Normal kids have teddy bears; I had Stephen King novels...
I was what you'd call a precocious little monster movie connoisseur from a laughably young age. Around 12, I was utterly obsessed with all things slasher flick and found footage nightmare fuel.
And just like any well-adjusted tiny weirdo, I damn loved every minute of the night terrors that would leave me shrieking myself awake in a cold panic, sheets drenched through with nervous sweat.
Really set the ambiance, you know? The grand finale was occasionally even blacking out from fear only to groggily resurface in the ER with an IV full of sedatives. Now that's some peak psychological trauma right there - the cornerstone of any well-balanced childhood.
Speaking of which, I definitely had a textbook upbringing scattered with all the hallmarks of A+ parenting fail. Things like a doting mother so convinced her daughter was certifiably deranged.
Mom, bless her heart, dragged me to more therapists than there are Linux distros. They'd scribble notes, nod sagely, and prescribe "normalcy" like it was a magical potion.
Direct to where the chaos began.
See, I had a twin.
However, she died when I was nine. I don't have that memory, which is unexplainable, and I would never have known if I hadn't accidentally found a photo of two identical girls in my mom's "private" memory box. Two girls that Bella was not a part of.
Definite red flag for a sane person, right?
Having a biological twin you knew literally zero about, despite sharing her personal batch of amniotic fluid for the better part of a year? Nothing to see there, clearly! No plausible reason to be even a little bit concerned or feel massively gaslit.
Anyway, long story short - I start having these gnarly fever-dream night terrors that feel...off. Like I wasn't just witnessing some scripted horror flick, but legit re-living some repressed traumatic memories on a constant endless dopamine loop. Like getting front row seats to my own personal psychological torture chamber.
The first time I had the same nightmare I'd been having for months, my mother, like many parents, blamed the movies I watched. This was extremely frustrating, as I knew my nightmares had nothing to do with the films in question. I'm particularly sure it was not about the movies because I saw how she died in one of these dreams.
It was always the same damn dreamscape too: tucked in my sad little hobbit hole bedroom, that eerie dead silence you only get in the harrowing 3am witching hour. Until it started - those unmistakable, stomach-twisting whimpers echoing somewhere deep in the winding hallways of our bizarrely massive suburban labyrinth of a house.
Like a dumb blonde bimbo in a slasher flick, something sick and twisted inside compelled me to go full Leeroy Jenkins chasing those cries for help. Creeping down those dim corridors, my heart jackhammering being the only real soundtrack as I traced the muffled wails to the guest bathroom...
Forget Freud; this was some next-level gore scene.
Mom was drowning my sister in the tub. She was kicking and calling for me, weirdly, without really talking. It was something like telepathy, and then afterwards...I also started feeling like I was being smothered, and I woke up short of breath and coughing out bits of water. This was how the dream always came, and at some point, it got so intense that I passed out and woke up in a hospital bed.
I never mentioned to mom she was the one drowning her in the dream and she never told me in detail how, she drowned.
The dreams soon stopped, and what followed was feeling her talking and even touching me sometimes. I always told Mom maybe it was her ghost trying to reach out, and the next thing I knew, I was locked up in the loony bin getting my head shrunk because I was "running mad."
Mom, as expected, prohibited horror movies in her home....she actually banned watching movies, burned my books and creepy-looking toys, and pretty much forbade us from even bringing that topic up. After years of therapy and being doped up on meds, I was finally "fine". No more dreams and no more memories. But when I was bored, I'd try to recall my experiences with Bella and my life before age nine, but nothing ever came to mind. This brings me to conclude there is a possibility that ghosts exist.
So, the concept troubled me more than I had anticipated. And the fact that I was facing an ancient, probably haunted-as-fuck building in the middle of nowhere did not exactly put me at ease.
With all the will I could muster, I brushed the uncomfortable thoughts off and stepped inside.
Even if ghosts existed, I had company, which was quite enough.
I was smacked on the face with cold air and the noxious char of burning wax. Blinking rapidly, I shook my head to focus on where I had just entered.
It was quiet and cool and also dark. I couldn't see anything apart from eight lit candles, which explained the annoying smell of wax.
As if on cue, the lights flickered on, hurting my eyes.
With my hand shielding my eyes, I peered about. It was nearly impossible to believe how magnificent the place looked on the interior when it appeared so old on the outside. It looked more like someone's chill living room than a creepy murder cabin
There was an old rocking chair beside a fireplace that looked rather warm and alive despite the biting cold inside.
Everyone in the room had found a seat at a circular table in the center of the room, just in front of me.
Obviously not a romantic date.
"Turn those lights off!" Jax ordered, irritated as if I had turned them on.
I didn't want any disagreement, so I switched the lights off, very humiliating to say, obediently.
There was just enough light to walk to the table without tripping. My footsteps reverberated on the floor in the areas the carpet had not yet covered.
There wasn't even a hint of dustiness.
Much to my dismay, I ended up sitting next to Kevin, as the only two seats left were either next to him or next to Logan...and I was not under any pressure going to sit next to Logan.
Logan was a pervert, he was quite capable of deciding to molest me right then and there.
Bella was still glaring daggers at Jax. Wonder was slumped over, fixated on the screen of his smartphone. Michael, like me, was waiting to see what was on while his brother was smoking his lungs out, and Logan was.....well, he was just staring at something on my face.
I was beginning to wonder why everyone was silent. Was Jax not going to pull out some wine and glasses and maybe call out for a waiter who was hiding somewhere? It was a damn date, for crying out loud.
Unfortunately, he didn't. We all remained silent, calculating and attempting to match each other's breathing rates. Or maybe I was the only one doing that.
"So....." Bella started.
I tensed up, gripped with a weird sense of gratitude that she had the ovaries to be the conversation pioneer. We all collectively turned our attention to Jax, watching, waiting with bated breath.
More silence.
But this time it damn near had a physical presence, pressing down on us from all sides in the candle-flickering gloom.
My watch ticked.
I shuffled my feet, looking for a better position for my knees. Kevin cleared his clogged throat, and the rest breathed.
Seriously why was everyone so silent!? It was beginning to feel like we were stuck in a silent standoff.
"So...." I repeated Bella's lead, shooting Jax an emphasizing glance in case he'd somehow missed her voice inches right next to him.
He didn't talk. Instead, he just leaned back in that creaky chair of his and produced an old, weathered board from God knows where, dropped it on the table with a hollow thunk, along with some wicked-looking pen knife that Kevin instantly snatched up.
Jax then proceeded to lazily drag those dead-ass eyes over towards me, like I was supposed to have some sort of cosmic understanding of what fresh new Hell this was.
Still, nobody uttered a single damn word. It was like they'd all been collectively struck mute by some sadistic, greater force.
I could feel the agonizing silence penetrating every nerve ending, worming its way under my skin in waves of escalating discomfort. Nearly gave me a migraine, that oppressive, weighted nothingness.
I wanted to scream.
Can't anyone just say anything?
At least explain why we were staring at a stupid board in silence. But as it was, nobody seemed interested in asking. I was the only person with no hint of why we were silent.
More ringing silence. Extra shivers ran down my spine. More irritation.
My stomach suddenly grumbled loudly, harshly reminding me that I'd skipped dinner like a reckless idiot. Awesome, now I was literally wasting away on top of slowly losing my tenuous grip on reality.
"Shouldn't we be starting?" Bella asked just as I was about to scream and lose my head in the process.
She looked at Jax, who, in turn, pushed the board toward me and nodded.
What did he expect me to do with it?
At this moment, I wished I had stayed at home and watched some nice horror movies. It would have been better than coming here to waste my time on an empty stomach. I should have eaten that pathetic food.
"Am I supposed to eat this?" I heard my voice cracking through the void before I could stop it.
"Talk," was Jax's only terse reply.
Just that one jarring little word, lingering in the air like an ominous command. As if I was some kind of poorly trained dog instead of a human being. As if I could just instantly mind-meld with his psycho intentions through sheer focused concentration.
What an utter asshole.
"Talk," I echoed back with a thick lather of sarcasm, because why the hell not at this point? We'd clearly entered the Existential Twilight Zone and all bets were off.
Bella shot me one of her trademark shut-the-hell-up-now glares from across the table. But I was too far down the rabbit hole of hangry delirium to care anymore. I just glowered right back at Jax, silently screaming every filthy curse I could summon his way with my mind.
"We're summoning someone, and you'll be our channel."
I couldn't help but snort out loud, "That's stupid."
Everyone's piercing gaze fell on me, and I hastily added, "....and how would the board help anyway?"
"That's an Ouija board, silly!" Bella snapped, adding voltage to her initial stern glare. I had to bite my tongue to stop myself from telling her some nasty truths.
Jax was ready to fly over the table and kill me as if he could sense my unspoken thoughts.
I folded my arms in front of my chest and huffed.
From the many horror films concerning seance boards I had seen, I needed to be an extra breed of stupid to try that mistake. Don't get me wrong. I was not scared...I just love my life.
The piercing glares kept raining down from all sides, but I really couldn't have cared less if they burned holes straight through my skull at this point. Coming as Bella's emotional support human was one thing, but actively engaging in their satanic witchcraft massively overstepped some lines. I was too young to be indebted to the devil.
" Do it!" Kevin suddenly snarled through clenched teeth, something freezing and metallic pressing up against the vulnerable flesh of my throat.
The knife.
Well, I must admit that this was completely unexpected.
Maybe this was so serious to them, or maybe they thought it was a nice prank....it didn't matter. My life was in jeopardy. I just had to play by their rules for the sake of all of us. If I talked, I'd be saving more time.
"Is anyone out there?" I asked, hesitant, and cast a questioning glance at Jax.
This is so messed up...what am I even saying right now?
God, I sounded awkward as hell. My own words practically stuck in my dry throat, my voice coming out strangled and pitiful. It was surreal, being forced to speak your potential last words under threat of grisly dismemberment.
" You must cut your index finger and place it on that symbol." He said, obviously angered.
"I am not slicing my hand open for this bullshit," I barked out a harsh laugh, but it quickly withered into a tense swallow as the freezing steel kissed my exposed jugular again in silent warning.
Protestingly, I did as was asked and raised my head. " Then what?"
"Then you shut up!" Jax growled like a rabid animal, his flinty eyes glittering with something unhinged and feral in the candlelight.
I would have thrown my own beastly growl of insult, but with the knife dancing dangerously on my skin, I pressed my lips tighter than they were ever meant to be.
We went into another long pause where I was forced to hold my bleeding finger rigidly in place on that strange occult symbol etched into the floorboards. My neck craned at an unnatural, straining angle - the only way to avoid nicking my jugular further on Kevin's blade.
The dull throb of pain from my makeshift wound pulsed in time with my racing heartbeat as I fought to control each ragged breath. While everyone else remained laser-focused on the Ouija board's pointer, I opted to bore holes straight through Jax's skull with the intensity of my glare instead.
If looks really could kill, I would've gouged out his eyeballs and dismembered that snake of a human being inch by torturous inch before this depraved ritual reached its climax.
My furious death stare happened to snag on the chain around his neck. That's when an eerie sense of recognition slithered up my spine like an icy trickle of water.
Yes! That was what had seemed out of place when I saw him earlier. I'd never seen it on him before.
It was a black chain with something like a snake curled on a skull. Creepy. But cool. Even creepier, I felt like it belonged to me, and I felt compelled to reach across the table and yank it off his neck.
Just as I was debating whether or not to go through with it, I felt a presence behind me. There was an instantaneous shift in my focus.
Slowly, I turned my head away from the knife's edge to check my surroundings.
Nothing.
A single, icy bead of sweat slid down my back. I quickly turned to see whether anyone else had seen or felt it, but they all looked compelled by the pointer that had moved and was now pointing toward the 'yes.'
I let out a long sigh of relief before it actually sank into my thick skull. It had shifted! The pointer had moved!
For the very first time, I was not afraid. I was excited and pleased with myself simultaneously, until a freezing breeze, like the one I had felt earlier, swept by my side next to the empty chair between Logan and me.
My heart began pounding dramatically in my ears despite my best efforts to calm down. Nothing could go wrong. Logan had not felt it, so everything was fine. I just had to check again.
I turned around and confirmed that no ghostly creature was lurking in the shadows behind me.
Feeling a load of pressure had been released from my lungs, I turned to face the others, confident. Having just managed to relax for a minute, I opened my mouth to speak, but a hand landed on my shoulder at that same moment, making my bones jerk off my body.
I screamed.
★. ★. ★. ★. ★. ★. ★. ★.
Hi
I'm so giddy at the thought of all your minds being completely shaken after that ritual. Let's fully dive into the ominous depths, shall we?
Firstly, I NEED your most depraved theories on WTF was actually going on with Cat's twin sister situation. Demonic possession? Repressed trauma resurging through night terrors? Or did some straight-up murderous shit go down that's been buried?
While we're cranking the paranoia to 11, what's the hottest take on the forces they could potentially be summoning with this goddamn Ouija board ritual? Hungry demons clawing their way through the veil? Malicious spirits looking for fresh vessels? Or did Jax's creepy cult persona unlock the gateway to some dark stuff beyond human comprehension? Spill all the nightmare fuel you've got!
Speaking of Jax, that twisted fuck clearly has bigger plans brewing beyond his typical mind games. What are we thinking - is this just his latest sick power play to traumatize everyone? Or is he tapping into legitimately dangerous occult knowledge for some egomaniacal scheme? Dude gives off big cult leader energy, right?
Also, Cat definitely felt the icy caress of the paranormal during the ritual. So was it simply her fear projecting spooky phantoms? Or did some legitimately malevolent entity make its presence known when they started messing with that sinister board? If so, what could they have potentially unleashed?
Then we've got Kevin, that highly-strung psychopath, holding a literal knife to Cat's throat. Homeboy took the situation from mildly alarming to straight dangerous in two seconds flat. Could the tinderbox of tension and violence ultimately lead to blood being spilled before the night's through? Whose throat may need slitting by morning?
Lastly - that necklace Jax was rocking really struck a profound, unsettling chord with Cat. What deeper significance could it possibly hold? Is it linked to their past/family history in some way? Or are we just dealing with a cruel mind-fuck from the master mindfucker himself?
As usual beautiful blasphemers, shower me with your darkest, most deranged theories and predictions! Remember the more fucked up the better- that's the sole fuel that stokes my creative fires right now.
*Unholy laughter* I want to be consumed by your most profane mental offerrings.