InsaneJournal

Olivia had fallen asleep the night before behind a dumpster located in one of the alleyways that led off Melrose Avenue. She had been with a new client that night. A middle-aged man who didn’t believe in paying for his prostitutes. Instead he had left the young woman scared and beaten in a deserted alley once he was finished with her.

For a while she had lay there, completely motionless with her jeans tugged down her frail body. After a half hour or so the cold cement against the bare skin of her scarred legs became unbearable and she forced herself to find the strength to move just enough to pull her jeans back up her legs, covering the fresh scratches and bruises on her thighs from the man she had been with.

One arm wrapped under her backpack as she pulled it under her head, her entire body curling close to it for several reasons. The main reason being that she was warmest in a balled-up position and another being that nobody would be able to steal it without waking her.

That night she dreamed of her earlier nights of living on the streets. She had respect for herself then. The things that had happened to her, the things that broken her and made her who she was today; these were the things that constantly haunted her on the rare night she was able to sleep. Perhaps it was because of these nightmares that when she opened her eyes that morning in a field of strange grass she was not surprised.

It was frighteningly familiar. Not the grass, of course. Or the extremely thick fog. But the terror that came with waking up in a strange place that you could not recognize. It had happened before, countless times. She’d go to sleep once place and wake up somewhere else with half of her clothes missing and a drowsy feeling as if she had been drugged.

The strange thing was that she didn’t feel drowsy now and after a quick glance down at herself confirmed that she had all of her clothes. Her black tank top with the stains on it, her jeans that were a couple sizes too big and ripped, her Army jacket that had probably seen several owners before her, and her red converse that were complete with holes from being worn so much. 

Her stomach growled as her slender fingers tightened around the strap of her backpack and she pushed herself up to her feet. It took her a moment to find her balance before she slowly looked around. Her lifeless gaze scanned the trees and the surrounding area before the familiar feeling of tears stinging her eyes. She was scared. Not because she was lost in this strange place that looked nothing like the cement world she inhabited in New York, but because she didn’t know what was real and what was the product of her unstable mentality.

Nervously her fingers crept down to her opposite wrist, working their way down under the blue bandanna that she had used to cover some of the fresh cuts she had made. Roughly she dug her nails into the wound, drawing a sharp hiss of pain from her as she looked around again. Suddenly she saw movement through the thick fog that surrounded her and the tears that had welled in her eyes started to stream down her cheeks as fear overcame her. Slowly she brought a hand up to her cheek, wiping away some of the tears. Suddenly she winced, feeling that the area around her left eye was swollen and bruised.