The Manicheans

For all previous chapters, please visit http://curiosityquills.com/published-authors/johanna-pitcairn/death-by-chocolate/

Right. I had heard that before! Just minutes ago, or hours, whichever, I thought I could leave! But guess what! Someone or something didn’t want me to!

Throwing him a questioning glance, I didn’t reply a word.

“I know what you might think… But there is a way out.” The Stranger grinned from ear to ear. “Come on, let’s go!”

At this point, no, I wouldn’t go anywhere. Why didn’t he just leave me alone? Things would be much simpler for me if put, and awake.

“What is out there?” I said without moving, “another ghost of Kara ready to tear me to shreds?”

“You’re worried about what’s outside? You think something is waiting for you?”

His expressionless eyes made me furious inside. What game was he playing with me?

“Well…” he chuckled, “anything can wait for you. Or anyone. You make your own reality, remember?”

I choked. “Since when do I make my own reality? You think I imagined all of this?” My hands flew in fast circles in the air. “You think I like to experience drowning in my imagination? You think I like to see dead people? My dead best friend hurting me and questioning my past deeds? And for what outcome? This senseless crap???”

A wave of anger surged through me again. Why couldn’t I wake up and be done with everything?

“Here, here…” He smiled. “I understand your frustration but getting angry won’t change the fact you’re stuck here until your mission is complete.”

“And what is my mission exactly?” I grew tired of hearing the same speech like a broken record.

“I told you. Save yourself to save the world.”

His intense golden stare pierced through me and made me shiver, despite the ambient air feeling damp and sticky.

“Did you have a conversation with someone else about this because I can’t remember you telling me about saving the world either,” I snapped.

“Sure you have. And by the way, you agreed to it as soon as you stepped foot inside the psychic’s house.” He winked.

She had showed me no disclaimer to sign! The old Gypsy lady tricked me to read my future because I was lost and hungry. Gosh! I should trust no one. Almost regretting punching Melissa in the nose, I sighed. None of this would have happened if I had kept my cool. But again, Mark had gone too far by cheating on me with her. And punching her was the only way I knew to defend my honor.

“You can justify all the wrong you did as much as you want, in the end you’ll have to pay the price for every sin you committed,” Evan’s voice suddenly echoed next to me.

“I don’t need scolding! I’m old enough to know what I did wasn’t right,” I shouted back at Evan while looking at the stranger who remained perfectly still and silent. “I will redeem myself. I owe it to all the people I’ve hurt.”

I swallowed hard and felt a lump in my throat. Now wasn’t the time to cry again. Glancing away, I took a deep breath to calm myself down.

“I think you’re ready to face your fate,” the stranger extended his hand, and I grabbed it with trembling fingers.

“What is threatening this place?” I asked with a broken voice.

The stranger’s strident laughter caused me to shiver like a leaf again. His face grimaced in the spookiest way, just like an evil clown. When he finally stopped, I felt ready to pee my pants. Well, technically, my linen tunic.

“You know… I think you underestimated this world’s impact upon you. You thought you were so tough and could handle anything, but look at you now. Not so tough after all, huh?” He moved his face a few inches away from my cheek until I could sense his breath all over my skin. “You will battle the greatest threat of all. What makes you whole and empty, what causes you bliss and utmost suffering, what pushes you on the verge of collapse and on the brink of the most glorious satisfaction. You hold it within. You cherish it. You love it. And you also hate it. Do you know what it is?”

I shook my head.

“Really?”

I shook my head again.

“That’s such an easy answer.” He smiled. “Your anger.”

My anger? How could my anger threaten the world?

“You’re so full of yourself. You pretend to understand but have no idea the damage you’ve caused by being so stubborn.” He pressed his hand on my shoulder and pushed me forward. “You need to see how bad your anger can be. How much pain it has caused!”

With sweaty palms and my stomach tied in a knot, I walked out of the room. The muscles in my legs hurt with every step. If I had the power to find the box of magic chocolates, I’d have wished to transform into the tiniest being possible and disappear from the surface of the earth. But the box like everything else stood far away from my reach. I had to endure whatever torture would come my way. No escape. No shortcut. I’d be taught a lesson worth to remember.

My hand in the stranger’s hand, I welcomed my sentencing. I stood alone against an enemy as familiar as it was foreign to me. I never tried to understand my anger, and certainly never worked on tempering myself down. I only reacted impulsively. The end of the world didn’t mean a thing unless I worked on a conscious effort to defeat what was raging inside and dominating me.

We passed the dining area and walked until we were outside again. We left the pyramid behind and entered an open space in broad daylight. The cheering crowd from earlier was still waiting for me. They all looked at me and waived as the stranger led me to a small wooden stage at the center of the area.

The only contender to beat was I. The whole wide world would watch and clap. The sea of heads and hands in the air echoed deafening shouts and chants as a loud roar in my ear. Still holding onto the stranger’s hand, I anticipated the chime of the bell before everything would go down.

The Stranger didn’t look at me once. He only spoke to the crowd and encouraged them to applaud some more.

“My friends…” he said, “today a savior has finally come… Dark times are over… Welcome her home!”

The crowd cheered like at the Superbowl. I closed my eyes. The knot in my stomach had become so tight, the ache gave me cold sweats. No matter how hard I tried to regulate my breathing, my heart was beating at such speed, I thought it’d break down inside my chest.

“Now today, we don’t fear death anymore…” The stranger continued, “we will rise victorious against adversity…”

I prayed for the torture to end. What if I’d faint? What if I’d suffer from a heart attack?

Come on! Put me to the test already…

“Always so impatient, eh?” Evan stood next to me again. I reopened my eyes and stared into his green glow. Dreamy as always, even as a projection of my subconscious…

“Does it make sense now?” he asked.

I stared at him and everything reverted back to Kara and me, exactly at the time when she decided to attend the party at Mike’s house.

“This guy is poison! I told you already.” I was screaming at her like I hated her for even thinking about him.

“You’re being selfish! So selfish…” She said while trying to contain her tears.

“Yeah well next time, have a crush on someone else!”

She came up to me, her blue eyes wet with tears. I knew she was hurt. I knew I couldn’t fix what I had said or done. Our friendship would not recover from that fight. I could have apologized right away, and assured her I only wished her well.

But the truth of the matter was love had gotten the best of me.

I didn’t think falling for Dan would happen to me. The first time our eyes met, I immediately felt a distinct pinch right inside my heart, as if struck by Cupid’s arrow. Stupid analogy, but it really felt this way.

I ignored my feelings because I knew Kara liked him a lot. Every time he passed by me in the hallways, I looked down and kept walking. My exit strategy worked until the day I couldn’t get away from him.

Studying for a test late one afternoon in the school library, I heard his voice and my fingers froze on the keyboard of my laptop.

“I knew I’d find you here,” he said and I melted. He smiled. I found myself staring at the most perfect set of facial features. Forget the Justin Bieber haircut. I sighed. Regaining my composure seemed impossible at this point.

“You’ve worked long enough,” he proceeded to shut my computer, and pulled me out of my chair. I didn’t show any sign of resistance. His after-shave fragrance overwhelmed me as soon as he pressed me against him, and I closed my eyes for a second to focus on the delicious scent.

“Come on nerd, let’s get a bite to eat.” He grabbed my bag and led me out my sanctuary. I was nowhere safe with him. He held the power to break girls’ hearts, and I stood next in line. Worse, what about the gossip if someone saw us together? And Kara? She’d never forgive me…

But I followed him. Feeling the warmth of his palm in my hand, I loved every second of it. The quarterback liked the nerdy chick with glasses and a horrible temper. At six foot three, he was much taller than my five foot five, but I liked to think of him as my protector and guardian angel.

Gosh… What had I done for the affection of a boy? I cringed. Evan gently massaged my shoulders. The muscles in my back ached everywhere he applied pressure. My head began to hurt too as more ugly memories flooded my brain.

I refused to go to the party and used packing for the move as pretext.

Dan texted me all evening long to keep me updated. Kara got really drunk and ultimately threw herself at him in the house. Her infatuation over him had become obsessive, so he and I had devised a plan to scare her off. He’d frighten her enough, she’d never want to stand in his vicinity ever again. Him pretending to be interested in her was just a ploy.

When things started getting hot and heavy, he offered to drive her back home. In his car.

I never thought the accident would happen, and couldn’t believe he actually slapped the crap out of her like she showed me in the dream. The whole girl-beater thing was a lie… presumably.

Dan called me right after the incident.

“She’s not breathing,” he said and I heard panic in his voice.

“Calm down,” I ordered.

“I have to take her back! And I can’t bring her like this… Oh gosh!”

“What?”

“I’m going to go to jail.”

“Ok… Deep breath. We’re going to figure this out. Together. Dan, snap out of the funk you’re in. Right now! I need you to focus. Are you with me?”

“Ye… Yes.”

Even if only fourteen, I took my mother’s sedan in the middle of the night and drove all the way to this empty lot where he had totaled his car, away from any busy area.

Less than an hour later, I found him sitting by the wreckage. How he survived the crash was a mystery to me. With all his cuts and injuries, he looked nothing like the powerful and strategic quarterback who robbed every girl’s heart on the football field.

I ached to see him so weak. But we had to make things right. Kara’s alarming condition would destroy our lives… What would she say when she woke up? If she woke up… Would she say Dan punched her simply because he didn’t want her? How far would she go to ruin his reputation out of spite? Everyone at school knew how infatuated she was with him. No one had a clue about him and me. No one.

A big streak of dry blood marked the entire right side of Kara’s face. I retched when I pulled her out of the car and her head wobbled like a doll. Gosh. I had no clue whether she was breathing. I put my ear by her nose and tried to feel air coming out. Nothing.

I caught Dan crying. His entire body was trembling. I did my best not to cry too, even if tears welled in my eyes.

No way Dan and I should sacrifice our future because of a stupid accident.

“We have to hide her somewhere, and make it look like someone abducted her and killed her.”

Dan stared at me and didn’t say a thing.

“Come on!” I shouted. “Help me here!”

“I… drove her back home. Everybody knows that. What am I gonna say?”

“You pulled over on the side of the road because you wanted to make out. Someone saw you and threatened you with a gun to steal the car. You begged them to let you and Kara go. They insisted on taking the car with her inside. You tried to fight them but they knocked you out cold and left you there.”

I had to think fast of a plausible story that’d keep the cops at bay. After burning the car down, no evidence could trace her disappearance back to Dan. Not for a while at least.

Yep I was that crazy. And that much in love.

He shrugged. “I don’t know about this.”

I grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him hard. “Do you want to jeopardize everything?”

He moved back into the upright position and kicked the passenger door like a mad man.

“I can’t believe this!!”

I hugged him. “We have to be strong.”

He pushed me back. “How can you be like this? She’s your best friend! We never wanted her dead. We just wanted to scare her off! Now look at what we’re doing!”

He was right. But did I listen? Of course not.

“You want to lose your scholarship? Flip burgers for the rest of your life? Or clean rest area restrooms?” I scowled. “You were driving her and this accident happened. You’re hurt but will be fine. She needs to go.”

The heartless villains of all the movies I had been watching since my childhood suddenly found a strong resonance in me. It felt so easy to be bad. With the right amount of precaution, no one would know what truly happened to her.

After we finished with everything, I drove Dan to a grocery store parking lot deserted at night, and located only a few miles from the area where the accident had occurred. I stayed with him until dawn, and then waited for the store to open. He walked inside and surely enough, someone from the staff took him to the nearest police precinct.

He declared his car stolen, and Kara missing. I felt confident after the work we did, cops would find the car first, and Kara last.

And by the time she was found, I’d already be in L.A.

I expected to read resentment in Evan’s eyes, but all I saw was a spark of light, shining like a star at the end of a very long and dark tunnel.

“Is there hope?” I asked, my voice trembling.

He smiled. “Only if you’re willing to believe there’s hope.”

I remained silent. I was a criminal. Dan had become the reason for my loss of control, and my stupidity caused him to fail everything after that dreadful night. He barely managed to graduate high school, and started college but dropped out within a few months during his freshman year. After getting caught by an undercover cop, he got incarcerated for dealing recreational illegal substances to underage adults at a rave party. All the dreams of playing football and ending up in the NFL draft vanished as quickly as his addiction to hard drugs became stronger and stronger. His past haunted him constantly. And I watched him destroy his life from afar while I continued my own journey to hell in L.A.

After we split up, he begged me to stop visiting him because he couldn’t stand my presence anymore. Karma awaited me at every corner, and I never got spared. Anger management issues led me to commit petty crimes. I did community service because I started fights for no good reason. Violence had become my only outlet.

Dan never forgave himself for leaving Kara behind. Our relationship didn’t recover from her passing. What seemed like a good idea had become the worst scenario ever. Everything turned into agony because of my foolishness, and now? I had to finally pay the price.

Evan patted my shoulder as if my subconscious really could help me feel better. And I still didn’t know why he looked so familiar.

“Here… You’ve been prepared for this. You’ll do great,” he said softly in my ear.

But as I searched the sea of heads chanting my name, I got welcomed by an inferno instead. The world as I knew it needed to be rebuilt from its ashes. With a long and sharp spear?

“Be quick!” Evan shouted as a dark shadow suddenly emerged from the flames. I blinked. The animal standing before me looked exactly like the gargoyle that circled the top of the pyramid when the stranger and I entered the edifice for the first time. The pair of red eyes was staring at me, sign the beast would attack at any given moment.

I heard a loud growl behind me. Feeling the weight of the spear in my hand, I watched a growing number of similar devilish creatures slowly circle me. Beads of sweat merged into streams on each side of my face. I was panting.

The gargoyles surrounded me like an angry mob ready to strike. I didn’t see flames anymore, only them. Hundreds of them. Growling in unison. Sending waves of fear through my limbs. They kept staring at me, moving closer, inch by inch, until all I could smell was the sulfurous scent of their skin.

Not really sure why, I dropped the spear. Too late to catch it! The weapon vanished into dust as soon as it touched the ground. What now? I couldn’t fight the army of gargoyles with my bare hands. The monsters would reduce me to bone and marrow in a matter of seconds.

I closed my eyes and started mumbling the first few words of a prayer. Funny how the thought of dying made me feel religious again.

“Dear Lord, if you still believe I can be saved despite the horrible deeds I’ve done against so many people, please, I beg you, give me a sign.”

The growl intensified. Expecting to be devoured alive, I spread my arms and screamed in surrender.

But nothing happened. When I reopened my eyes, the beasts and the fire had disappeared.

I kneeled to the ground and started crying. So many tears fell they formed a puddle of mud before me. Pressing my hands into the puddle, I grabbed some of the mud and rubbed my hands together. The dirt felt good against my skin. I was finally ready to make amends.

An ice-cold breeze suddenly blew the hair of my neck. Looking straight ahead, I realized I had been transported to a snow-covered field. I was still wearing my ridiculous jewelry and my lightweight tunic, none of which kept me warm. The breeze pierced through to me like nothing.

There in the whiteness stood the silhouette of a young woman. She raised her hand and waved at me. I didn’t move. I knew this wave.

Kara.

She wanted me to come to her.

I started walking in her direction. Despite the freezing cold, I didn’t stall.

I couldn’t run away from the truth.

When I finally got near her, she looked exactly like a corpse brought back to life. A brain-eater. A bloodthirsty hound ready to rip my heart from my chest…

“Your imagination has always been out of control…” Evan’s voice in my ear startled me.

He was strolling by my side – still shirtless like the first time we met – smiling and looking as happy as a clam. And I still didn’t know who he was supposed to remind me of.

“What are you doing here?” I swallowed hard and glanced back at Kara. She hadn’t said a word yet. “W-What does she want from m-me?” My teeth clattered hard.

Evan patted my shoulder. “Just to talk, Julie, she was your friend after all.”

True. And she died because of me.

Staring at Kara’s hollow glowing purple eye sockets, I lost the last bit of courage left in me. For the first time, I couldn’t think of anything to say to her. For the first time, I was ready to listen.

She suddenly clasped her hand around my fingers and clawed at my skin like a cat. Her sharp nails cut the flesh. A burning sensation spread throughout my hand. I tried to pull it out, but she held onto me so tight, she almost ripped my index off.

I cringed. She pressed her nails like daggers, as a sneer ran across her face from ear to ear, and she started laughing, her laughter echoing like a shrill all around me. High pitched and loud, her voice was an evil scream coming from a place filled with darkness and pain. Droplets of blood trickled down my palm and stained the ground.

“I have been waiting for this moment for so long.”

My tongue felt like lead inside my mouth. I could only grunt.

“And you don’t even know what to say to me now, do you?” Her hollow eyes lit up with a brighter glow. Extending her other hand, she touched my cheek, scratching the skin even as deeply as she moved closer to my lips. She finally pressed her index finger against my mouth and I almost tasted the acrid smell of her rotting flesh. I wanted to throw up but she held me still, and pushed her finger harder until I could feel the pressure up to my teeth.

“But do you really have anything to say to me?” Mesmerized by her stare, I slowly shook my head. “I didn’t think so.” She slapped me hard and my head snapped back. “Liar!” She shrieked again. “Do you love me?” More tears streamed down my face and I nodded. She slapped me again. “DO YOU LOVE ME?” I felt the burn of her hand. “Do you think you’ll ever be forgiven for what you did? DO YOU?” Her violent slaps didn’t overcome the raging ache in my heart. I wished she beat me up unconscious.

Her purple eyes glowed harder as she kept talking. Hypnotized, I wanted to drown myself in them, and forget all about the past. But she made sure I felt everything, and the pain inside my chest grew stronger with every breath I took.

“You will beg me to spare your life,” she scowled, “while you never offered me that choice, did you? F.Y.I. I really want you to die…”

The Kara I knew would never be so evil to me. But again, I had been disloyal to her, and deserved my just punishment, whatever it may be.

“But…” she continued, “it would be too easy to let you go and not give you a second chance. So here’s the deal: do you remember what the Gypsy gave you?”

She presented me the familiar box of chocolates and opened the lid.

“You can stay here for eternity or can redeem your way back and change for the better. Remember, whatever chocolate you’ll eat, you’ll have to make the final decision. Whatever power you wish to get, you’ll work hard to be able to use it. If you decide to fight for your salvation, you’ll get what you were looking for.” She paused and dug her nails through my hand to make me cringe. “And you know what you’re looking for, right?” she said very softly.

I nodded slightly.

“Good. So which chocolate do you want?”

TO BE CONTINUED…

So Julie’s concerns were right! Her drink was spiked and forced her into a deep sleep, her dreams turning into a freaky nightmare.

Two things need to be pointed out:

1)     We still don’t know the role of the Stranger in Julie’s introspection. Last post, I said the Stranger was an intruder, but what kind of intruder is he? Good or evil? If good, he’s supposed to help her remember so she can survive the journey and travel back to the real world. If evil, he will force her to stay in a state of limbo forever.

2)     Whatever Julie is dreaming of, might or might not be the truth. Are her thoughts induced by the Stranger himself, or are they coming from her subconscious?

Everything has to do with what happened to Kara. And so far, a little bird tells me she didn’t meet her happy ending.

Read on to Chapter 8 to learn more… and I’ll meet you there next week!

To read the previous installments, please visit http://curiosityquills.com/published-authors/johanna-pitcairn/death-by-chocolate/

Weeping like a child doesn’t equal badass in my book. But I guess I needed to open the dam, and let all the emotions out. Catching my breath was a challenge for a few long minutes. How many tears could I shed?

The Stranger kept staring at me with an expressionless attitude. Maybe he found my crying amusing; something else he could take advantage of once the right occasion would come. As if I hadn’t shown enough weakness for one day.

“So… I hope you find the answers you were looking for,” he said.

Well, no, but thanks for asking anyway.

I shook my head. “I’m tired.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Tired? But you just slept. Come on, let’s get you out of here, you need some fresh air.”

Fresh air? I thought no one exited the pyramid.

He grabbed my hand and pulled me away from the bed. As I stood, the muscles in my legs all cramped up. How long had I been under? Days? After rubbing my limbs to release the stiffness, I slowly moved out of the room.

I had become a robot following the Stranger’s steps wherever he had decided to take me. And I stayed convinced his intentions, as good as he pretended them to be, were not to take me outside.

Dreaming of Kara had ripped a hole in my heart and the residual pain of her memory lingered like a hangover. I had traveled back in time to when we thought our friendship was so strong, it’d last forever. But actions mean more than words, obviously. And our unbreakable bond proved unable to stand the test of time.

We returned to the chamber where we ate earlier, and I noticed the table had been wiped completely clean. The army of attendant-priestesses had also disappeared. Leaving me standing, the Stranger proceeded to rearrange the furniture by setting the chairs against one of the walls and moving the table away from the center of the room. His back turned at me, I watched him kneel and slowly run his fingers against the floor tiles.

After going back and forth between the same two spots, he finally stopped and pressed an imaginary button with his palm, and then stepped back and grabbed my hand again.

“Watch,” he prompted.

I heard the sudden clicks of a mechanism echo inside the room, as the floor tiles started shifting sideways and then down, creating a passage in the middle of the ground. I recognized the steps of a stairway at which the Stranger pointed.

“Ladies first.”

I threw him a questioning look.

“Let’s go,” he pressed his hand on my lower back and pushed me forward. Either I’d resist and die of a hole in my head bored by his glowing golden eyes, or I’d survive a bit longer. As if the choice wasn’t already made. Setting one foot on the first step, I stared at the blackness below.

So we weren’t going outside! Right once again. Exploring basements didn’t belong to my area of expertise so…. What would I find there?

“Are… Are you coming with me?” I asked with a timid voice.

“Of course,” he replied, smiling. As if that comforted me.

Okay… I started my descent into the unknown. A few feet down, a strong smell of mildew attacked my nostrils. Dust made me sneeze. It was incredibly hard to see anything, and I moved carefully not to trip and break my neck. Now would be the right time for a magical Evan light bulb to appear! And also a box of tissues, please!

The Stranger followed behind. His clicking sandals didn’t click anymore, and his steps actually sounded muffled as if he cared about being as silent as possible. Would we wake someone up if we weren’t? A lump formed in my throat – maybe I’d stumble on another monster at the bottom of the stairway… with no chocolates to defeat it. But if fighting an ugly shapeless creature could help me get rid of the overpowering mildew stench, there’d be progress somewhere. I seriously sneezed at least fifty times, and was far from being done.

“Bless you!” Evan interjected.

“Woah you snuck in here too, huh?” Rhetorical question since Evan was a part of me, but it felt comforting to talk to him again.

“Well… I wish I could come more often but the old man behind you poured something in the wine you drank and you hallucinated for a while up there.”

The evil Anakin Skywalker becomes Darth Vador – and uses his powers against me?? Ha! Nothing new here.

“And I dreamed of Kara. Not in a nice way either.”

“I know! The bastard is forcing you to remember something you’ve ignored for too long.”

Glancing sideways, I caught the green glow of Evan’s eyes. They looked so captivating in the dark… And his familiar orange halo also illuminated the way before me, so I finally knew where I was. Well, at least see where I was. Wait… How could my subconscious turn on the light? And would the Stranger notice anything?

“You’ll worry about that later, pal!” Evan interrupted my train of thoughts by firmly patting my shoulder. “Focus on where you’re going because it ain’t pretty down there.”

I gasped.

Along the way lay the remains of bodies partly or fully decomposed. Walls on each side lined the death row I was supposed to follow and the execution room seemed like the most logical destination. The stench inside the confined area increased with every step, becoming putrid and unbearable.

“W-What happened?” Throwing up would happen in 3… 2… 1…

“They hid from the truth… and died,” the Stranger’s voice echoed all around me and I instantly shuddered.

“I’m scared,” I whispered to Evan.

“Just have faith. And don’t ignore Kara. She has something to tell you,” my subconscious replied.

Hearing her name made me want to break down again. “Why are you talking about her?”

“Because she holds many answers to your questions… Don’t worry, soon it’ll be all over,” Evan added.

As if this statement made me feel any better. What would be over exactly? My life? My lies? My torment? My relentless mal de vivre?

Applying my fingers against the cold stone of the walls, I suddenly thought about the Gypsy and our encounter outside the grocery store. Wise decision making had never been my forte. But who could have predicted a Tarot card reading session would turn into an introspection of my soul? Maybe lazy eyed lady wandered in the rain for a reason, and I was destined to find her. Bullcrap. I never believed in fate.

Evan’s comforting orange glow switched off – hey! Turn the light back on.

“Sorry pal, exceptional circumstances,” he murmured softly.

A water drop suddenly hit the top of my hand. Okay… Pretty normal for a basement to be humid. As long as no bat would fly my way, or I wouldn’t have to slide down poo to find the exit, we were in good shape. A second drop landed on my skin, and I shivered. A faint breeze raised the hair on my arms and neck. There close to me, I was sensing a presence.

A scratching burn confirmed someone indeed stood in front of me.

“Ouch!” I exclaimed, “What was that?”

No one responded. And the Stranger was gone too. What the heck!

Clearing my head of all unnecessary thoughts, I focused on remaining as calm as possible. A purple mist appeared through the darkness, forming the shape of a body I recognized immediately. She was wearing the same white gown and her shining crucifix. Kara.

“What do you want again?” Taking a step back, I bumped against a wall instead of going down the hallway. Had I turned around by mistake? Extending my hands, I kept touching stone instead of open space, confined in a dead end.

There was nowhere to run. Prisoner of Kara’s apparition, I could either watch her materialize before me, or close my eyes. But what closing my eyes would help me achieve exactly? And Evan told me to listen to her because she held many answers to my questions. As if I really needed answers to my growing claustrophobia.

Kara stood in her adult form, the purplish glow of her eyes giving me more the creeps than a child molester in search of a crowded playground. I’d have actually traded places with an about to be molested child not to deal with her again. But she trapped me for a reason. Had she come back to claim my soul in payment for something evil I had done a long time ago and couldn’t remember?

A grin split her face from ear to ear. Super duper creepy. Help!

“Are you even real?” My fingers passed between us, and I felt a cold pocket of air.

Another burn slashed the skin of my arm.

“Why are you hurting me?”

I started getting pissed instead of afraid. Could I shake her like a doll until she’d finally speak to me?

More scratches followed, and each felt like papercuts, insidious but constant reminders more injuries had been inflicted. She couldn’t be serious. I was tougher than her. She had backed off during our previous interaction. What was giving her the power to strike me like that? Her devious games effectively triggered my harshest reaction.

She wanted me angry? She’d see me angry! I jerked my body forward in an attempt to catch her but a force of incredible proportion stopped my momentum and propelled me backwards. Losing my balance, my face hit the hard wall, pain throbbed up to the top of my skull and my vision blurred.

I cursed at the top of my lungs and looked at the purple mist.

“What do you want!?!” I screamed, and as response, Kara’s laughter echoed all around me.

“Oh you think it’s funny!”

Her face came very close to mine, floating like a shaky hologram. But the purple glow of her eyes didn’t cause enough uneasiness to make me forget about my rage.

“You hurt me,” her voice finally said, but the character before me didn’t move her lips once. She kept staring at me like a lifeless doll. Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the creepy fest!

“What are you… talking about?”

“You really don’t know?”

Her face melted away and got replaced by a screenshot. It felt like watching TV. I saw a house in the background. Cars parked in the driveway, and kids stumbling in and out. I entered. Music blasted in every room. I recognized some of my former high school mates cluttered in the kitchen and the hallways, drinking cheap booze out of red plastic cups. A girl finished a kegstand. A couple was making out by the first floor bathroom.

I took the steps up to the second floor. Passed a few other students, and then quickly moved to a bedroom. Posters of football players plastered the walls. On the bed, Kara and Dan sat next to each other, and she was playing with his hand. Her head remained very close to his face, so he could breathe the vanilla scent of her hair or something. Good god. She seemed… drunk. And so was he. She kept pressing herself against him, running her other hand along his back and his waist. She murmured something in his ear, and he giggled. Finally, he held her by the neck and pushed her onto the bed, where they ended up kissing.

Talk about voyeurism.

But I kept watching. I had to know what Kara tried so hard to show me. The scene quickly shifted to the interior of a car, presumably Dan’s. Dan was driving and Kara sat on the passenger seat. She grabbed his free hand and set it on her knee, but he surprisingly didn’t comply. The more she kept trying, and the more he rejected her advances.

“You jerk!” she spat and landed a punch in his arm.

“Leave me alone!” he ordered.

“Let’s pull over! I forgive you…” she slurred.

She threw herself at him – and he pushed her back.

“Not while I’m driving!” he scowled. “Stop acting like a child!”

“Don’t you want to be my teddy bear?” she giggled and threw herself at him again. “I love you my teddy bear, I love you!” she chanted and pressed her arms around his neck in a headlock.

“You gotta stop, you’re gonna kill us!”

Despite his efforts to make her move, she held on strong. The car started swerving on the road. It was dark, and hard to see whether oncoming traffic was approaching.

“My teddy bear, my lovely teddy bear!!” Kara sung while nibbling on Dan’s cheek. “Tell me you love me teddy bear, tell me you love me!!”

Distracted, Dan had a tough time keeping the car in a straight lane.

“My teddy bear!!”

“Stop calling me like this!”

“Why?” she whined.

“Just let me drive, please?”

“You hate me!” she started crying. “You hate me!!!”

The nibbling turned into biting.

“What are you doing!”

Pushing her away from him appeared a real challenge. The car kept swerving between lanes. She bit him harder. He screamed. Ripping her off him, he slapped her and she landed against the passenger door.

“You bastard! Julie was right! You’re a woman beater!”

“Why are you talking about Julie?” he replied angrily.

Kara cried more, and screamed. “Woman beater, woman beater, woman beater!!”

“Shut up!” he slapped her again. Her head tilted backwards and she hit the door.

The sound of a horn resonated in the distance. The car was in the wrong lane. Kara threw herself at Dan once more.

“Woman beater! Woman beater!” she repeated relentlessly.

“SHUT UP!” Dan smacked her with the back of the hand.

The deafening sound of the horn intensified, and headlights flooded the inside of the vehicle. Dan tried to regain control, while Kara was passed out on the passenger seat.

But a too sharp turn sent the car rolling onto its side, and tumbling several times before landing on the roof in a cloud of dust. One front wheel spun until halt and silence invaded the scene that completely faded out.

Kara…

An immense sense of despair overwhelmed me. I wish I had been in the car to reason with her, and tell her how stupid she had been. Why did she act this way with him? I told her to stay away. I had warned her.

Feeling the taste of my own vomit in my mouth, I closed my eyes. I wasn’t guilty of anything. This guy did this to her! Not me! He was a jerk and yet she still went ahead because she had a crush on him.

When her face reappeared in front of me, her hand ripped through my ribcage and gripped my heart very tight between her tiny fingers. Just like with the strangers, air was being squeezed out of my lungs again. Was it really the only way people knew how to catch my attention in this world?

“What… Are… You doing?” I blurted while choking to death. Maybe now I could finally let go and not wake up to deal with this crap anymore, whatever new crap would be thrown at me next.

“Do you feel my pain?” she replied with her disembodied voice. “I want you to know what it feels like to have your heart crushed into a million little pieces. You weren’t there for me, Julie. You were my friend. My best friend. Where were you when I needed you the most?”

Her eyes shined a brighter purple, like two LEDs suddenly powered by a violent surge. How did she turn so evil? I left her because I moved away, and then she stopped talking to me…

“You really don’t want to see the truth, do you?” she whispered and her mouth grimaced looking totally distorted. Meanwhile, my vision blurred again.

“I don’t know… What you… Want!” I exhaled my last breath.

She huffed and squeezed my heart harder. “How about an apology?”

No need to fight any longer. I was letting go.

She squeezed harder. “Look at me! Look at me!” she shrieked.

She pulled my eyelids open, and released her grip so I could breathe. Her bloodied face was staring at me from inside the car. Dried out black mascara tears streaked her cheeks down to her chin, her eyelids shut. Her lower lip hung low and swollen. I understood her pain, but could have done nothing to save her. She was alone with him.

I didn’t do this to her! I tried to scream and fight. I even tried to reject the fact she was dead.

My best friend was dead!

“Do you understand now what you’ve been missing all along?” She whispered and her cold breath made me have goose bumps. “You ignored my passing. You didn’t come to the funeral and you didn’t visit me once at the cemetery. You just pretended I didn’t exist anymore,” she said. “My friend abandoned me. My best friend left me all alone. I was sad. So sad. Do you realize what you did?”

While regaining control over my senses, I felt her hand holding my chin up and forcing me to look into her eyes… Her beautiful blue eyes that usually expressed nothing but love. But these eyes had died like the rest of her, and only her ache remained.

“You have to pay for what you did,” she said as I tasted the salt of my own tears.

She let my chin go, and without a word, glided away from me. Once I could breathe normally, I started heaving and let my face fall into my hands. Staying like this, I didn’t see light all around me. Finally looking up, I recognized the room where I had fallen asleep, and was actually still lying on the bed.

The Stranger was leaning against the doorframe, his golden eyes fixated on me.

“How was your nap?” he asked.

“A-Are you real?” I wiped away the tears covering my face. “A-Am I still dreaming?”

He chuckled softly. “Yes, I’m real. And no, you’re awake.”

Sighing, I grabbed the fabric of my linen robe and rubbed it between my fingers, as if this action helped remind me what reality truly felt like. But I wasn’t convinced yet the nightmare with Kara had ended.

“My friend’s dead.” I said, and more tears welled in my eyes.

“I know.”

“How?”

“Come with me,” he approached and extended his hand for me to grab.

I hesitated. “Last time you asked me to go anywhere with you, you imprisoned me underground and I almost got killed by Kara’s ghost.”

“I understand your frustration, but you need to come with me,” his eyes were glowing like two golden nuggets. A bit more of resistance on my part and my brain would be fried on the spot.

“Why?” I reluctantly asked.

“So you can leave this place.”