"Whatever keeps my children from hunger I don't care if its curtains or gold."
"Shh, quiet." They both stopped moving around in the room.
"Someone’s there," Steve whispered.
Mary could hear it too. Ma' stamping off her shoes before entering. She put together her hands with Sir Hugh inside them, careful not to squash him. Dear god, she prayed please don't let anything happen to Ma' . She opened her hands, Sir Hugh stepped down, and was steadily crawling out to-wards the room, out from beneath the bed. She heard the key in the lock.
"Sir Hugh...” she whispered silently.
And then he was out, she could see him on the floor, so small compared to the feet of the men.
"Ma..."
The key turned.
Somewhere in a dark cellar stands a candle
Its flame is gone, alike the flame of millions
Taken by the darkness and cold of others
It desperately seeks the warmth and comfort
Of whose flame still burns with passion and joy
But who will give it?
