I snapped awake.

Weeping for any once of air to fill my burning lungs.

I began rubbing the tendons of my neck. Moving the muscle around, the tightness became unbearable. A bit of a spasm reacted to the movements. It sent an instant warning up the base of my skull. The protest was more than enough to lay my cranium slowly against the closest wall. It relieved the tension as the plastered mix of materials took on the weight.

My arms; legs; my whole body felt as though it had been drained of life itself. I found myself completely incapacitated leaning against some corner where the walls met in the dark. The entirety of moment felt familiar.

Had I been here before?

My eyes eventually adjusting to the stygian. A door to the left, appeared slowly as if my eyes were in burst mode from a camera; with every snap of my eyelids, it showed more prominently from the opposite side by the spraying light outlining the wooden slats planked horizontally. A closet?

This is a closet.

My skin explored the surface of rough bumps and lumps. Large...small...longer...shorter finishes were smooth as my fingertips followed along. A fancy plaster design or technique for drywall.

My attention drew away as the sound of a door opening, then closing off in the distance. Faint footsteps began approaching; growing closer as well as louder with every second passing.

My breath began to have a slight chortle with the anticipation building, as a slender shadow whipped along the accordion style door and splattering shapes against the laminate flooring, and upon the white drywall only a few feet from myself. The light never quite reaching me.

The white planks suddenly swayed away from the latch as the door opened.

The minute silhouette, stocky and pleasantly proportioned, carried boxes in one arm, as the other let go of the closet handle. The face was hard to make out, as the light emanating behind him, blinded me. I winced away; pressing as hard as I could force myself against the wall. Holding my forearms up; shielding my apparently sensitive skin.

The guy placed the boxes down, and got onto all fours. Peering further into the closet. For a moment, his eyes locked onto my corner; but, he seemed to not notice myself at all.

He appeared to be more concerned with another smaller door inches from my toes.

I'm barefoot! Where did my shoes go?

As his right hand stretching closer towards the oval door handle, an instinctively upchuck feeling rivered, itself upward.

I couldn't help the lump crawling up my throat; splitting from my lips. I let out a few whimpering coos.

"Please don't..." I managed to croak out.

Deja vu swaddled at my brain. This is all too familiar.

Then as if a wild wind struck from a spin up storm, the quick flashes began.

The heartache... the house... the closet... the blood...

Those abyss banded eyes glaring at me from behind.

A shiver produced an even colder chill up and down my huddled frame.

THOSE GRODY OVALS!

An even skull fracturing acuity breaks through like a speeding train bulleting off uneven tracks.

It was more than some feeble chalky hand print wielding a warning... it passed on some kind of perdition.

That desperate attempt to get away in the car, was all imagined. I never left the puce and soggy bedroom.

Forwarding back to my present, his hand still only a few inches away from the metal knob.

A bigger dilemma surrounded the fear gnawing my gut... there's a way outta this!

I rose my left hand; my digits pressed together as one, I whacked at him. Warmth.

His hand was so heated, as if I had came in close contact with a heating pad of a smaller scale size. My hands where were exceptionally numbing; cold to the bone.

I've never been a person to ever be cold, let alone in the middle of a drought summer.

The pop forced him to withdraw the curiosity that had ahold of him. Searching the tiny room for any explanation for the sudden attack.

I was no longer within that small enclosing. I was standing outside of the hell house... a raw howl came from within the refurbished building in front of me.

The emotional torment fell on me. I gasped in agony for making such a choice. How can I make this choice for this individual.

I glossed over their large truck; only to have a double take over the incredulous political sticker stuck proudly behind the extended cab's back window.

I made the right choice.