MY STOLEN SHEEP

Words by Emily Miller

I miss my sheep. He was taken from me a few weeks ago. He hasn’t yet returned. I don’t know if I’ll ever see him again. He was one of my closest friends, you know. We’d spend many hours every day sitting together.

Sometimes he’d roll around the grassy fields, playing with his sheepy friends, and I’d laugh as he’d bound around and fall over. Sometimes we would just lie together and ease into a peaceful doze. Sometimes we’d wander and see all his flock. Some would stop and bleat to say hello, others would merely run past in a flurry. Such silly things, sheep are. I’d lie on the soft ground and watch them wander, their wool like clouds in the sky.

But then there was an accident, and I realise now, he was stolen from me. It was a car accident I think. The details are blurry, but I’m sure there was a car. Blood stained the road, and a corpse was pulled from the scene.

Of course I still see the sheep. I have to. It’s not the same without him, though. They were oncoming lights, not clouds anymore. They were horns blaring, not gentle bleats.

Sleepless nights come and go, and I realise, we count our sheep to know all of them are safe. But some are stolen from us through vicious plot, selfishness, and accidents.

Mine was stolen that cloudy night when a car tore around a corner and collided with my own. The driver’s body had flown through his window to land on my window. His blank eyes stared at me through the cracking glass while I lay trapped in my own wreckage, and his blood spilled over the road.

It haunts me.

‘Talk to someone,’ they said. I did. ‘Try medication,’ they said. I did. ‘Just move on,’ they said. I couldn’t.

I would lay in my bed and count my sheep until I got to 99 and I remembered all over again that the 100th had been stolen from me. And I would never get him back.