There was a moment of silence. It was calm; I couldn’t hear, couldn’t see, couldn’t think. Then my ears started ringing with the aftermath of… what? What had just happened? I wasn’t sure. I looked up. My vision was blurry and there was some kind of liquid flowing into my eyes. It was thick and sticky and blocked my view. I wiped it out of my eyes and looked around. People ran everywhere like chickens with their heads cut off. Their mouths were open in surprise and delight as they ran and shouted to one another in delight. Some people grabbed onto one another as they ran, holding each other tight and shrieking joyfully to one another. There was red coloring everywhere. It stained the clothes of those around me like confetti in a celebration, flew through the air like party ribbons, and soaked the ground in bright puddles.

The ringing in my ears started to fade. I wiped more liquid out of my eyes. As my hearing started to return, I could hear the excited shrieks of those around me. I spotted someone I knew. Who was it? I couldn’t remember. They screamed something at me in delight. I raised my head and smiled back, wiping more liquid out of my eyes. It looked like the pretty red paint flying through the air. Then I was jerked upright. Someone had grabbed me from behind. Was this an excited embrace like I’d seen some of the others around me doing? Whoever it was began dragging me away from the familiar person. Was it one of my friends of family? I couldn’t think straight. My maybe-friend tried running toward me, maybe to join in the embrace, but whoever was holding me was pulling me too quickly. I laughed at the familiar person and called to them to catch up. Just then, whoever had me shoved me toward a box. Was it like one of those magic boxes where people disappeared and reappeared somewhere else? What a fun surprise. The person who had dragged me closed the big door. There was a window on it. Well that was odd. How would the trick work if people could see inside? The person I knew slammed on the window and screamed in delight. Maybe they knew how the trick worked. I laughed at them and asked them how the magic trick worked. They just stared in surprise. I wiped more red paint out of my eyes and looked down at my hand.

And that’s when it hit me. As my brain cleared and I looked around outside the box, I realized what was happening. The people running around weren’t screaming with excitement, but fear and horror. The people grabbing each other weren’t hugging. They were being kidnapped. I looked at the familiar person pressed against the outside of my box. They stared at me with fear and sadness in their eyes. I recognized them. My love. The one person in the world who cared about me. This box wasn’t a magic trick; it was a prison carrier. I was being taken away with the others getting kidnapped. To where, I had no idea. I wiped more red out of my eyes and stared at my stained hands. They weren’t soaked in red paint. They were covered in blood. I pressed my hand against the window, leaving a bloody handprint. Then, just like the people running around outside my prison, I screamed.