Short Story on Entrapment. 8:00 Sharp

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Salina Kumbu         English Coursework         Zahra Fontenelle

8:00 Sharp

        10 seconds to go…5…4…3…2…1…8:00. Every room in the orphanage lit up with the echoing 8:00 chime until the house fell silent. I lay on my bed slowly sinking into the silence until a great bang woke the house. Scratching, growling and panting noises grew louder and louder from the top of the hallway, from The Red Door; the door no one ever used.  However even though it scared me, I was not surprised; every night we had to be in our rooms by 8:00 sharp for fear of running into the monster. The orphanage owner, Ms Kravon was a small, chubby woman. She constantly smelt of wet dog, which was weird because we were not allowed pets. She told us daily she was protecting us but every night I felt more trapped than ever. Girls had gone missing in the night. No one knew what the animal looked like; all we knew was that we would go to sleep with its roars ringing in our ears.

        “Everybody up NOW!” howled Ms Kravon. Her sudden outburst woke me up instantly. With a sigh, I stumbled out of bed. Another day at the orphanage. I walked to the old wardrobe and picked out my everyday checked dress that only got washed once a fortnight. After getting changed I stumbled downstairs to the cramped dining room full of 15 of us girls all wearing the same grey checked dresses. I had been the first orphan to be dumped here, and so I was well respected by the girls at least.

“Hey Ruth, where’s Anna?” I asked as I sat down to a small portion of porridge.

The room was quiet, you could just about hear the clangs of spoons against bowls and Ruth sat still, holding her silver dove pendant necklace. Has Ruth been crying?

“Ruth! What’s wrong?” I repeated, getting more worried.

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 “Ms Kravon made her work later last night, she had so much work to do, she didn’t get back to her room by 8:00…she’s gone” Ruth replied breaking down into tears.

I felt like I had been shot in the stomach. I didn’t know what to say.

I cried, “I’m so sorry, this is completely my fault. I wanted to look after all of you, but I can’t even do that”.

From behind me, Ms Kravon barked, “Ruby, what are you moping about, get to your chores or I’ll throw you into The Crunch.” The Crunch was an ...

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