VANISHED (#1 in the VANISHED series) #NaNoWriMo2019 ✔

e i g h t e e n ✔

The nightmares worsened that night. The same visions, but so much blood splattered every inch of every room she pictured. So many screams resonated in her cranium, ear-piercing and stomach-churning and desperate. And so many times Jade appeared, but she was blurred, replaced by someone Arielle didn't know. A pallid girl with long locks of greasy ebony hair, so reminiscent of the suicide girl at the Queen's University... but no, that couldn't be.

Can it? Why would I dream of her?

Upon waking, Arielle was so nauseous she considered canceling her ticket to the St. Augustine Lighthouse. But whenever her eyes closed, the frightening flashes of Jade and the unknown girl and blood and screams plagued her. So she heaved herself from bed and got dressed. Being outside would be better than locked inside with her terror.

She wished for Stella to be there. For her cheerful disposition in the morning, the bagels and cream cheese she scrounged up, her pep-talks and knowledge. Regret swirled into Arielle's belly and mingled with the already dreadful nausea. It became so bad she struggled to finish the coffee she'd bought on the road to the Lighthouse.

Breathe in, breathe out—it's only fear.

Stella's crystals were in her pocket, smooshed against her upper thigh. Reassured, protected, she inhaled the breezy, salty air as she exited her car and headed into the St. Augustine Lighthouse welcoming area.

"Wow," she muttered upon seeing the swirling white and black structure, towering over a forest, its red tip bright and intriguing. The pictures didn't do it justice.

She zipped up her jacket, remembering the warnings that it could get windy at the top. Shoving her dizziness aside, she admired the building and all its beauty. As a former history major, places like these always caught her attention. Facades draped in stories, walls covered in tales, halls decked with legends. One day, she'd travel to Europe and visit castles, monasteries, battle-sites—but for now, an old Florida Lighthouse would have to do.

She recalled what she read before they left for the trip—the details that repeated in her mind in an soothing way, over and over, like a chant, a prayer. One-hundred-and-sixty-five feet above the sea. Two-hundred-and-nineteen steps. Eight landings. A black, winding circular staircase.

She lidded her eyes and visualized it all; and when she opened them, there it was, up close, real. The St. Augustine Lighthouse.

There weren't many people—it was nine o'clock, opening time—so she sucked in a large gulp of the refreshing ocean oxygen and trudged forward.

This structure had always fascinated Jade. They never got a chance to visit it during their trip to Florida together, but Jade planned for it for years. That was why she kept this place last on their itinerary; she wanted to finish with a bang.

"It seems so blissful and cute, but it's super haunted, Ari," she had explained, a few months before her death. "Inexplicable cigar smells, visions at the top of the tower, a little girl laughing late at night, doors locking, chairs overturning, items moving, disappearing, then reappearing out of nowhere. Oh! And music boxes play on their own, too."

Chills slithered up Arielle's arms and turned them rigid, painful. She wished it were easier, wished she had the kind of courage Jade used to have. Even with all that had happened to Arielle and Stella since they started the trip, Jade wouldn't have given up. Fierce, brave... she would have pushed forward. Would have mocked them for freaking out turning tail. "Be like Zak!" she would have said, making both her friends cringe.

And so... I must be like Zak.

Beautiful as they were, the winding stairs were exhausting. Each step took its toll, seeping soreness into her calves and aches into her hips. Arielle wasn't in awful shape, but by the fourth landing, her breaths were wheezy and her vision blurred a bit. Her palm was so sweaty it slid from the railing when she sought to grip it. Teenagers ran past her, taking the steps two at a time; even an elderly couple passed her, smiling—almost in pity.