Per Linda:

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “key.” Use it as a noun, a verb, or use it metaphorically. Have fun!

“Key!” she shouted. It made no sense to me. What key? What did I need a key for?

She was pointing down toward the table in the mud room. There was a key. But why did she shout? What am I supposed to use it for? I barely had the time to think. A huge man was behind my mom. Suddenly she was tumbling down the stairs. It took me no time to realize she was dead. Her neck bent sideways at a ninety-degree angle.

Without another thought, I took the key and ran to the car. Luckily, those keys were in my pocket. I wasted no time getting out of town. This seemed an impossible mission. But we’d had so many break-ins at home and work that I knew it had something to do with me. In that sense, I was a key. People were being killed. People I loved.

An old motel just out of town offered me the respite I needed. While sitting at the old bed, hoping the bed bugs would be kind, I looked at the key. Not house, not car, bank? Why me?

These questions would have to wait. A strange sound came from the bathroom. A toy wind-up monkey?

end of stream