Long Road to Arcadia

10/13/22 freewrite

The infant girl lies in her crib, watching the toy horses dancing in circles above her, hanging from the spinning mobile. The night light allows her to distinguish their silhouettes against the darkness that pervades over the rest of the room. The little child is tired, but she will not sleep. Everytime she closes her eyes, she hears it shuffle closer. The night light, which was so annoyingly bright that she couldn’t fall asleep when she was laid in her crib, now, that same illumination is painfully insufficient to expose the room and those that are in it. She is awfully sleepy. She fears to close her eyes, but she can’t sto–She blinks. It takes effort to wrench her eyes open again. But the sound of ripping clothes gives her the strength she needs to stay awake. The sound comes from her mother’s bed. She can’t see the clock, it’s too far from her night light. She is too young to read it anyway. She breathes in. She breathes out. She breathes in. She breathes—footsteps on the carpet patter past the wardrobe between her and her parents’ bed. She snaps her eyes open. She hadn’t noticed she had closed them. She tries to move her head, but it’s too heavy. She can’t turn to face the silence where she had moments ago heard footsteps. She balls her soft hands into fists and squeezes them. She has never stayed awake all night before. Is it even possible? Will the night ever go away if she doesn’t sleep? She keeps her fists tight to keep her alert. She hears a faint sound coming in through the closed but thin window. The barks of a dog a few houses down the street. The unexpected sound draws her attention. Her heightened alertness bolsters her resolve. She can stay awake. All night if she has to. The dog stops barking. And silence follows. She retains her steadfast gaze. The silence seems out of place. In the dim light of her night light, all is still. The baby realizes the anomaly. She hesitantly raises her eyes. The toy horses have stopped spinning. The child is scared. Her eyes begin to water. She starts to cry, her choking sobs are weak and quiet but quickly grow to loud wails. Frantic footsteps sprint to her crib-side. She forces her eyes open despite the tears. She can’t let it get closer. A silhouette looms over her crib. Then it leans down, arms outstretched for her. Then the glow from her night light shines upon its skin and she stops crying. It’s her mother that reaches down into her crib. And now it all makes sense. What else could have sounded from her mother’s bed? What else would approach her crib carefully and slowly, waiting for her to close her eyes so as to not wake her? And what else would come check on her in the middle of the night? The dog begins barking in the distance again. Her mother’s cold hands lift her up, hugging her tight with both arms while laying a bundle of blankets down in the crib. The baby looks back down at the crib. In the bundle of blankets is a doll. She doesn’t like this doll. Too big. Too ugly. Eerie black eyes. She can’t look away. She can’t close her eyes. For as hard as it was for her to stay awake and force her eyes open; they are now locked, transfixed by the doll. The tears in her eye take their toll. Everything was blurry in her wet eyes. The doll almost seemed to waver in her blurry vision. She loosed up to her mother to cry in complaint of the new toy that instead of providing comfort, it had the opposite effect. Her mother held her tight with both arms, and her mother tucked the doll into the covers with out-stretched arms. The baby doesn’t cry. Though in distress. She finally fell asleep.

…

“It’s a long road to Arcadia.” The baby is woken by the many arms holding her close. She looks up, but the face that greets her is not one that she recognizes. Nor is the voice, for that matter. “Perhaps we can just hide out here.” A man says, “Humans mature quite quickly, right?” The baby feels the footsteps reverberate up through the woman holding her. The surrounding are unfamiliar. Tall buildings and shining street lamps tower above her. A man and a woman. She doesn’t know why she is with them.

We have to get her back before she’s too old.” The woman says, “Children are the only ones of value. The younger, .the better.” The infant doesn’t understand human speech. She understands even less of this foreign inhuman speech. “There is a crossing not far from here.” The woman says, breathing hard from exertion, “If we start our journey now, we can get there before our delivery expires.” The man stops suddenly. “Expires?” We have to care for it until we reach our destination or it will expire within a day.” The woman stops too. The baby sees their faces shimmer for but a moment. But in that moment, they exhibited piscine features. Gills. Fins. Scales. Sails. The terrible realizations sets into the couple. They were not going to return home to Arcadia for quite some time. They needed to learn to care for a child; in the safety of the mortal world or they wouldn’t be able to keep their living cargo alive in-transit to Arcadia.

…

The world came crumbling down. The bricks were ground to dust. For the empty cup was filled. Would you drink of it? Hope for the fallen. What can we say? Run from the trees. It was there that we first saw them. Long limbs from the shadows. What else could I say? Maybe you can run away. But it would take much of the destruction. There they were. Stay in the light, lest ye be ambushed. Stay in the light, for they wait in the shadows. I couldn’t get past them. They were coming after me. Trying to defeat the enemy is all but impossible. What can you say?

…

Ghost on the computer. Maybe she spent too much time watching videos. Making videos. Browsing forums. Posting. Commenting. Making videos. Even producing live streams at times. But she can’t do this forever. Death comes to everyone. Not even the internet can save you. So they went to put away her old computer set. Though she was dead. They couldn’t let it take from you. What was happening.

…

A man, a woman, and a baby that isn’t theirs, stand in a residential neighborhood in the middle of the night. “Just pick a house, Susan.” The man says, holding the baby to give the woman a rest. “I don’t know. They all look the same.” The woman, Susan, says, “This is your idea. Why don’t you pick a house, Michael?” The man, Michael, sighs and rolls his eyes. He stomps forwards to the door of one of the houses. With two arms he holds the child. He raises another arm but he doesn’t knock on the door. It’s dark out. He’d have to be very loud to wake the owners. Loud enough that he’ll surely wake the baby and the neighbors.