• I stared into the black night. So dark I couldn't see anything. But I still felt shadows everywhere. Along with the tears running down my cheeks. Ever since I was a little kid I had wondered what it was like to be abandoned. And now I knew, but I wished I didn't.
    I heard a low, growling sound behind me, so I turned and screamed at the sight of my mother's dog. Screamed with joy. But where was my mother, the owner to the dog? Just minutes before, men dressed in black came, carrying guns in one hand and knives in the other. I hid under my mother's bed and had no idea where my mother hid. If she hid at all.
    The dog, Shadow, backed away from me, and continued to growl. I beckoned him forward, wondering why it was so afraid of me. It was usually so happy to see me.
    "Here, Shadow!" I called. And then, from behind me, a hand covered my mouth. I tried to scream but couldn't. So that was why Shadow was growling. I turned to face the man. Or woman. My mother.
    "Be quiet," she said in a hushed voice, "The men are still lurking around every corner in the village."
    I nodded. Then I heard the shot of a gun. The next thing I saw was my mother falling to the ground. And blood. A lot of it.
    I ran into the trees behind my house, Shadow followed me. I didn't stop running until I was sure the men dressed in black couldn't find me. About a mile away from my house, I dropped onto my knees, exhausted. I looked at Shadow, who was still staring in the direction we had just ran from. He was panting, as I was, too. My mother was dead. My father kidnapped. Nothing else mattered to me.
    I laid down on the cool, damp grass. I searched through my pockets of my pants, now covered in dirt and torn in many places, until I pulled out a knife my father had given me before he was kidnapped. I stroked the smooth blade of it.
    "Good luck, Shadow," I whispered, "May you have better luck against the men dressed in black than your family has."
    The last thing I saw was Shadow staring at me with those wide, sorrowful eyes, before I drove my father's blade into my own heart. And I no longer felt the cool, damp grass beneath me. Instead, I was sucked into it, to a place of trees stretching to the clouds above. To my left there was a lake, the water smooth as glass.
    And to my right was my mother. "I'm sorry," she whispered as she hugged me and stroked my hair, "Your father will be joining us soon."
    "Wh-Where re we?" I asked, confused.
    She stepped back, smiling. "Welcome to the afterlife!"