in my life : camren ON HOLD

chapter : five

I look up to my ceiling, too preoccupied with thoughts of Lauren's weird behavior to sleep. When I had gotten home earlier my head also started hurting so I skipped dinner. Now I'm hungry. I'm too scared to go into the kitchen though, the last time I got up to eat I seen Taylor. That can't be a good thing.

Instead of getting up I stayed in bed, deciding to get something in the morning. I closed my eyes and rolled over to my side, pulling the blankets up to my chin. I shivered, was it always this cold? I opened my eyes and caught my reflection in the mirror on my dresser, my eyes focused on something behind me, or rather someone.

I shot up in bed, scooting as far away from the side I seen the face on. By now I was breathing heavily and my heart beating unnaturally fast. There was nothing there.

What the hell is happening to me?

After a couple of minutes of me trying to relax myself I layed back down and stared at the ceiling again. I'm covered in sweat and the hairs at the back of my neck are still standing but I couldn't be bothered. I'm going crazy. That's what this is. How the hell am I supposed to tell my parents? They brought me here to help me get better but it feels like I'm getting worse. What am I gonna tell them? That I'm seeing things? This is insane, no I'm insane.

I wrapped the blanket tighter around myself, it was so cold. Maybe I should get an extra blanket. I swung my legs over the side of them bed and stood up, I walked around my bed and up to my closet to grab a blanket but then I remembered what was found in there in the 70's. I'm not usually the one to get scared over these things but with my recent mentality issues I don't think I could handle anything else.

Not like there'd be anything to handle though. I'm not even sure I'd seen Taylor the first time.

I made up my mind and reached for the doorknob. It was cold to the touch. I jiggled the handle and pulled the old door open. I spotted a dingy quilted blanket from the back and pulled it out, disrupting a few things in the process. I shut the door and turned around, what I seen next made my heart stop.

There was a girl standing in front of me. She was was pale, her long blonde hair flowed down her arms. Her long sleeved floral print blouse showed off her mid drift while the skirt she wore fell down to her feet. She seemed normal enough but what made my heart stop was her bleeding stomach. There was a huge gaping hole in it, and as I stared at it she stared back at me. Her seemingly lifeless eyes sent shivers down my spine.

"Wh-who are you?" I stuttered. She tilted her head to the side, her eyes still trained on me. We stayed like that for what seemed like ages. Until the girl spoke up.

"Don't you already know?" she asked. Her voiced sounded so familiar.

"Taylor?" it can't be her. I refused to believe that.

"What? No." she assured me. "I'm Laurie."

"Lonely Laurie?" I felt pretty dumb using the name in her presence. I'm not even sure if she knew of that name.

"Yes Lonely Laurie." she said as if it were so obvious. In her defense it was that obvious.

"I'm sorry." I apologized to the apparition. "But what?!"

"Oh boy." she seemed a bit annoyed with my reaction so I straightened up to show her I can take this seriously. "I'm dead." she clarified.

"No shit." I said, she looked at me with a confused expression. "I'm sorry this is just... " I ran a hand through me hair. I looked back at her, the gaping hole in her stomach hasn't gone away.

I have to be crazy, there's no other explanation. I shouldn't be seeing this, yet here I am, not only seeing but interacting.

"How long?"

"Since 1975." the pale blonde girl answered.

"Do you remember what happened?"

"I was murdered."

Great, she is who she said she was. Still though, this is insane. I threw the blanket onto my bed and sat down, trying to get a hold of my nerves.

"Why are you here?" I asked her, lifting my head out of my hands. She rolled her eyes at me.

"Yeah, because I deserve this kind of hostility in my own home." she said.

"I mean why are you here now. You evidently didn't come just to talk." I cleared up the air, not before adding. "And this house. It's ours, my families, we live here now. You just haunt it." she shot me a dirty look.

"Whatever, everyone who comes leaves eventually." she gestured around the room. "This always becomes mine again in the end."

"Okay." I decided not to argue with her, she kinda did have a point though. "Back to my original question. Why are you here?" she thought for a second before she said.

"I need your help." I was taken by surprise, what would she need my help for? "I need you to figure out who murdered me."

"What?!" how am I supposed to do that?

"Please? You're the only one I can talk to right now." she pleaded. "That last person I talked to moved out the next day."

"Hmmmm, I wonder why?" I said sarcastically. "That hole in your stomach isn't helping matters." as soon as I said that the whole started disappearing, the gaping hole turned into the unblemished skin of her stomach.

"Better?" she asked. All I could do was gape at her. "I'm scaring you aren't I? Oh god I always do this."

I suddenly felt dizzy, I layed my back down onto the bed, my feet hung off the side.

"I'm crazy," I muttered to myself. "this is insane. I'm insane. This is fucking pshyco." I thought for a second. "Maybe this is my imagination again? When I sit up she'll be gone." I sat up and she was still there.

"Hello." she waved at me.

"Not gone," I muttered to myself, shaking my head. "not gone."

"Are you okay?" now a dead girls asking if I'm okay?

"Peachy." she tilted her head to the side, it was silent for a few seconds until she spoke up.

"Maybe I should leave. This is a lot to take in I guess. Just promise me you won't move out tomorrow?"

"Move ou- what?" she giggled.

"You say that a lot." with that she disappeared. I shivered again, the cold was the only way of knowing she was here. I pulled both blankets over my shaking body, my mind was running a mile a minute but my eyes were fighting for sleep. I played what had just happened over and over again, this is real. As my mind turned this over in my head I fell asleep.

[Chapter Song: Yesterday by the Beatles.]