After waking up from my unwanted slumber, everything was pitch black. My hands were tied behind my back by a knot that was nearly impossible to untie, and I was blindfolded. I laid stagnant on the… I didn’t know at the moment. I seemed to be bundled in a confined space that was pretty stuffy, and I felt as if I was elevated from the ground. I was moving yet still.

“Am I in the trunk of a car?” I asked myself.

Yes, I was in the trunk of a car after being kidnapped. I knew that I was in trouble; I just didn’t remember how I got in it. My claustrophobia gradually began to creep into my amygdala. My pores secreted thick, salty droplets of sweat, and it seemed as if the confined space started to dwindle even more. The pace of my heartbeat exponentially increased. THUD! THUD! THUD! My nerves were getting the best of me, so I did what any stupid person who has gotten kidnapped would do: I tried to escape.

I began to kick the top of the trunk all of my might: THUD! THUD! THUD! I kicked even faster and harder until I felt it pop open. The wind was pushing so aggressively that it immediately closed it as soon as I opened it. At this moment, I was drenched in sweat, yet my body steadily secreted more and more.

Suddenly, the car started to slow down. I heard rocks crumble under the wheel as the car stopped. The car door opened, and the driver started pacing to the back of the car. From the loud sound of the rocks under his feet with each step, I could tell that he was wearing boots.THUD! THUD! THUD! I felt a slight shake and the heat from sweltering summer sun as the trunk was opened and then…

My eyes opened.

I was sitting on the passengers seat in my mother’s van, awaken from a much-needed slumber. I wiped the drool off of my cheek. I was drenched in sweat, not from nerves but from the heat. I smelled a hint of soul food in the air and nothing seemed to be within walking distance of each other.  I braced myself as we approached a pothole: THUD! THUD! THUD!

“You finally woke up from your nap,” my mother said.

“Yeah,” I replied. “I kind of had a weird dream.”

“Oh really? What happened in it?”

“Nothing that would regularly happen in Mississippi; I know that much. I was trapped in a trunk of a car.”

“Why would that not happen in Mississippi?” she asked, confused.

“I did not feel one pothole,” I replied.

“Oh yeah, that’s super weird.”