Haunted

The Day Of

3109 words

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My head is cradled between my tiny hands, and I rock myself back and forth, back and forth, desperately clinging to whatever sense of normalcy, of sanity I can.

It had been getting worse from the moment the first guest entered the grounds of the Black Estate. Their own ghosts called out to me, adding to the chorus of voices inside my own head. They tell me things, impossible things, frightening things...

But I mustn't listen. I let out a long, shuddering breath. No. I can't listen.

I rise up to my feet, groaning as a wave of dizziness hits me from the sudden shift. I latch on to the wall to keep myself from toppling over, and I peek out the crack between the door and the wall. Coast is clear.

I make my way out from the guest bedroom and tiptoe downstairs, not wanting to alert anyone to my presence, for if I did, they would welcome me or talk to me and I have enough voices chattering in my mind to make up for the lack of company. I slip out the back door and into a wonderland of flowers.

Roses, lilies, chrysanthemums, hydrangeas, tulips, and hundreds of other kinds of flowers fill the garden. They look, at the same time, wonderfully up kept and wild, with vines curling off of old pillars and overgrown masses of plants shifting around as I walk in their midst. This is where I go to unwind, to take a break from the pounding flood of voices in my mind. Here, they do not come. Here, I am free.

I pluck a budding rose from a nearby bush and I inhale the aroma of the delicate flower. I close my eyes, and a dreamy smile floats across my face. Mmmm...

Gray... you didn't really think you could hide from us for long, did you?

I gasp, and the rose drops out of my hands. Tears come to my eyes involuntarily. How is this possible?! They've never found me here before...

Mentally cursing them, I rush through the garden, trying to desperately to find something, what it is, I have no clue. I'm just running to run, to pretend that I can really run from them at all. Because they are in my head, an ever-present curse.

Running won't do you any good, will it? One voice muses.

No, but she's cute to try. Look at her frail little legs! I come to a screeching halt at that remark. I will not let them laugh at me!

I busy myself with a patch of flowers, moving them to a different patch of dirt and replacing them with a few budding daisies, meanwhile humming to myself. I have found that if I act indifferently to the voices, they grow bored of me and leave me alone.

You won't be so lucky today, Gray. I can almost feel breathing down my neck, and I twist violently around. No one is there.

Today? What's special about today? And yes, I know that it is my uncle's birthday. But that happens every year, what's special about this one?

Malevolent thoughts fill the air... someone will die tonight. I shiver. What could that mean? Someone will die? How? Malevolent thoughts... none of the guests would... attack anyone, would they? My uncle would not invite a potential murderer into his home, would he? And if so, who, and why?

Ah, that's the million dollar question, isn't it? Why would anyone want to kill poor, innocent old Delilah Black. But you know better than anyone the lengths he has gone to in order to gain power...