Untitled VI

The door slammed shut and the house rattled as if it had been awoken from a dream. Billy peered out from his warm duvet towards the hallway. His mum had left for work. She had returned to her teaching role a few days ago and had left Billy alone for the first time in months. In some ways Billy was relieved, but there was an underlying anxiousness that he could not shift. He looked down at his leg then peered across to the stub on the right side of his body and sighed. Another day of boredom and another day of wishing he was dead.

Billy lifted himself onto his wheelchair and rolled towards the bay window that overlooked Galleon Lane. It was frosty outside and the air was still dark from the night before. He scanned the road for life but could only see a few women walking hand in hand with small children; obviously taking them to school. Billy frowned; he missed his friends, he missed riding his bike to Parkside Primary, he even missed his teachers. With one hand he turned his chair towards his shabby single bed. Times were hard; his mother hadn't worked in months, she was getting ill and no money was coming in. There was even talk that they may lose the family home. Billy didn't care; he knew someone up there was punishing him. First the accident, now this. He was happy to live on the streets with all the crackheads, whores and runaways. He didn't see himself as any better than them. He was an outcast as well; people would piss on him in the street and spit at him as he rolled by. That's what he thought anyway.

As Billy pulled himself back onto his cold bed he heard a creaking outside his bedroom door. Then he heard a shuffling. Creak, shuffle, creak. Billy thought it was Gil, the manky old cat from next door that came into the house from time to time, hunting for mice. But this sounded bigger than a cat. It sounded almost human. Creak, shuffle, creak. Billy began to feel scared. He had been having vivid nightmares about the man who had ripped his leg away from him. The man had been chasing him, with a look of murder in his eye. His hands were covered in blood and he was tailing Billy. Billy's feet were getting heavier and heavier. Then he looked down, he was chained to the floor. The man had caught him; Billy was doomed. A brick smashed across Billy's face and he was blind. He couldn't see what the man was doing to him but the pain was intense. He was dying. The brick was pounding down on him. Smash, smash, smash. Billy was dead.