Michaela's Monster

Chapter 5: Amidst the Darkness

About an hour later, thanks in part to Michaela's Dad taking a wrong turn amidst a playfully heated debate with his wife over the validity of pineapple as a pizza topping, the Montrose family arrived home with enough food to feed seven people, as opposed to just the three of them.

Even as the pineapple debate naturally escalated and evolved into the consideration of olives and their validity under the same criteria, Michaela couldn't help but find herself feeling lost in thought, zoning out into her own world, while occasionally providing a soft chuckle to falsely imply she was listening.

While she was emotionally and physically exhausted from the day in general, her mind was still racing with what she had thought happened in the basement of the Church, but couldn't have possibly been true.

The residual feelings of the fear and anxiety that had been induced by the purity of the darkness flashed through her mind, reminding her of the shameful and cowardly way she had frozen when the darkness had eventually begun its pursuit.

Even after she had excused herself for the night, retiring to her bedroom as her body screamed for its much-desired rest, the constant burden of her over-active mind kept her eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling, directly negating her body's willful intentions.

As she lay stubbornly awake in bed with her thoughts endlessly racing in circles, Michaela lifted her right hand and examined the odd ring that she had found on her index finger when she awoke in the empty Chapel.

It would all have been so easy to dismiss as a tension-ridden nightmare, were it not for this singular piece of tangible evidence that was upon her finger.

Is it really possible? Michaela thought, Could this ring have come from my dream into reality?Had it actually been a dream to begin with?

For a moment, Michaela considered how her Abuela had visited her on the eve of her passing, blurring the lines of what was real or even possible, and how every moment since then had seemed to come with its own moment of contemplation as the constantly shifting sands of Michaela's perception made her wonder what the word 'reality' even meant anymore.

Visits from dead relatives was one thing, after all, generations of people had claimed to have similar experiences over the history of humankind. Whether there was legitimacy to their claims, or simply wishful thinking, this damned ring was something else altogether, and it was far more upsetting in nature; not only in regards to the method of its procurement, but the fact that it remained upon her finger even now in the waking world, haunting her with memories of what may, or may not, have been.

The longer Michaela stared at the odd design carved into the ring, the more she thought back to how this object had seemed to 'call' to her, coercing her through peak states of fear, panic, and frustration, as though this inanimate object's will was stronger than her most visceral of instincts.

What was even more troublesome than the mere presence of the ring though was how it refused to be removed.

On the car ride home, right around the time that the first shot was fired in the great pineapple debate, Michaela had sat in the backseat, quietly trying to remove the ring from her finger, only to find that despite its oddly convenient, tailor-made fit, it wouldn't budge.

Even as Michaela's Mom had launched into her well-structured diatribe about Pizza being a specifically savory dish since its inception (also the moment that Adwin had taken a wrong turn that led down a rural road to nowhere), Michaela had secretly attempted to use her own saliva to lubricate the removal of the ring, but still to no avail.

Even by the time they had pulled up to 'Pascal's Pizzeria', Michaela had been yanking and pulling on the ring so long, it felt as though if she pulled any harder she would either pop her index finger out of its socket, or rip the digit clean off her hand.