Living in Florida for 5 years seems like a pretty sweet thing to do. You make friends, memories, go to the beach, eat great food, and see some pretty fantastic stuff. Though every positive has got to have its negatives. While enjoying the sun kissed sand and crystal clear waters, you tend to forget about the bad things. Forget that this is real life, and reality is dangerous.

Bustling feet and the squeak of silver carts fill the air. You breathe in the light scent of cleaning supplies, lavender you assume. These things aren’t new to you, you come to this place pretty often. Purchasing basic necessites to keep you going. So, obviously you’d automatically blend in with the smells. They’re practially keeping you sane after all. This place. This one building. Known across the nation, Walmart.

You’re next to your mother, one hand on the cart she turns into the toy aisle. Slowly moving along taking a glance at the new set of dolls they had put up. You walk over and pick one up commenting on its appearance and proceeding to place it back on the shelf. Walking up and down the next aisle you finally reach the fishing area. You dash to the small glass front fridge and yank it open looking at the small white, red, and orange canisters inside.Your eyes dart across each shelf looking for a specific type “nightcrawlers”. You see the maroon container and pull it out popping open the top for a glance inside. Not to your surprise, you see one wiggling around attempting to get deeper. By now your mother has walked over and sighed for the hundredth time, saying, “You are not getting worms.” You look at her and whine “Why? I’ll pay for it with my own money! Please please please! I promise they won’t die and I’ll play with them every day.” She glares at you and says “No.” Being quite the annoying child you are, you ask why once again. Not to your surprise, you recieve the long awaited anwser “Because I said so.” Just like any other time, you put them back and mumble “If this was a test, you’d fail cause that’s not a good anwser.”

She ignores your huff of frustration and keeps on to the next aisle. After grabbing everything you need you both head to the electronics hoping to find your sibling. Finding nothing, you stop for a second looking at the laptop cases. She looks your way and says “Venga Aquí, it’s late and we still have to go find Paul.” You do a one footed spin and see your brother creeping up behind your mother. You open your mouth to say something when he quickly shakes his head and puts a finger to his lips. Smiling you lean against the cart and watch as he digs his hands into each of her shoulders. “Boo!” She jumps turning around to playfully hit him. He lets out a slightly high pitched yelp and dodges. You start laughing “Mami, you should’ve seen your face. Whew, that was a good one.” She scowls at your brother and pushes forward. Walking along side her all three of you head to the register. Paying for what you need, you grab some bags and walk out to the silver truck that’s waiting in the parking lot. Placing the bags in the back, you walk to the side and clamber across the seats to your preferred side. She starts the car once everyones seatbelts are on and you start up a conversation about school. Looking out the window you see you're already turning onto your street. Looking at the houses, you see some of your neighbors sitting in their driveway. Your mom slows to a stop and rolls down the windows. You sort of shout “Hi!” Mrs.Christy and Mr.Louie wave back and they have a short conversation with your mother. After that you continue for a couple of feet and pull into your drive way. You hear the garage open and she pulls the car in. Getting out, you look onto the empty lampost lit street.

She tells you and Paul to grab some bags while she unlocks the door. Leaving the keys in the door you walk in first. Lifting your arm weighed down by bags, you manage to hit the light switch. Calling out for your beloved dog, you look the right and stop. You drop what you’re holding as your brother walks in. He looks the same way and shouts “Mom, come here!” She dashes over as your brother grabs the closest thing, your lime green pogo stick. He lifts it up, holding it like a bat. Suddenly time seemed to speed up. You feel your brother nudging you back, and the scream of your mother as she tells you to run. You know where to go, and you take off leaving them both behind.

You can barely see, the street lights and moon being the only source of sight. Your feet slamming against the blackened concrete as your heart beats within your ears, blocking out any other sound made by the creatures that roam throughout the night. The only thing coming out of your mouth are heavy breaths. Still fresh in your mind you see it. Yellow light and the chirping of crickets fills your senses as you're dragged back into the oh-so recent memory. Shards, sharp, sharp shards. You see them cover the ground, you see them stuck in the frame of the window. Beyond the window, eternal darkness. But beyond that blindness, you know what lurks. Tall, slender trees concealing the creatures that lay beyond.

Suddenly, you’re snatched back into reality. As you see Mr.Louie’s house coming into view, not caring who is already fast asleep, a scream rips through your throat. You see his head jerk towards the deafining sound that just left you're esophagus. A few more steps and you're in front of him. Eyes watering, chest heaving as you gasp out. Snippets of words are spit like fire as sweat dribbles down your forehead and the back of your neck. “The window. Broken. Somebody.” He stares at you trying to understand when you get a small burst of energy, just enough to whisper “Somebody broke in.”

His eyes widen in dismay as he jabs his hand in the direction of the door. “Go inside.” and without question you run in, him heading to your house. Walking into their kitchen you see his wife, Mrs.Christy. She looks towards you and looks at you in question. Explaining the situation she says to go with Louis and Landon, your best friends, you find them in Louis’ bedroom watching Cartoon Network. They look at you, “Oh hey, what’s up”. In an empty voice you look at them and explain the situation. They scoot over to make room for you, you sit with your back against the wall. There you sit staring at the screen watching the colors flash as the show goes on. Eyes glazed over, your trapped in your own world. Now staring into the wall, thoughts rush into your head a mile a minute. Suddenly one stops and it hits you like a train. You whisper it to yourself. “Ever since now, I’ve been blinded by all the good things in this world thinking it was oh-so perfect. All this time I was to stupid to realize this place isn’t as good as I thought it was. I can’t believe I had to wait until something happened to notice it.”

One week later, the image stuck into the depths of your mind. You along with the rest of your family are waiting for the day time to come where you could take down the boards nailed across the window, and live like normal. You sat on the dark wooden chair doing homework on the island when your mother walks over. She looks to you and says “They don’t know who did it.” You look at her astounded. “The only thing they found was a child sized handprint on the sink window.” You stare, mouth agape at what she said. Little did I know, this was just the beginning of a long list of bad things about my planet you had yet to learn of. Even today, though the image is but a faded memory, it remains burned in your mind for eternity as a reminder of what this cruel world is capable of doing.