The Escape Attempt

By Anoosh Arta

In real life, we encounter situations that make us run away or desire to do so. We feel lost and seek answers in an unknown world. These situations can be exposed on us from the outside world or from the world within. In either case, we wish to escape them physically or mentally by ignoring and denying them or by adapting to them as written destiny. Those of us who never quit to overcome the problems by running away from negativity and attempting to explore the unknown will defeat the estranged world. These are indeed true artists.

This story is about the perseverance of one of these life artists who stands up against her fear and attempts to escape a captive dungeon to open her way up to freedom.

To all life artists in the world!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Apr 25, 2022
• ISBN: 9781662454981

Book preview

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The Escape Attempt

Anoosh Arta

Copyright © 2022 Anoosh Arta

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING

Conneaut Lake, PA

First originally published by Page Publishing 2022

ISBN 978-1-6624-5497-4 (pbk)

ISBN 978-1-6624-5498-1 (digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

About the Author

To my daughter, Rosana

Some hundred years ago, there was a chapter in someone’s life full of prosperity and arrogance. Then, the wheel took its turn and changed her temperament through the years. Not a positive change, of course. And here we got Aunt Heredith who could tease you to your bones if you were in her presence.

Aunt Heredith was popular in her town as everyone had been hit once by her nasty words. No one could see the pain that sourced her heart-breaking remarks except Charles, who saw her for real and married her. Aunt Heredith gave birth to Bishop Mark, my great-grandma’s first husband, who died after two years of marriage. The cause was a heart attack that hit him hard while he was climbing up a tree. They said he climbed the tree to fix an empty bird’s nest, which was hanging loose on one side due to the wind the night before. But the reality was that he climbed the tree to look for my great-grandma’s bracelet, which was stolen from her room by a naughty bird.

Anyway, my great-grandma couldn’t wait any longer. She married my great-grandpa a month after, and there came my grandma and her sister, Aunt Betty, who in my opinion and based on what I’ve heard from here and there, was a complete copy cat of Aunt Heredith. Although they were apparently not related, I quite extremely doubted that. However, these two had one big difference. No one could see Aunt Betty for real if there was a real. Thus, she remained single and never married. My grandma died at a young age. And although my mom was not brought up by Aunt Betty, she has always seen her as her mother’s replacement. Quite astonishing to me because Aunt Betty was nothing but an unkind creature with a nasty tongue. She had spent years of service in military and retired about two years ago. This gave her more free time than before to bug her nose around and hit people with her nasty words. My mother was not an exception to her, and with all that unpleasant character, she loved Aunt Betty and treated her as one of her closest dears.

I never liked Aunt Betty and neither did she. We both picked at each other every time we got around. I couldn’t help myself going against her and fighting her back with nasty words. Until that day, when my mother got a telephone call from the hospital, being informed that Aunt Betty was hospitalized because of a heart attack. I can’t explain how devastating that was to my mother. After a few days and a few visits, my mother asked me to go and visit Aunt Betty.

No way! I said.

My mother’s eyes became teary, and she could not say anything more.

Why should I go to her? To say, how I miss her impolite, selfish, and uncaring character? I continued.

My mother swallowed her sadness, looked at me straight, and said, She may die soon, Lili, and she wants you to visit her.

Unconvinced and unwilling, I accepted my mother’s request and visited Aunt Betty that very next day.

It was a usual day. I entered the hospital and after a while, found myself at her bed. She was awake. She turned her head to me and stared at me with no smile.

Hello… I said reluctantly.

Aunt Betty signaled me with her finger to come closer. I did so. She whispered in my ear, Make sure you’ll get out.

She then smiled. Suddenly, the device hooked on her went out beeping. She passed away while still smiling at me.

The door opened and a few hospital staff rushed in. They pushed me away and began to work on her. I was pissed off, not by her death, but by her unfinished nonsense words. I saw her the winner of an unfair game. I was not given any time to get even with her. She left me with some nonsense that would always make me wonder what she meant.

I watched her through all those hands working on her. She was still smiling at me. That old witch! I was angry.

Suddenly, I felt a burning sensation in my arm. I looked to my side. There was a hospital figure in a white coat by my side. He had given me a shot, I think. Soon, I passed out. The next thing I could remember was being dragged by two people on an empty back street, probably outside of the hospital, toward a black van, waiting a few steps ahead. I could not feel my legs. They threw me in the dark van. I couldn’t remember until afterward.

I opened my eyes to a dimly lit place. My head felt very heavy. I