Her tiny, premature son had come in the dark, early morning hours after the War, his lungs not ready to work on their own. She had buried him just as an ugly dawn broke, had placed him in the wet ground herself, wrapped in the red, white, and blue quilt she had brought her first son home in. She had never felt more pain than when she began to cover him with the dirty, brown earth. Despite all her abilities, she couldn't save her own child. Repairing existing damage was possible, but she couldn't replace what hadn't been given time to develop.
Barely registering the harsh wind gusts, the woman forced herself to go to the grave, to mourn and keep feeling the awful pain so she could make peace with it. The blackness lurking in her mind wanted to block it out (and everything else), but she knew it would take over completely if she let it, and then she would never see her teenage son again. The darkness was too familiar, too comforting, and consuming. She had just spent a decade in its grip, as her life flew by, unable to change the mistake she had made by saying yes to Kenny.
The wind swelled, but she paid no attention, broken fingernails digging into the pale, cold skin of her palms as she sank to her knees in front of the unmarked grave.
"My baby," she whispered, tears spilling from dark lashes. Four weeks had gone by, but it still felt like yesterday. She had wanted him so much! His father hadn't, but she had. Pain tearing through her battered heart, Angela let the darkness have its way for a while, her grief unbearable.
2
Bands of pain were clamping down on her stomach when she became aware of her surroundings again an she eased down the thickly-carpeted hallway stairs and unlocked the basement door. She slipped inside the pitch-blackness with a fearlessness that still surprised her. She'd been terrified of the dark as a young girl, but had spent so much time down here since the War that she didn't even need the penlight anymore.
Listening intently, Angela scanned for intruders, but the Witch was silent. She slowly climbed to her hole-up with the same thought she always had: Hate it here! Can't wait to roll!
Not reacting fast enough to stop it, the heavy door to the storage area slammed shut behind her, locking automatically. She winced at the noise, even though there was no one left here to tell on her, get her punished.
Angela moved toward the small, wooden room hidden behind plastic-covered mattresses and box springs, sliding inside the warmth with an unconscious sigh of relief. She locked the door and her feet stepped carefully over the bags and boxes littering the 8' x 6' storage room she was calling her den.