Valley of Death [View all]

I'm in the backseat of a car. My mother is driving. Her new boyfriend is in the passenger seat. We are on a dark and windy rural road. My mother is driving too fast. She keeps nearly rear-ending cars she approaches, and nearly hitting oncoming cars when she tries to pass people, or veers into the wrong lane by taking curves too fast. I am very angry at her. I keep yelling at her. "Slow down! Can you even see?!"

I insist she pulls over. Her new boyfriend seems surprisingly normal. I ask him if he can drive. (I can't drive. This is true.) I ask him if he can see. He can do both so I say, "You drive. Otherwise, you can just leave me here, in the middle of nowhere. I don't care. She is not driving any more."

So he drives. I am still in the backseat and my mother is in the passenger seat. The boyfriend seems to be a decent driver, and I feel safer, though I'm still mad at my mom.

Suddenly, we go flying off the road into this tremendously deep ditch. We are falling down the ditch, which is narrowing. It's lined with old tires that begin to break our fall. As our descent slows, I realize we will not be hurt in this crash, which is a relief.

When the car stops, we can't open the doors. I roll down my window. I tell them that I'll climb out and get help. But my mother rolls my window halfway back up, opens the glove box which is full of old keys and key chains. She starts hanging these old keys on the window. Some of them are mine. I'd lost them years ago and never knew what had happened to them.

I am so angry at my mother, not only because she's been hoarding my lost keys, but because hanging them on my window while I'm trying to climb out is so irrational and unproductive. I throw the keys on the floor, roll down the window and climb out, yelling at her the whole time about how useless, obstructive, crazy and unwanted she is.

When I try to climb out, the tires slope and I fall down. I end up under the car.
I follow a narrow path and emerge into a dark valley. It's a trailer park, surrounded by these deep, tire-lined ditches.

A dog is barking because I am an intruder here. An old couple grabs the dog and retreats into their trailer. I go and knock on their door to ask for help. They won't answer.

I start walking around, trying to find a spot where I can get a signal on my phone. This valley is very deep. The sky seems very far away. I come across many trapped cars,like ours. It looks like some have been there a long time. I know this is bad.

I finally get a signal and am about to call for help, but I see a teenage girl is watching me. I realize that she will attack if she thinks I am calling for help. So I put the phone in my pocket and walk up to her saying, "I can't get a signal. Can you get a signal?"

She pulls this kind of cell phone shaped compact out of her pocket, opens it, shakes it, holds it up to her ear. But it's not a phone. It's birth control pills. "No, I can't get a signal either," she says, putting the pills back in her pocket.

Then my phone starts ringing in my pocket. I don't want the girl to feel threatened so I say, "Ugh, that's probably my mom. I'm not going to answer it. She's driving me nuts."

"Oh, my parents drive me nuts too," She says. So I start chatting with her, trying to bond with her. I ask her where she goes to school. She says she doesn't go to school. I ask her if she knows a way out of here, maybe some way she gets out to go to the movies or go shopping. She says she never leaves the valley.

I tell her I don't see any stores. "Where do you shop?" I ask, and knowing it's a mistake as I am speaking, I ask, "What do you eat?"

"People." She sees I'm scared so she adds, "Oh, don't worry. Just your blood."

She takes out some kind of blood-drawing weapon. I realize I am in some kind of valley of fangless vampires.

I back away from her. I wonder if I can fight her off. She says, "I like you. I won't take it all, right away."

Another girl appears. She has a stick covered with razor blades. I am backing away from them, pretty sure I cannot fight them both. They back me into a trailer. About 15 people are in there, all with weapons. The second girl attacks me with her stick. I block with my hand. A razor digs into my palm. They are all closing in on me.

I am going to be killed.