JenHunter

Jorunal entry: It’s not like it’s common sense that being a homeless runaway in a foreign place is a preferable option to living in a big house, with both parents, grandparents and a younger brother. With food on the table, cozy bed, own bedroom and all the luxuries of an upper class family there are, and then some. Of course most people will shake their head when I tell them I left it all behind years from now, when I’m of age and will be able to even admit to having done so. You should have stayed, they’ll say, you should have finished school and milk the opportunity of having everything paid for by your family. And to that I will always say: Hell no. I’d forever have it hanging over my head - the fact that I ‘owe’ them, that they ‘did something for me’ and are therefore entitled to tell me what to do with my life, their constant reminding that I need to ‘give back’ what’s been invested in me. And that would only be a problem I’d face if I made it until coming of age, which is

She quickly pulled out the tube of coloring cream from the box and slipped it into her sleeve. Then she popped open a box of the strongest hair bleach and did the same with the bottle of developer and the sachet of bleach powder. She placed both of the emptied boxes in the back of the shelf, behind a few full ones. By the time they find it she will be long gone, even if they care to check the security footage. She grabbed a small bottle of the cheapest sparkling water on her way to the checkout and placed it on the conveyor. She let the hair products slide out of her sleeve and into her bag when she fumbled inside for her wallet. Lady at the cash register greeted her in a tired voice, scanned the bottle of water, and told her the price in Czech. The girl spilled a bunch of Czech korunas she had left from family trips to Prague and Liberec cities; just a spare change from getting snacks really, but enough for a small bottle of water. She paid and just nodded at the lady when she

She made it back to her camp and slept for a few hours, again woken up by nightmares of all roads leading back to her old family house. She couldn’t fall back asleep afterwards, so she took what she needed and went down to the lake. It must have been late afternoon; she spent the night at the church and only left at dawn. Maybe not the smartest decision, considering she should use daylight for life-saving chores and not sleep through most of it. But it felt good to have someone she actually wants to spend time with. She exhaled deeply as she dropped her clothes on the shore and went into the lake. The water wasn’t very cold, considering the lake wasn’t very big and recent months were quite warm all around the clock. She used a cheap shampoo-plus-shower gel combo bought from men’s section of a convenient store and washed herself. Mother nature will need to forgive her for contaminating this lake so often, but she knew how important it is to keep up appearances of not being homeless if

The following few days she kept coming back after dark, and they kept talking. It seemed like each night went on longer, edging closer to dawn by the time she’d leave the old church. Most of the time they’d discuss lighter matters and recall funny or interesting memories from their respective lives. But every time their conversation would stir towards these more personal, emotional matters, the same need for warmth resonated from the boy’s recounts of his encounters with people and failed quests for being accepted. And every time her heart broke a little more, a little more understanding of the faceless voice and his deep-seated fear of evoking the same emotions in her that caused other people to reject him in the past. “Is there anything I can do or say to convince you that it’s okay to show yourself?” she asked one night. He hesitated before answering with what she could assume to be a sad smile. “I think I heard it all before.” According to his recounting there were many promising

The night went by, then the day went by and as she circled back to her camp she found prey once again laid out on the stone. She closed her eyes and inhaled slowly, making up her mind. After nightfall she made her way to the church, half of the day’s gained goods safely packed in a bag. She switched off her flashlight as soon as she closed the door behind herself. “Kurt?” she called out softly. She heard a stir above. “Ja. I’m here.” She inhaled deeply and let it out slowly as she walked across the room. “I brought your share” she said low and placed the contents of her bag on the altar. “Thank you.” He sounded sad, and she could imagine why. “Listen, about yesterday… I’m sorry” she turned around and hopped onto the altar to sit on its edge, facing the vast empty room and all of its darkness swallowed corners. “I snapped-- it was a full blown overreaction. I thought about it a lot today” she sighed and lowered her eyes to the floor in the distance. “It’s probably because I was always

Giving the benefit of the doubt, the girl spent the following day in the city alternating between sketching portraits of strangers willing to pay any amount and scouting elders who might want help carrying groceries for some spare change or food items. She was happy with what she had when she went back into the forest. Arriving at the camp she was presented with fresh prey and a bunch of berries laid out on the stone she used as a make-shift table. “Would you look at that” she shook her head with a smirk. “The boy really did know where everything was.” She settled down, prepared everything and divided it into two piles. She wrapped up one of them and carried it to the not-so-abandoned church. It was the first time she saw it up close in daylight, and the ruined state of it seemed more prominent now. She entered the building, in awe at how much it changed in the warm, stained glass-tinted twilight. There were no deep, sharp shadows either down by the floor or up, under the

"I’d rather feed myself to the wolves than go back to my family - that’s words that came out of my mouth today, and even I was surprised how well it hit the nail on the head. Maybe that’s why nothing in these woods scares me anymore - because the only thing scary to me is not in the wild, but rather in the walls of an upper-class suburban family house some couple of hundred miles away." She put the journal away just as sunrise turned into a full-blown daytime. That day she checked her snares for prey and did her usual rounds, going in growing circles around her camp to make sure nothing looked out of place. Later in the afternoon she took a nap, woke up after twilight and decided it was time to do as she declared and come to the abandoned church. It crossed her mind a few times to do this in daytime, but if the first meeting taught her anything, is that her peculiar conversator won’t step out of the shadows, so she argued herself to grant him the luxury of having them in the first