Dark Heart by Bethanie Marsh (the read aloud family txt) 📕

voice? Was I going to die? Was I already dead? What was going on? When would I be able to home again? I couldn’t help but cry. I’d found out that my best friend was dead, been attacked and I was now in a room with no visible escape. I started to cry more, and that was when I had a vision.

*

“How did she get out of the room?” a tall, bald, brown eyed man asked.
“I don’t know. Somehow she found the touch pad. Either way, she’s dead because of it. She took the left door instead of the right door. The sick ones ripped her apart” a short, fat, black haired and blue eyed man said back.
“Silly girl. We could have kept her safe. He wanted her, said he needed her. She would have been fine, she just freaked out.” the bald man said.

*

Yes! I knew how to get out! Score one for me! Touch pad, touch pad… where was it? Was it hidden? I groaned quietly and started to feel the wall. Come on, come on.

Oh Jesus-Mary-And-Joseph where is it?!

At that moment, my hand hit something. The wall was raised slightly here. I put my hand on the raised part of the wall and a section of wall next to me moved across. Boom!

I smiled to myself and looked through the door.
In front of me was a staircase that went around in a circle, I couldn’t remember the name of those types of staircases but it didn‘t really matter. I smiled again and started to slowly walk up the stairs, pausing every other step to listen for movement. After hearing nothing, I decided it was safe to continue. I started to wonder if I was dead and remembered something my mother had once said to me. ‘Do you believe in god?’ she said and I shook my head ‘Say yes to end it. To pull the trigger. In a game of Russian roulette, you would always say you believed in god before you began.’ To this day, I’m not sure why she had said that to me. At the time, I had been about 12. As if a 12 year old girl would be playing Russian Roulette. Unthinkable. I miss my mother. She’s still alive, but not the same. I originally had a little brother. Toby. I’d loved him to pieces, I’d being the main word there. I blame Mary, my father tells me not to, but I can’t help it.
It had been an average day. Nothing out of the ordinary. My mother had come downstairs to tell us that she and father were going out for the evening and that Mary was in charge. Mary loved being in charge, but I bet she wishes she hadn’t been. When my parents had left, we sat watching TV for a while when there was a knock at the door. My mother had always told us to never answer the door when she wasn’t there, but this time, Mary did. A bang was what I heard, no scream, nothing. I stood and ran to the front door and saw Mary on the floor and a tall man with brown hair stood above her limp body. He looked at me and grinned. I hope never to see a smile such as that again.
He came in, putting things into a bag as he went, walking towards me as I backed away from his terrifying gaze. Fear was the only thing I knew at that point. When we reached the front room, Toby shouted at the man to leave but the man just laughed at him. I turned and gave Toby a ‘be quiet’ look but he mustn’t have seen it as he ran towards the man. The man frowned and hit Toby away, it was like watching a lion swatting away a fly, and Toby’s head connected with the wall with a loud bang. I wanted to help him, but I was too scared of the man to move. I should have moved.
The man came towards me with the grin on his face and shut the door. I was only 13, but I could guess what was coming next. He pushed me to the floor led on top of me, taking away my clothes and then his. I should have run, but I couldn’t move. He was too strong. I begged him and begged him to stop but he wouldn’t. At the time, with tears running down my face, I had wished it had been Mary this was happening to, she was the oldest, she’d been 18 at the time. I had wished I was in a different place, that I could switch bodies with Mary, so she would have to endure this horror and not me. When the man had gotten what he wanted from me, he’d smashed a wooden plank over my head and I’d passed out, grateful for the getaway.
I’d woken up in the hospital and my father was sat in a chair next to my bed. ‘Where’s mother?’ I’d asked him and then he told me the story. When they had gotten home and found Mary knocked out, they were terrified. Then, they found Toby’s body, he’d died of pressure on the brain or something like that. They’d both cried as they waited for an ambulance, then mother had wondered where I was and that’s when they had found me in the living room, unconscious, bleeding, naked and covered in… well… you get the picture. I had wanted to die there and then. In one night, my brother had died, we’d been robbed and I had been raped. Had my pureness stolen from me.
I woke from my trance and realised I was stood at the top of the staircase and was stood in front of two doors. I frowned and then remembered my vision. The left door leads to death, the sick ones, and the right one to safety. Okay, right it is.

I tried the door handle and the door opened outwards. On the other side of the door was a hallway. Just an average hallway with a marble floor and pale walls with doors on both sides, maybe about 15 as far as I could see. Without another thought, I started to walk down the hall.
I’d had 17 stitches because of the plank of wood over the head and I’ve had a scar on my head ever since, on the right hand side of my forehead close to my hair. My parents asked if I wanted some special operation to give me my virginity back, I was ready to jump at the chance before I realised that it wouldn’t erase what happened, and it cost a bomb. Ever since Toby was killed, my mother has been different. She was depressed and self confined for weeks after and his funeral was horrible, we all cried except for my mother. She just couldn’t seem to cry and it was horrible to watch her sit there with no expression on her face. I think she just shut herself out.
After that, she didn’t talk for ages. Before, she always seemed happy and cheerful. Now, she seems to constantly have a melancholic aura about her. We still have fun and she has fun with us too but she still has a distant look in her eyes. I’d always sworn to hunt down and kill the man. Hey! Now I seem to have fangs, I can totally kill him!

I smiled to myself but then remembered that I would be killing a person, and I didn’t really think I could do that.
Smack.

Damn. I’d run into a wall. I came out of my thought and looked at the wall in front of me. Uh oh

. If this was a wall, it was a very funny looking wall. There was a shirt and tie in front of me and the shirt and tie was on a person. I gulped and slowly looked up into deep brown eyes.
I laughed nervously and said, “Helloo” Didn’t do much though because the man grinned.
“Well well, look what we have here” he said, slowly walking around me. His long brown hair hung on his shoulders and his high cheekbones were covered by his skin being pushed up by his grin. This couldn’t be good. “How’d you get here darlin?” he said as his hand pushed my back and I fell flat on the floor before turning onto my back.
“None of your business, ass-wipe.” I snapped back at him, looking up from the floor.
“Dear, dear. Such language from a sweet little flower.” He bent down and his lips met mine ferociously and I screamed at him through his lips against mine. Oh, come on!

I put my hands against his shoulders and pushed as hard as I could, sending him flying backwards. Woah. I can’t believe I just did that.

I didn’t have time to applaud myself though as the man started coming towards me. Time to go! I rolled over quickly, scrambling to my feet as fast as I could but apparently I wasn’t fast enough.
“Come on baby, let an old vampire have his fun.” he said pushing me to the floor where I froze. Vampire.

You had to be kidding me! Vampire?!
“I’m a vampire?” I said quietly and he nodded “How fucking gay is that?!” I shouted and the man looked down at me with an amused expression on his face.
“I like you already” he said smiling at me and he then looked down at the white blouse I was wearing and smiled again. Wow, I had picked a brilliant day to wear my blouse hadn’t I.
“Listen buddy! You may be a vampire, but you still have man parts and I have a foot, do you really want them to be introduced to each other?” I snapped and he frowned at me. I have no idea where that had come from, I’d just thought of it randomly. I actually laughed mentally when I said it.
His momentary lapse of concentration thanks to my snappy remark gave me enough time to punch him in the face and shove him off me. He rolled across the floor and I was able to turn, stumble to my feet and run.
I found another hallway and started to run down it, with the man close behind. I had to find a way out, a room, anything. I opened the first door I saw… I really should have opened a different door.

Chapter 4 - Unexpected

"Oh Crap!" I said, gasping as I said it.
"Oh shit." He said quietly,