• Handkerchief over my mouth and nose, I walk swiftly. The stench of dead bodies fill the air. Bodies covered in boils, black and deep red. Bloody. There are so many dead bodies my stomach churns just at the sight, but at the smell my last meal comes from my mouth. So repulsive even the dogs do not dare touch. The Bubonic Plague, or some call it the Black Death. Thousands, maybe millions in Europe have died, hundreds in my town have already died, their bodies cast into the streets. People everywhere are carrying posies and other flowers, all only in vain.
    I am on my way home from the market, I dearly wish to be home and yet I do not. My father has already died and my younger sister is near death, I do not wish to see her die. I fasten my pace. Suddenly a figure falls in front of my feet, it is a young girl. She desperately whispers
    “Please, please, I beg of thee, please save me…God please save me.”
    I do not dare touch the young girl, instead I try to run away. Something grabs my ankle. I let out a gasp of fright and quickly turn around to see the child tugging at my foot. I have dropped my handkerchief and now I run. As I run I hear the girl faintly whisper “God…please…” Silence. She is dead.
    Home at last I find my younger sister dead on the couch. Now I can’t help but think, What God? So many have died. Why God? Might anyone be saved?
    That night I weep myself to sleep, only to drown in nightmares. I dream of the girl in the street and of my sister, they are running to me and I am running away. Both girls are covered with black and red. I feel as if I can really smell their dead stench. I am scared.
    Each day passes by, more people die, and I keep having the same nightmare. But, each night I dream, my dead sister and the dead girl keep getting closer. I run faster and faster. Each morning I feel weaker and more tired. Am I getting sick? No this can’t be, I must be imagining things.
    Four days since my sister’s death, now mother is sick and I know she is dying. I can’t save her. Can God save her? I haven’t the slightest clue. Mother will probably die, and yet I still try to save her. Why? I don’t want to be alone. Being alone is scary. I would rather die than be alone.


    It has been a week now, since my sister’s death. My dreams go on unchanged, but the girls keep getting closer and I keep getting weaker. Mother is also getting worse, she
    has the plague. I can’t help her anymore. I know my mother is scared, she cries at night and I hear her praying. I no longer pray. God is saving no one.
    That night my mother dies. I am alone. Now my nightmare includes my mother, she is also chasing me and all of three of them get much closer. They smell of death, and are colored more vibrantly in red. I scream in my sleep but I cannot wake from my slumber. My dead mother, my dead sister, and the dead girl suddenly stop and so do I. I do not know why I have stopped but when I turn around they are all right behind me. They circle me. They all smile and start singing.

    “Ring around the rosies
    Pocket full of posies
    Ashes, ashes
    We all fall down.”

    It is so twisted and menacing, I scream louder! They are pulling me down. But where is down? I know… down is where death is.
    Now I wake, panting, sweating, ALIVE! But it is now that I realize I am covered in black boils. Plague. I am sick with the bubonic plague. Soon my black feverish body will become red, bloody and cold, like my mother and sister. I know what is to become of me. Dying of the plague is very slow and very painful. I am alone. I would rather die now. I choose red blood over black death. I run to the study and pull out a fine, sharpened pair of scissors. I am so SCARED! Will I be able to go through with it? Will I be saved bye a God I no longer believe in? Will I be saved? I will find out soon. Very soon…
    “Drip”