Boots hit the hard wood floor silently. The smell of cigarettes surrounding the jackets that were being worn. The dog? Silent for reasons no child ever wants to see. Blood stained the pants of the leader, not his own...never his own....
They were careful with their movements, checking the kitchen and figuring out only two people were home by the dishes in the sink. It seemed too easy. They spread out throughout the house, taking anything of value. The TV, the fancier plates, even the vase our grandma's ashes were in. Every nice thing was taken. They made their way upstairs, looking through rooms....
It didn't take long for them to find one of the occupants....the five year old yuka. Within seconds she was snatched from her bed. Jolting her awake. When she went to scream she was slapped hard, falling to the ground as one of the men picked her up by her hair.
They didn't even give her the chance to talk, slicing open her voice box with scary precision. She cried in pain, unable to scream as the slammed her to the ground. They held her down while they ransacked her room, then left her with one of those guys.....for reasons so horrible they would make a grown man cry.
The other two continued searching and ransacking the upstairs, leaving the child to be tortured by the third. They easily got the valuables out of the house, still searching for the second occupant in the home. Soon....three shots sounded.
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I was startled awake by the sounds of gunshots. Normally I would go back to bed....but tonight? They sounded like they came from above me. I jumped out of bed, but I soon realized I couldn't get out of the basement, someone had went to grab a box on the bottom and the boxes started falling.
That's when I saw him, a random man in our home. I ducked down as fast as I could, my hands shaking, tears staining my eyes as the crashing started. Things breaking, stuff falling....I heard it soon after.....a lighter. Within seconds the entire basement was engulfed in flames. I grabbed my phone quickly as sirens started in the distance. Minutes passed, I burned my feet climbing over the burning boxes and cut them climbing over broken glass.
Making it to the basement stairs wasn't any better, the stairs were creeky, old, caused splinters easily. But I didn't care. I ran up those stairs into the smoke at the top, the whole house was on fire now. Before I had time to think, a piece of the ceiling crashed down on me. Trapping me.
I desperately clawed my way out, my legs being scratched up and burned on the flaming piece of ceiling tile. Scrambling to my feet I ran upstairs. Reaching my sisters door I yanked on the handle, not caring the metal was burning my hand. The door had been locked. Desperately I kicked at it, not stopping until the whole door came crashing down. As the dust cleared....I froze. There she was....laying on the floor. Ripped cloth scattered around her body. Cuts and bruises all over her.....a slashed throat....but that wasn't the worst part.
She was dead. Shot twice in her stomach then once in the head. Effectively killing her where she laid. I could tell from her tear stained face she had suffered while I was sleeping peacefully. The anger boiled I'm my head, sadness taking over as I dropped to the ground, cradling her in my arms. Crying out knowing there wasn't anything I could do now.
The window cracked under the pressure of the falling house. The sirens defening outside now. The people who do this long gone. I sobbed holding her, blood staining my clothes as her dead eyes looked at nothing. She was just a kid. She didn't deserve this. If they had found me was this exactly how I'd be too? I didn't even notice the men in uniforms grabbing me until I was pulled away from yuka. I screamed and cried, holding out my hands as if she could reach out.
The firefighters carried me out, I saw everything through my tears. The lack of furniture, the burning house, the bloody footprints....then the second worst thing I could see that night. Our lovely, fluffy Australian shepherd minx....was dead on the grass outside. Beaten with a brick, her stomach slashed open and her head bashed in. In that moment, I felt nothing. The tears falling down my face were theo ly sign of emotion. I had lost both my pet and my sister in one night because of a mistake I made.
The people who saved me set me down across the street from the burning building. Police and paramedics rushing over to both question me and check my wounds. They kept me distracted as they took my sisters body away on a stretcher. They asked me if anyone else was in there and I said no.
Their efforts to keep me distracted didn't work though. I looked over and froze when I saw what was happening. Two officers, taking pictures of yuka and laughing. One of them handed the other a twenty like it was a game. Something broke inside me at that, they were supposed to be the heroes....but they were....laughing. an officer took my phone to call my parents. No surprise to me when they didn't pick up.
I was tended to right there as I watched the fire slowly stop. The light disappearing into the night just like those men did. Without a second thought, the paramedics loaded me into a stretcher. As they were getting me into the ambulance, I heard another officer speak. I saw the same two guys with a third officer now. That officer said something I could never forget...
"I'm glad we decided to take our time. We would've had to make an arrest if we didn't"
I caught the names on their badges before I was loaded into the ambulance. J. Johnson, m. Smith, and z. Ronan. Those names burned into my head as the ambulance doors closed and they sped off down the road. Everything else was a blur of needles, stitches, and medication. That is until my parents finally picked up their phones.
Turns out, they came back early morning to find nothing but ruins of a burned house, crime scene tape, and detectives surveying the scene. They weren't allowed on the premises and were advised to go to the hospital I was in. They came in screeching. Yelling at anyone who got in their way until eventually....it was me.
Mrs. James: WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO BRAT!?
mr. James: do you have any fucking idea what youve done!?
My dad grabbed my hair, yanking me upwards, then slapped me back down
Mrs. James: you fucking cunt! There was so much product in there! How could you let the house burn!
I tried to explain how I didn't burn it, how three men got in...how minx was gone. They weren't having it. Yanking me around and slapping me again and again. Only leaving to go see if they could find yuka...not knowing she was dead yet. I knew the punishment would be severe for this as soon as they left. Even if I did nothing. A fourteen year old could be blamed for every single thing wrong in the house.
minutes later, they burst back into my room. Mom was crying, still pissed. Dad was even angrier. He ripped my IV out of my arm, causing me to cry out in pain. Within seconds, I was being yelled at again. This time...for yuka. How I messed up. How I basically killed her. How I was the screw up in this family. And I believed every word. Then my father said something that shifted things permanently.
Mr. James: your done. You aren't my daughter. Don't you ever show your face around us again you disgrace.
My mother didn't stand up for me. Agreeing with him. They left screaming, threatening lawsuits against me. Their own child. Screeching about legal reprocutions and charges. About a restraining order against their own daughter.
They didn't even wait an hour before turning every single other family member against me, saying I killed my sister. Spinning a made up story about jealousy and hatred. And before I knew it.....I was exiled from my own family for something a stranger had done.