Prisoner Beneath the Slides

Alright, fools. Sit down. It’s time for a story with Dee- one in which they were a whumpee (Not traumatic, ees all good). It gets interesting and very villainistic at the end, so stick around.

When I was in elementary school, my best friend (call her Cathy) and I used to play “chase” with this other duo (call them Tyson and Rowlin). This chase game consisted of us literally doing just that- chasing each other without consequence. It went on for literal years at recess.

We worked as pairs- so Cathy and I vs. Tyson and Rowlin. Our game of tag was simple and we alternated roles after every day. 

Roles: Run or Tag.

Cathy and I were typically faster and usually ‘won’ (meaning we tagged them many more times than what they did us most of the time or we otherwise dodged their tags whenever they chased us). Cathy and I had a strategy for when we were the ones being chased. We stuck together and when Tyson and Rowlin were very close to us, then we’d split. So now both boys had to split up and chase after separate girls who ran faster than them. They exhausted faster when they were by themselves and it gave Cathy and I a chance to hide and recover before they found us and we were on the run again.

Well.

There was this one day that Cathy didn’t show up to school. I kindly asked that Tyson and Rowlin- um- not chase me because my partner was gone. These boys looked at me, looked at each other, then smiled at me with the most menacing grins I’ve ever seen. I ran my little ass off. My strategy for that day was purely to hide. There were two slides on the end of the playground we didn’t visit often: a red-painted steel one that was very thin and useless to the game, and a blue one that contained three slides, all jumbled together, and you could hide beneath it and be cloaked by shadows because of where the sun was in the sky. This latter one was where I went.

This next part has haunted me.

As I was hiding beneath this slide and catching my breath from twice the running (I have asthma btw), I had my eyes closed because I was about to pass out and that’s how I ground myself and focus on...not passing out. I opened my eyes, and I kid you all not, there was an entire line of boys standing in a semi circle, trapping me beneath this slide.

One boy in particular terrified me. He was one of the boys who was obnoxiously tall for his age and looked like he might try to eat you for breakfast? Yeah. Keep in mind that I was a tiny kid (I’m still small), so this was significantly more terrifying than if it’d been literally anyone else.

So, I was beneath this slide, having just recovered from my near asthma attack, and I was surrounded. What did I do? I friggin’ rammed into these guys in a short sprint, trying to push through them, but they didn’t budge; I was just uselessly throwing my shoulders into them. Giant Kid even laughed at me- that was horrifying.

Eventually I just stood in the center of this trap I was in and looked left and right in panic like, “Oh my god. What do I do??” I genuinely believed I was dead meat and they were all going to pounce on me.

Then Tall Kid steps back and I tried running through the gap he created, but...I came face to face with Tyson and Rowlin.

I don’t remember what happened afterwards, but I told Cathy she was never allowed to miss school ever again.