Suddenly, the darkness of my room actually suffocates me. My eyes are closed but I can see my room through my eyelids, not very clearly but I can see it. I feel like something is on top of me, I cannot move, my breathing is fading, my heart's pounding. I want to open my mouth to scream, but I can't move my mouth.
Just like that, I suddenly feel the weight on me leave. I can breathe again, and I can move. My eyes are closed, it's midnight, and I'm in the middle of my sleep. I open my eyes. What was that, anyway? I slowly sit up, shivering. Something creepy is in the air. My window is open, I remember closing it last night. I feel tired, probably because of the weight. I feel pallid, and like I could snap in half at any time. I feel like there's something behind me. Just go back to sleep, Molly, stop imagining things, it's just like any other night. I think. I slowly turn around. There's a head coming up from behind me, eyes cracked and bleeding, tongue out. I'm speechless as the neck rises.... and it's gone. What kind of little kid are you? Thinking that there's a monster under your bed. My thoughts don't help me, I shiver like mad. I haven't gone to school for three days, even morning I go straight to visit Alicia and spend the entire day with her. Maybe I should go now, to avoid this feeling. I glance at my alarm clock. 1:30AM. Wow great, I'm pretty sure I can't go right now, but I need to get out of my room.
For some reason. I feel like I want to discover the secret of my neighbor's house, tonight. I reach for my phone and turn on the flashlight app. As I change and brush my teeth, attempt to tie up my hair, I feel like turning back. I shakily walk down the creaky wooden stairs, heading for the front door, and just before I leave, I look down that hallway of my house, I concentrate on the door where the bodies are in. Suddenly, the door knob turns. I shriek, push the front door open, and run out. I hope I didn't wake Mom. The outside world does not seem very friendly either.
I trip on something hard in my backyard. I look down, it's the stone girl. Trying to forget about that unfortunate encounter, I pass dark willow trees, and head for the neighbor's house. There seems to be something in those trees, something that I don't want to see or know about. I really feel like turning back, I didn't even bring anything to save myself, nothing but the scissors I always keep in my coat pocket.
Everything on the porch is broken. There's liquid soaking the dirty steps. I'm too afraid to knock on the door, my hand reaches over and test the knob. As I expected, the front door isn't locked. I push open the door, and step inside, leaving the door open, in case I need to run for my life. I always thought that this house was identical to mine, but the inside is different. I hope that there are no more bodies. It's so cold in here.
There's two hallways, I have no idea which one to follow, so I randomly pick the right one. There's black and white pictures nailed to the wall. There's a picture of a scary skinny girl, she looks pretty depressed. There's a lot of a family with three daughters, none of which is the scary skinny depressed girl, after the row of pictures of that family, there's another picture of the scary skinny depressed girl, except for that this time, she's smiling, and there's another scary skinny girl next to her. They're probably Amanda and Natalie. I think. I shiver, as I turn to the last two pictures, I freeze, my eyes widen. it's Eleanor and Shane. he looks dangerous and she looks sweet. And it's not a photograph... it's drawn. The last one is of the two scary skinny girls and Eleanor. Definitely Amanda and Natalie. I notice the little boy clinging on to Eleanor's dress. Must be William. This is drawn also, I guess Eleanor died before cameras were finally available. I try to imagine wanting to take a picture, instead of taking out my phone and just pressing a single button, I have to pay someone to stand there for a long time. That's impossible.
I exit the hall, going into a kitchen, someone definitely lives here, but how is that possible? There's nothing but the kitchen at the end of this hall, I go through the hall, again. This is strange. I walk into the second hallway, which leads to a staircase. The railing breaks when I touch it.
The staircase leads me to a really really long dark hall. The second floor isn't that high, at least not as high as my house.
I use my phone to look at all the doors on either sides of the hallway, but there aren't much to see, all the doors look the same, they're all cracked and wooden. There's water dripping from the ceiling, one drop gets me in the eye and blinds me for a while. I continue down the hallway.
There's suddenly a scream, the voice startles me so much, my phone slips out of my hand, it falls right side up, the flashlight shining right at a picture on the ceiling of a witchy looking old woman. I scream. Her eyes are wide to the size of saucers she looks so creepy that I grab my phone and trample down the stairs. I know it's just a picture, but I did hear a scream before I dropped my phone, same scream I heard when I first came that day back in junior year. I freeze at the front door, I remember keeping it open when I first came, but it's closed. It's not locked calm down I tell myself, and reach for the knob, I turn it continuously, heart pounding and sweating, but the door doesn't open.
I'm too late. I can feel someone behind me, making it unable to move. Why. Did. I Come. Here. Alone? I try to move again, but it doesn't work, I start to feel dizzy, like I might puke. This just has to be a dream. I breath in and out, and look behind me, nothing. Just as my heart starts to slow down, I hear the scream again. It’s coming from upstairs, I no longer want to know the secret of this house, I just want to get out, I try the front door with all my energy, but it just won't open. I turn and run helplessly to the kitchen.
A dead end. The kitchen is so dark, I hope that if I stayed still nobody can see me, it's better than my own kitchen anyways. There's dried blood stretched on the wall of my kitchen, just none of my family members other than Mom and I have seemed to notice.
I suddenly notice something on the walls, something I didn't notice the first time I came, there's one thing that's same about this house to mine, they both have that kitchen window. I run over to her, just as I hear footsteps in that hall, and jump out.
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Terrible landing.
My foot stings so hard, tears continuously ooze out of my eyes. I look down at my leg, it feel right on a sharp rock, which sliced a line down my shin. I look up, I'm right under one of those creepy willow trees. I slowly crawl away, one of the long strand of leaves brushes into my hair. Using the wall of the house, I can stand up. Taking one last look at an upstairs window of my neighbor's house, I see a light flicker and a shadow of a little kid run by. I look away, and suddenly my heart thumps really hard. There's just so much a person can take. I need to go home.... no, home is just as bad. I don't feel safe anywhere, if I go to visit Alicia now, there's spirits of people who died in the hospital. I look around, I have no idea how to go home. This is the back of the house. A light flickers again, this time closer to me. I don't take time to think.
I have no time to think, I start to run, and for a long while I couldn't figure out why I didn't wrap around to the front of the house and run home, but I ran farther and farther away from home, I didn't know that this house had an extending backyard too. Just how long is this place?
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It felt as if I ran a mile, and just couldn't stop running. Until something brings me to a complete halt, I stay there frozen couldn't even believe my eyes, if I look behind me that house is at least two blocks away. And in front of me is a huge cemetery. I didn't even know that there was a cemetery. The second the first few tombstone crosses started to come to view, I had skidded to a complete halt. My hand shakily travels to the unlocked padlock at the opening of the tall black fence. What am I doing? I think as I stepped inside. I felt hypnotized. I started to read the names, dates, and epitaphs on the tombstones. I pass graves belonging to Eleanor's friends. I walk down the rows of tombstones and wonder what is beyond the cemetery. I notice that my shin is still bleeding, I start to head back to the front of the cemetery.
By the time I passed the old neighbor's house my head started to spin I felt badly dizzy. The morning wind blew my hair, making it flow ghostlike behind me.
My house comes to view. I could hear my breathing, as cold white air exhale out of my mouth. I stumble to the front door and open it. Maybe because of the warmth inside, the blood leaks even more out of my ripped jeans. I quickly run upstairs, just to notice that my teeth are bleeding, also. I must've banged it or something. I take out my hand mirror, wanting to see if Eleanor's here. But I gasp when I see my own reflection.
I look like a vampire, pale, mouth dripping with blood. I close my eyes and drop to the ground. Living on, I don't know where my future's heading, dying is not a good option. I feel so trapped and scared.