The Right Kid

“Are you sure this is the right kid?” Donna asked the grizzled man sitting next to her, as she scooted away from the table making adjustments to her equipment. She had been watching the little girl behind the two way mirror for over three hours now and still nothing. 

“Yes, you said the blond, curly haired, kid, I got the blond curly haired kid.” Ernie told her.

She lifted up the microphone and spoke to the girl, “hey, Lizzie, can you try again for me one more time?” She asked sweetly.

“Uh huh” came the soft reply.

Donna watched as the little girl stared intently at the spoon. The spoon remained motionless. 

“Try the crayola.” Donna spoke through the microphone. She watched as the little girl stared at the crayola until tears formed in her eyes. She noticed how she hunched her shoulders and leaned in closer, still, both the spoon and crayola both remained still.

“Well I’m getting nothing from her, put her back.” she instructed.

Ernie rose to go and before he closed the door, he asked, “Do you want the other kid?” 

“No, not today...and don’t feed them either.” She shouted through the closed door, not sure if he heard her or not. But she really didn’t care so she turned back to her computer.

Ernie opened the door to the other room and as he walked in the little girl started fussing and whimpering. “Oh hush now, I’m not gonna hurt you.” He tried to sound nicer than he had been, but she still jerked and hollered when he bent down to unlock the shackles that held her ankles to the legs of the chair. “Now stop that, you’re just making it worse than it has to be.” He smacked her calf to try and make her stop squirming. She didn’t. “STOP NOW!” He tried to reach down again, but she scooted around in the seat of the chair. He lowered his forearm across her back and pushed her face down to the table. ‘Now BE STILL! I’m trying to unlock you.” He told her as he was finally able to unlock the hasp and set her free.

The second she was free, Lizzie ran around the table to get away from him. He just reached across the table and grabbed a handful of her hair and drug her across the top. She squirmed and flopped around, bucked and kicked and screamed, giving Ernie the hardest time. He pulled her up and secured her under his arm against his side and toted her down the hall to her makeshift cell. “Just stop it, I’m not going to hurt you! STOP SCREAMING,” He kept telling her as he carried her. Ernie opened the door and tried tossing her inside. Lizzie held on, she wouldn’t let go and pulled and yanked at his shirt pocket until it ripped off. She then slid down his side and landed on the floor with a thud. “Now you stay here!” He told her absently as he bent down and picked up his pack of cigarettes. When he looked up to leave she had crawled into the corner and sat there crouched down like a bullfrog ready to jump.

Lizzie sat there and rocked back and forth. She knew her surroundings, there were 142 nails along the baseboard, there were 64 tiles on the floor, 12 ceiling tiles and nothing in this room but a blanket and pillow, oh and the coffee can they left for her to use the bathroom in. Lizzie laid on the blanket and put her face on the dirty, cool floor. It was then that she saw it. There under the edge of the door was a book of matches. She scrambled to her knees and crawled over to the door. She tried to squeeze her little fingers under the door to reach them, but they weren’t quite long enough and when she did come close to touching them, she only pushed them further away.

Lizzie sat on the blanket and tried concentrating, like the Donna woman told her to do all the times she was in the room shackled to the chair. “Just close your eyes and imagine it happening. You can do it, you’ve done it before.” She told her. And then after hours Donna would get mad and tell her she wasn’t trying hard enough and she was going to be punished and Lizzie would be thrown back into her cell.

It was then Lizzie closed her eyes and actually felt the matches in her hand, she tried pulling a match off and rubbing it against the striking strip. Nothing happened. In her mind, she pulled all the matches out of the book and couldn’t get any of them to light, not even a spark. Lizzie collapsed in exhaustion and fell asleep. It was somewhere in the night, deep in a dream, she was able to create enough heat for one match tip to catch. Lizzie could smell the Sulphur as it begin to smoke, the smoke sizzled into an ember and the ember to a fire that hopped and skipped across all the matches igniting the entire book into a flame. Lizzie thought about being free and lured the flames even higher and higher.

 

Photo taken by OP

Chief Davis watched as the two lifeless bodies were carried away in body bags. “Are there any survivors? The Chief asked.

“Yes, two little girls over there.” The firemen pointed to Lizzie and the other girl wrapped in blankets.