Graveyard mentality!

It is the weirdest shit ever. This whole week all I have dreamed about is the graveyard. The graveyard I went to last week, the graveyard I got lost in last week.
It was all Faye’s fault, Faye Dilton, the most popular boy in our little town. If he stood on the table in his 1st-period class everybody was standing on the tables in their 2nd-period class. If he says that he has a headache during the 5th period-everyone magically gets a headache in the 6th period.
He leads the whole school-no one tells him no.
So when he asked me to go to the graveyard with him on Halloween I said yes-reluctantly-but yes. He, Karen (said like Kah-rin, not like the stereotype), Mason, Isaac, and Chadwick came to my house on Halloween night, even though I wanted to stay in my fetal position wrapped in blankets, I slipped out the window and walked with them, all the way to the graveyard. Faye had some kind of juice when he came and he let me have it. I didn’t know if he had drunk some or not but I took it.
At the time I wasn’t thinking of being roofied, poisoned, or just a straight-up getting mono. I sipped the watermelon-flavored liquid like it was milk and I was a baby…

I smelled the haunted air before I saw the limestone gravestones. I knew right away that I wasn’t ok, my head throbbed and my legs grew weak.

The next time my eyes opened I was in the middle of the graveyard all by myself. The horror of laying alone in the middle of the graveyard on Halloween didn’t hit me until I stood up. I screamed and cried-I couldn’t believe that Faye drugged me and left me here… I couldn’t believe my sorry-ass took the drink. I felt dread, anxiety, and extreme pain all at the same time. The pain was abrupt-it shot through my spine quickly and soon I was back on the ground. The pain grew to be unbearable and the emotions I felt made it even worse. I looked down at my body and noticed millions of bruises and gashes-they had drugged me, beat me, and then left me in the middle of the graveyard. I peeked at my private areas to make sure I hadn’t been roofied, in that instance I was fine but I knew that they had done everything else. The welts on my leg burned and the scar on my forehead bled into my eyes. I touched the gauche and I knew right away that the boys had used tools to do the deed. Knives, bats, things like that-all to hurt me-me, who has never done anything to Faye or his gang members.

The night air swiftly brushed my bloodied face, blew my knotted hair, and dried my salty tears.


I stood up gently this time, straightening my back, curving my neck, and stretching my legs. Making sure I didn’t fall back down again.

I walked slowly around the graveyard. I didn’t know where to go. The darkness made everything hard to see, which meant that I couldn’t tell if I was walking deeper into the demonic depths of the graveyard or slowly out. The wind blew toward me and knocked me off my scraped and slashed feet. I didn’t bother to stand up again, I just lay there. I wanted to call for help but my voice was raw with blood.

Now, of course, none of this actually happened but as the cameraman recorded me all alone in the forest with only God, other cameramen, and the director watching, it felt so real. I won a dozen awards for that movie and I am so proud I did it but I still have nightmares about it, it is like it is etched in my brain. All the other actors and crew have said the same thing, I guess that means that we’re stuck, stuck with a graveyard mentality.