Hannah had been in a deep sleep after their good long walk in the woods. Their Mum had left them in the car while she popped into the corner shop to pick up some milk and bread for tea. It was a hot day, so their Mum had left the car windows open. She would only be gone two minutes, she said.
She woke up with a jolt, as the car’s front doors both flew open and two people dived into the car, started it up and hurtled away at breakneck speed. She could smell the acrid smell of burning rubber as the tyres screeched along the road, and then she felt herself go rolling as the car veered around a sharp bend. The car harness held her fast, but she was starting to feel very sick. She looked over at her little sister, Jenna, who looked petrified too and was starting to cry.
She looked in the car rear-view mirror where she could usually see her Mum’s face, but this was not a face she recognised. This was a man, with a hood over his head. From where she was sitting, at least Jenna couldn’t see that awful face, with those dark glowering eyes. It was a very frightening face.
Suddenly Hannah felt the car lurch, and felt it swerving and skidding, skidding and swerving. She was getting dizzy, and swaying about all over the place, but held tightly by the harness which was pressing hard into her chest. She could hardly breathe. Finally there was a huge bang. The car came to a sudden halt. Hannah was pitched forward, and then back again, hard against the back of the seat. Simultaneously the person in the passenger seat was catapulted through the windscreen, glass shattering everywhere. The driver was motionless. Hanna looked at Jenna again. She was shaking terribly and had buried her head under her blanket.
Hannah didn’t know what to do. She wriggled around, trying to free herself, but she was stuck fast in her harness. Jenna was doing the same, and was whimpering. It seemed like ages before they heard sirens, and they could see blue flashing lights approaching fast. They heard the sound of voices.
“This one’s dead, Dave!”
“I don’t think the driver could have survived that either, Mike, the whole front is stoved in.”
Someone tried to open the driver’s door, but it wouldn’t budge.
All of a sudden a man in a uniform put his head through the still open back window. “Blimey! Hey, Dave, there’s two Alsations in the back here – in harnesses. They both look alright.”
N.B. The above little story is entirely fictional – one of my homework exercises for my Creative Writing Group. We were supposed to write a story in about 400 words with the prompt line of “She looked hard in the mirror, but this was not a face she recognised” which could appear anywhere in the story.
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