* * *
Abbey shoved her back against the brick wall as hard as she could, trying to wake up from the nightmare she now found herself in, but she knew it wasn’t a dream. As the haze in her mind began to subside, reality set in. She was alone and her mother was dead. Abbey bit down hard on her forearm and muffled her screams of terror into her sleeve. The jagged bricks dug into her back as she slid down the wall. She welcomed the pain. Unencumbered her tears flowed, mingling with the rain streaming down her face as she slumped to the ground. Exhaustion consumed her and the edges of her vision dimmed. She welcomed the darkness as sounds faded and everything around her turned to black.