Don't Be Mad

Where was mom? She told me to come down here. I know she did, I heard her. It's so dark. I told myself it was going to be, but it's different now that I have to be here. I didn't want to. I want to see her again. I just want to see her face. I want to remember her different. That face. I don't want to remember her face like that. Any of them. Not mom. Not my sister. Not the man from the crew.

There isn't even any light peeking through the hatch above. Have they gone yet? I can't hear anything anymore. Just the hum of the ship. Just my breathing. My crying. I can't help it. I miss mom already. There's just something about not being able to see, even with my eyes open. The walls are cold, and if there is anything to grab onto, I can't feel it, no matter how long I try to reach. Even if I could reach the hatch, it's way too heavy for me to lift. Mom has to come back. She has to. How else will I get out of here? My shoes squeak on the floor where it got wet from me crying. I'm holding my mouth, trying to keep it inside. They heard me before. They'll hear me again if I don't shut up.

We were just trying to find some food. It had been more than a day since I'd eaten. Mom had gone on longer. But even with her getting thin like that, she still smiled. She had to put the smile on, but she still tried. When were they going to find us? We'd been out to see for a long time. Bad storm. They happened. All of the old crewmen tried scaring me, telling me ships like this one went missing all the time. But I always laughed, since they seemed to be okay being on ships like this, even though it happened 'all the time'. At least until the storm came. Every time I looked out the glass in my cabin, I could see the lightning, even though there weren't really any clouds. There were stars out, but every few minutes they'd disappear when the lightning would take away everything. Mom pulled me into the room when I tried walking out to see it. We saw those men again, running. Why would Mom lie like that to me? She never had a problem telling me the truth before. Why did she say then that we were going to be okay while she was crying?

I started to see things then. They weren't real. I know they weren't. There was nothing to see because there was no light at all. It was almost like I was seeing my own breath as it came out, like if the weather was really cold. It wasn't real, though. You can't see things in the dark. I still couldn't hear anything outside. Where was...Mom! I know she told me to be quiet. I wanted to be good. Like I should have been back there. But, just like then, I was so scared. There was no way out, and nobody was around. I pounded on the walls, I yelled out, I kicked on the floor. The only reason I didn't try knocking on the hatch was because I couldn't reach it. I was being bad again. I wasn't listening. It was why I was here.

We were locked up together in our cabin, with no lights on. Mom would tell us stories and sing my favorite song about the sunshine, but always really quietly. I was very hungry, but Mom said we had to stay inside. People were sick, and we didn't want to catch it. Mom kept saying the lightning made them sick, but...didn't lightning burn you up? She only left once, and put me and my sister in the little hatch. We kept asking to go with her, or for her not to go. We made her cry, and I felt awful about it, but she told us she'd be back. Mom didn't lie. We heard the hiss of the hatch open up, and we saw Mom again. That was the first time I saw her face like that. The way I never wanted to see it again. The last way I remember seeing it. She'd brought back some food, but it tasted...bad. Like it had gone really old. I didn't like it, but nobody said anything. Just like every other night, we slept in the hatch. It was different then. Even though I couldn't see, I knew where everybody was. I could hear them. And Mom had a light so we could see. The only time it ever went off was when we were really asleep and that one time she heard the footsteps. She had her hands over our mouths so hard it hurt, but she didn't let go until the sounds went away. Big, loud footsteps, sometimes shuffling on the floor, like it was looking for something. And tiny, scratchy footsteps. Lots of them. I can still hear them. Even though there's nothing up top.

The next time we woke up, Mom told us to be ready to go. Was it over? Were the people okay now? She wouldn't tell me, but she kept saying things to my sister that made her cry. The lights were low everywhere. Nothing as dark as in the hatch, but much less lit than I remembered it just a day ago. And it smelled just as bad as the food from a while ago, except it was everywhere. Mom went first since she had the light. People must have been very sick. They were all laying down on the floor, not saying anything. Some of them in their rooms. Some of them just on the floor. Mom told me very quietly not to touch them. They needed their sleep, she said. They'd be mad if they woke up. Some of them had a neat trick, I thought. They could sleep with their eyes open, but their eyes were wrong. Like they'd blinked but forgot to put their eyes in the right direction again when they opened up. My sister carried me after a while as we made our way up the ship. There wasn't anybody else awake that I could see, and I really wanted some of the crew to wake up. They'd let a bunch of rats get around, and it looked like they were going to wake up a lot of the people sleeping, since they looked like they were biting at them. It wasn't until Mom put her light on some of them that I could see they were doing the same trick with their eyes. But they were awake? Mom and sis were backing up away from the rats, since they were gross. With my sister holding me like she was, I could see behind her. And there he was! The man from the crew who had told me the stories before the storm. He was propped up asleep on a railing, really dirty from his last meal. My sister, moving away from the rats, backed up enough so I could reach out and pat him awake. I wanted to know if everyone was okay. Mom never lied. He was mad when he woke up.

I got scared when he got mad, since my sister dropped me without telling me. Him getting mad, her yelling, it woke up a lot of people. And they were all mad at us. My shirt got pulled over my head when I fell, and the next thing I knew, Mom was grabbing me, and carrying me away, back down the ship. Why didn't she go back for my sister? The man from the crew was hurting her! Didn't Mom love her? I was so scared that I couldn't ask, just cry, and it made me feel even worse since it was waking up so many other people as we moved along. They all sounded angry as they came towards us, and it was all my fault. I put my hands over my mouth, but I couldn't help it. I recognized some of the signs on the wall, and saw that we were back in our cabin. Mom was crying just as much as I was and...I thought about it again. Her face like, looking like that. No, I didn't want to remember any of that! It was the way I remember it as she closed the hatch and told me she'd come back. She never lied. I kept repeating it, over and over again as I waited in between my throat hurting from calling out to her. She'd come back. Mom never...I heard it! The footsteps again.

I had to be good for her. I had to keep quiet. I know I'd just broke my promise, but the way the footsteps sounded, it was just like a day or two ago. Mom didn't like them at all. The hatch hissed open, but I could barely see up top, even with the difference being the hatch so dark you couldn't see your hand in front of you. I saw the top of Mom's hair from the edge! She came back! I reached out for her, but someone else picked me up. I couldn't see who had me, but I saw Mom. She was sick. It must have been all the food she'd eaten since she left. Her tummy looked like she'd eaten a whole lot. She kept shaking and humming the song about the sunshine. Until the rats started coming out. Mom never liked rats before, so why did she try eating so many of them? They had all been what was in her stomach, and now they were coming out, one and two at a time, and Mom kept shaking. The rats, all of them that she spat up, all fell into the hatch. Mom fell asleep then, and fell into the hatch. The rats didn't like that, and Mom started screaming. I kept trying to see who had me, but before I could find out, the cabin was quiet. The only thing I could hear was my crying. I wanted to be with Mom. And just like that, I fell back into the hatch. When I fell, I could see up again, and I could see my sister, sick too. I started crying when I hit the bottom of the hatch. Or what I landed on. I looked for Mom in the hatch as it closed. I saw her just before the light went out. Mom was mad at me.