My heart flew out of my chest as I free fell from the immensely rocky and leaf filled hillside. I felt like my life flashed before my eyes and it was all black…I awoke in an almost too bright to handle room. Why was I here? What was here? My mind was filing through questions like this, when finally my eyes adjusted to the room. I was lying on a floral couch like the one your grandma would have, the floor was a nice oak, and there were bar lights hanging over my head, only instead of a bar being below them, there was the couch. Other than the couch, nothing else was in this room. It was small and had crème colored walls, and directly across from the couch was a closed door. I decided to stand up and try to figure out where I was. As I stood up I looked down at my ripped up and dirty Sunday school dress, it used to be a bright red color, it reminded me of a poppy flower. My eyes began to tear up at the thought of how I got where I am standing right now. Just to think, last week the one person who I had spent my whole childhood raising, died. Last week, that’s when everything crazy started to happen.

I stood on the linoleum floors in the kitchen with my sister by my side. I was making lunch for the both of us since Mom locked herself in her bedroom doing some sort of new drug on the market. Dad, well he had left when Lily was just a baby, Mom says he was a bad man but I don’t know if I believe her. Lily is my younger sister. She’s only 2 years younger than me and I basically have raised her. I could be her mom. We look alike, and I do everything a real Mom should be doing. We both have blonde straight hair and are pretty tan. There are few differences between us, other than the fact she’s a whole foot shorter than me; I have blue eyes and she has brown, she was annoying and I wasn’t.  As I showed Lily how to make mac’ n’ cheese I heard a loud hard bang at the door. I wonder who it could be. Lily didn’t even think she just acted. She flew to the door and opened it. A large man that was wearing a business suit stood in the door way. He was a balding and had bright blue eyes; he was extremely tall and had a sweet smile on his face. For some reason I wasn’t scared I (actually for the first time in a very long time) felt safe.
He looked at me “Riley.” Said the man.
How did he know my name? I questioned in my head. “Uh yes, and you are?”
“Sorry, excuse me ,you don’t have any clue who I am do you?” said the man.
I shook my head agreeing with him.
“I’m your father.” He said.
My head went blank and then it started popping with questions. Why didn’t you come earlier, what made you come now, and who are you really?
I must have given him a questionable look because he then said ,“You probably have a lot of questions for me, and I will tell you those answers. But we need to leave now.”
For some reason I decided to trust him and began packing my stuff in an old backpack of mine. I grabbed another small backpack with the characters from some television show Lily used to watch and packed a few of her things. I arrived back and saw Lily immediately making a connection with him. His eyes flicked up and ushered us out the door to this black suburban it looked almost like an FBI agent’s car. Hmm could he be an FBI agent! I pulled open the door and found a booster seat (for Lily?). It was a pink seat with purple and yellow butterflies on it. I hopped in and scrambled to the other seat. The man lifted Lily up and placed her in the booster seat. He then shut the heavy black car door and placed himself in the driver’s seat. He started the car and then we went on down the long town road of Mulberry, Wisconsin.
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After a trip to Burger King and a few bathroom stops, we made it to a mansion 12 hours later. This was the first time I’d ever seen a house this size, we lived in the dumps! As soon as we walked in the mansion’s huge marble doors, my dad took us to our rooms.
“Here we are!” He stated as he swung open the tall white door leading to Lily’s bedroom.
Her room had pink walls and a princess bed. It was a little young but Lily was immature for her age so she loved the room.
“It’s so big!” She was squealing with excitement.
She was right; it was a huge room from what we used to have to share. There were Barbie dolls and stuffed animals in one corner of the room. The other had a few blankets and her bed was centered in the middle with a nice canapé over the princess bedding. She busted into the toys in the far right corner and my dad smiled at me. He closed the door to her bedroom and walked across the hallway to another large white door. The door swung open and a mature room appeared in front of me. The walls were a lilac color and the bedding was ruffled and white. On one wall was a white desk with a few notebooks and pencils lying on it. A dresser sat on the other side of the room. It was honestly a room I couldn’t have even dreamed of having.
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Later that evening as I sat in Lily’s room playing with the dolls, I questioned her.
“Don’t you think this is a little odd?”
“What’s a little odd?” she asked back.
“That he just shows up! Why would he show up out of nowhere?” I said in a whisper yell.
“Come on Riley your thinking into this way too much! Maybe he was busy with work before and he finally found some time off to take care of us.” She said trying to sound convincing.
“I guess so.” I said ,still not convinced, but I didn’t want to cause trouble between us so I gave it up.
“GIRLS, DINNER IS READY!” my dad belted.
We scrambled down stairs starving from the long ride.
After dinner I headed upstairs and went to sleep in my massive comfortable bed. But even though this bed was 1000x more comfortable than my bed at home, I couldn’t sleep. At around 2 AM, I finally drifted off into dream land.
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The next morning I awoke with the site of a beautiful red chiffon dress lying on the end of my new bed. I slipped it on and ran a brush that was lying on the desk through my hair. I headed into to Lily’s room to see if she was in there. Her dolls were spread out all over the room and a few stuffed animals were on the bed, but no Lily. She probably is just downstairs eating breakfast. I could smell the wheat waffles baking and the sweet maple syrup drenched over one waffle that had already been cooked and served. I glided down the marble white stairs and followed my nose into the kitchen. The glass table held some waffles and all the chairs were empty. Where was Lily? Maybe she decided to explore this house like I’ve been dying to do since we got here last night. I grabbed myself a plate of waffles and sat down. I looked around as I ate. The door to maybe the backyard was just across the table from me. The kitchen was to the right, it had beautiful caramel colored granite counter tops and white cabinets and stainless steel appliances. I examining my surroundings, when the door I thought led to the back door, clicked. My dad stepped in; he was wearing a white shirt that was covered in dirt with some basketball shorts that were black. He also had some running shoes on. Did he go running? No you don’t get that much dirt on you from running! “Do you have any Idea where Lily is?” I asked ignoring the fact he was so dirty and sweaty.
“Hum.” He said why was he stuttering?
“Yeah she uh went outside to play.” He said in an almost worried voice.
I pushed myself out of the chair and moved toward the backdoor. He slid out of the way and went through the door to the brisk air on this sunny day. “LILY!!” I yelled. The backyard was big. It had lots of trees and bushes and had even a little shed that was a light brown color. Then suddenly from inside the door a hand flew out and grabbed a hold of my arm. Whoever it was they were strong and it frightened me. I let out a yelp and escaped from their grasp. I dashed across the yard and was met with the ultimate challenge, a cliff. I turned back around and saw something I’ve never seen before, a creature.  The only thing I could compare it to is a futuristic alien.  One thought ran through my mind, my Dad just turned into an alien! I had two options be captured by this alien or try to make it down this cliff and run. I took one last glance, his alien mouth was full of razor sharp teeth and had greenish tint to his now long and lengthy body. Then I jumped, I free fell from this 30 foot cliff into leaf-less tree branches and rocky grounds.

The next thing I know I’m in a bare bright room. I try to understand why I’m here and come to the realization that the alien killed my sister. As he was chasing me, I could see it in his all black eyes I was prey, and it was either run or be killed.
The door handle began to jiggle and my head raced through multiple questions, was this alien waiting for me to wake up so he could eat me awake and alive? Or was I saved by the government and they were coming to see if I was awake? You wouldn’t guess who walked in; it was Lily, the one I thought had died. What was this some kind of sick game or just a dream?  “LILY!” I said with a sigh of relief.
“Riley, you wouldn’t believe what happened to me!” Lily exclaimed
“Where are we and what happened?!” I said.
“Well, Dad turned into this alien and then Mom came and she brought some guys in these police uniforms-only more protected!”
“Were they in the army?”
“Yeah that’s what mom said they were in! Anyway these army people captured dad the alien, but then he got away again and then they captured him again! And then we found you knocked out at the bottom of the cliff!”  She made this sound almost exciting as if it was a story she was quoting from some book. But this was real and this had really happened to us! Mom walked into this room. That I’m now guessing is some place that the government keeps people safe in.
“I’m so sorry! I’ve been the worst Mom! Ever I never take care of you guys and I’m just glad I realized the best things in my life were gone!” She said starting to tear up.
I smiled “It’s ok.”
We all hugged and told each other what had happened to each of us during that day with “Dad” and Mom explained to us that’s why she told us he was a bad man. She also told us Dad was locked up in a science facility being tested on.