20080316

Life in the Cell

by G.M. Hakim

It's dark in here, so very dark and cold, and the rank stench begins to overwhelm me. My eleven brethren sit quietly in peace in their pits, but they are not at the front of the line; they do not see what I see each time the wicked light shines down. Although we are shackled, I feel exposed, threatened, as if I could be taken at any time. First darkness, and the smell of spoiling milk: why doesn't he remove that, the torturing wretch, rather than leave us to suffocate in its stench? Then the glare of blinding light; is it time, is it us? The hand of justice reaches in, the roof that binds us lifts, the warmth of the hand surrounds me, and then a splitting pain in my head, being ripped in half, I'm sliding, sliding, and I hit hard, my flesh searing in hot oil, and my life slips away, as I've become... scrambled.

6S

G.M. Hakim, author of Nature's David, is a middle school English, Journalism, and Drama teacher who is starting to find time to write again. Inspired by Six Sentences, he started two blogs in 2008: Five Word Monologues and If A, Then B.