I awake with a start, covered in sweat. I reach up to wipe my forehead and bring my hand down. 

Dark red stains my hand. I’m not covered in sweat. I’m covered in blood. 

I feel sick. I rush out of an unfamiliar bed, out of an unfamiliar room. Oh god, where am I? Why do I feel so heavy? I attempt to swim away but realize I can’t. I can’t because I’m not in water. I’m on land. 

I feel nauseated. Everything is spinning. I sway and try to keep my balance. My hands reach out for something, anything, but I collapse and meet the floor. 

Images flash through my head. 

Swimming with my sisters, my friends. We’d decided to swim further from home, closer to the currents. Nothing we weren’t familiar with, though. 

I heard them yell, telling me to swim away. Why were they telling me to swim away? We were having a fun time. I didn’t want to leave just yet. 

But then I couldn’t swim, couldn’t move. A net surrounded me. I struggled and struggled but it was no use. And they just left me. They left me. I was pulled out of the water. Scary people stole me. They hurt me. 

Hot tears fall down my face. It’s an unusual feeling. You can’t feel tears in the ocean. 

Is that where I am now? The house of the land dwellers? Where are they? What are they going to do with me? Are they going to kill me? Eat me? 

I’m sobbing and trembling with fear. I wait for the land dwellers to come and collect me. To realize I’m awake. 

But they don’t. No one comes. 

After the nausea starts to clear, I lift my head to look at my surroundings. This place is tidy, tidier than the homes we have in my village. But it doesn’t feel like a home. It feels sad. 

I attempt to stand up but the nausea returns. Vomit comes up my throat, out of my mouth, and onto the floor. I crawl away from the putrid smell, but I do feel better now. 

Throwing up isn’t a new experience for me. You can get sick in the ocean just as easily as you can on land. But for us, the water carries vomit away. There was no clean up needed. I haven’t been here for long, but life on land already seems inferior to my own. 

I attempt to get up again, this time successfully.

After wandering through most of the layout, no one appears to be home and this place isn’t very large. I should leave before someone gets back. I don’t know where I am but I know going out into an unfamiliar world is better than waiting here. Like fish bait. Oh the irony. 

I had already opened most of the doors, all they led to were other rooms. But there is another door. This one looks different from the other doors. The others are brown and resemble wood. This one is blue, like the ocean. It looks sturdier too. I reach my hand toward the knob, twist, and pull. 

The door remains shut.

I fiddle with the lock and try again. But the handle doesn't move in the slightest, almost like it's glued in place. 

What the hell? 

I put both hands on the knob and yank with all of my strength. It doesn’t even make a sound. What sort of witchcraft is this? 

After a few meager attempts to open the door, I come to a terrifying conclusion. 

They’ve trapped me here. 

Leaving me alone was no mistake. Because it doesn’t matter. I can’t escape. I don’t know how they’ve managed to keep me from opening the door, I can't do it.  I’m going to stay here. Stuck. Forever. Or at least until they come back. 

I lean against the unopenable door and face my inescapable fate. 

I’m going to die. Or I’m going to live out my existence in endless pain and suffering. I can't figure out which sounds worse. 

I slide down the door and hit the ground. To distract myself from my inescapable doom, I look around the room again. 

There aren’t any windows or mirrors or decorations of any kind. It’s really a sad space. And it’s not like it’s difficult to fill either, considering how small it is. There’s a large room with soft seats. A space filled with all sorts of gadgets that I’m sure I learned about in school but eventually forgot about. 

There are three rooms that connect to the space. The first, on the right, is the one I woke up in. There’s a bed and a table but not much else. The second is a cold room. It’s difficult to describe why. Everything is hard and smooth and it’s dark, darker than all the other rooms. There is a mirror in there, but it’s dirty and covered in a layer of dust. I don’t like it. The third is even more strange than the first and second. Shelves line the walls filled with odd materials. There’s a desk with nothing on it and a bookshelf only filled halfway. 

I sigh and wipe the tears from my eyes. If I die here, this sad house will be the last thing I ever see. Well, this and the face of the fucking land dweller that stole me. I let out a pathetic attempt at a laugh before I bury my head in my arms and sob.

Not long after, a swell of rage ignites in me. I'm angry. Unbelievably angry. Angry at my sisters and friends for leaving me. Angry at whoever is keeping me here against my will. Angry at every fucking land dwellers on this useless planet. 

I want to destroy something. Trash the place. Give my kidnapper a hard time before they kill me. 

I reach for the nearest thing, a large book on a coffee table, and throw it with all of my strength. I reach to grab something else but stop when I notice something odd about the book.  

On the other side of the room, the book landed on its cover, turned to a random page. But the page is all white. Completely blank. 

My anger is replaced with confusion and curiosity. I walk over to the book and pick it up.

The page, instead of being covered with black symbols like most human books, is covered in many small bumps on the page. I run my hand over the small dots in fascination. I don't understand what they mean but I know what they are. Most selkies don't know how to read. We don't have a use for it considering paper doesn't last long in water. But we were told that land dwellers could. And that those who couldn't see used a language of raised dots to read. They could feel them and decipher what they meant. I remember I always wanted to feel one in person. I never thought I would actually get a chance.

A smile creeps onto my face. Not because of the book, though it is fascinating, but because of what it means. My captor is blind. 

I’m surprised I didn’t see it before. The lack of interesting decoration. No mirrors, except for the one in the cold, dark room and even that one is covered in dust. I’m sure the other books are just like this one. 

Maybe all hope isn't lost. Maybe if I'm quiet enough, I can get the jump on them when they get home. Maybe I'll actually be able to get out of here. 

I search the room to find some kind of weapon. I don't plan to kill them, I'm not as sadistic as they are. But I might need to knock them out or injure them to get away. 

The space with odd gadgets seems like a good place to look. Everything is shiny, big, or covered in buttons and switches. There's got to be something dangerous. 

I grab a large metal shape on a counter. It resembles a large bowl with a long handle. I imagine if I swing it hard enough, I might be able to knock someone out. 

Right as I turn around to get into position, I hear the door rattle. Someone is coming in. 

I position myself so that when the door swings open, I'll be able to jump out behind it. I ready myself, both physically and mentally, and hold the metal object behind my shoulder, preparing to swing it. 

I take a deep breath and the door swings open.