It was all she could think about. She wanted it more than anything, but she could never find it. It seemed to slip through her fingers, just as she thought she had closed in on it, like dogs treeing a coon, only to discover it had hopped to another tree… The frustration was mounting, and every day it became more urgent as she searched. Never here, never there. Always running and hiding before the sun came up, always running and searching when the moon claimed the sky.

But the sun was ascending to the sky, and as she settled in the basement on the bed—who slept in coffins? No one but the Anne Rice wannabes—she heard a crash upstairs. No, she gasped silently. She ran for the door, but heard the shouts behind her.

Something wet covered her and her skin was on fire, and she tried to scream, but couldn’t. BANG. She jerked forward, and was suddenly in front of an open window. She caught a glimpse of her last sunrise, as everything burned, as she fell into darkness.

As she fell into a world of peace.