Tiptoeing

Dressed in her finest, Daphne silently agreed to play along in this ridiculous facade. But, if anyone could pretend that everything was okay, it was Daphne. After all , she had already successfully fooled everyone for years, making them believe she had the perfect life.

The perfect job, a doting husband and 3 adorable children. Everyone wanted what she had, at least what she was selling, and boy was she selling it.

This strange game her hometown was inventing would be no match for her skill set. She smiled as she entered the room, the tension was as thick as pudding.

As they gathered together to discuss the new year, blatantly ignoring the elephant, that couldn’t be any bigger, looming in the corner, awaiting the conversation to find it. Yet with every ounce of energy, they avoided it like the beggars that used to plague the street.

Each soul in the room had been battered by the battle that life charges, but no one was willing to be the one to draw attention to the devastation they faced...so they pretended. Dressed in in their Sunday best they made their way across the ravaged city streets to the only building left standing. An insane asylum that sat on the edge of the forest. Protected by the treeline, it made a great place of refuge.

They gathered together in the banquet hall, each one bringing something to share. Milk toast and jars of sweet homemade honey, some brought bowls of fruit and garden grown vegetables, and they feasted like kings on a holiday.

They sang as they played their violins and drums making music so loud it covered the sound of the incessant bombs that ignited overhead, igniting a passion in them greater than the flashes that overtook the blue sky.

And they danced.

Twirling and swaying along with the trees, as the rain tapped like punctuation on the sill. The stars twinkled like the flash of a camera snapping shots, capturing each moments as they happened. And they smiled as if they had never experienced fear.

Quietly, subtly, hesitantly, they made a pact.

Never speaking a word, they agreed to remain disconnected, lost in the narrative she had created. Together, taking their cues from Daphne, they played along, the kind of make believe that borders insanity. Living in a world of make believe, well, maybe.

They marked the walls counting the days, doing their best to keep track of the time that was so quickly escaping them. They balanced, teetering the thin line of sanity, wrestling with the spirits of the ones that dwelled there before them. Haunted by the remnants that scarred the halls. Drifting back and forth between the realms of reality and the incongruous truth.

Each new day brought prospect of clarity. Tasks were fulfilled, dinners were served as everyone tried their best to maintain a sense of normalcy while the world around them crumbled.

The power the asylum now held them in its grip and slowly, day by day, they succumbed to the insanity that enveloped the city making what was real, unreal and what was ridiculous, sane.

Lost to the void.

Emptiness filled their eyes and the rituals of the day became their new religion, saving them from the hell that was overtaking them unknowingly.

As the soldiers breached the doors of the asylum, they were met with complete madness. Surrounded by the shells of people who had no idea that their lives were soon to be over.

As they were seated at the table, Daphne welcomed them to their feast. Unknowingly feeding her last meal to her captors.