the girl who came back [story part 1]

Final flight of stairs leading to the high school

November 13th, 2004 – around 8

It was a gray, cold and rainy November morning, the sun was not up yet or it was clouded heavily by the November weather and I was heading slowly but steadily, a bit asleep, to high school.
In order for me to get to my high school, which is the highest point in the city except the old church, I had to go through a forest which surrounds the both of them and a big part of the citadel, this forest not only surrounds the citadel, but is a big part of it, only the top of the hill bearing the most important buildings.

Anyway, the forest is thus on a hill, which means I had to climb around 150 steps, each morning, through the forest, to end up a the base of another flight of stairs ( 178 ) at the end of which, lies the high school, the old church, the morgue and the entrance to the cemetery. The highest point of the city, the top of the hill.

I don’t have to mention that the steps, both of the sets, are really steep, otherwise it would take double the amount of stairs to climb, and because they are so steep, in poor light conditions, it makes it hard to see the end. That’s the case in the second flight of stairs, the first ones, doesn’t matter how much light there is outside, they are in the forest and you won’t see the end anyway.

So basically that was my path to school every morning, rain or snow. My house lies just at the base of the citadel, so it didn’t take that much time to get to high school, it was only about 500 meters, but because it was climbing a hill, it took me about 15 minutes.

Like I said, I was pretty sleepy, it was raining and because of that, the wooden steps, which are old, and in the forest, covered sometimes with wet leaves, were very slippery. I knew that, I had a few events of falling, and trust me, you don’t want to trip on those steps because if you happen to trip badly, you could end up rolling all the way to the end. You won’t survive over a rolling down a hill over some 100 steps or more.

As such, I kept my head down, looking at my each step and making my way up the hill. I was alone, in the whole forest. It’s not a big city, and the other kids take a different a path because they don’t live at the base of the citadel, they live on the other side of it, and the ones who do live here, are either too few, or have graduated and moved on, or study at a different high-school.

I was alone, climbing one step at a time when I felt a sudden gush of wind and heard a loud hiss above me but before I even had the chance to look up I felt another gush of wind, and another, and another, each from different directions.

When I managed to look up I only saw a blur of sorts and then I immediately felt a blow to my head and I started going down. I remember hearing growls, a hiss coming from different directions and in the same time, a really loud, girl like voice, screaming “NEEEEEIIINNNNNN!!!!” – That’s “No” in German.

I don’t know what happened next, all I know is that I fainted from the blow in the head. I actually remembered the dream that I had, which was pretty vivid and then I woke up and the first thing I noticed was that everything was pitch black, I couldn’t move – it was like I was trapped in a box, and the smell was awful – it was smelling like iron and copper and dead, old moss – the kind of smell that you get from a dead lake full of moss or from a swamp.

I tried moving but I was really trapped, I banged my head trying to get up and I couldn’t see a thing. I was breathing really heavy and then I realized – my worst nightmare since I was a kid – had came true. I was buried. There was no other explanation.