Coraline sat on a box that was not yet unpacked, staring into space. She was tired and bored. Her parents were in the dining room, chatting with some old work friends they had invited over. Coraline, having had no interest whatsoever in their boring work conversation, had left and was now even more bored than before, and wondering what to do.
Finally, she decided she might as well catch up on her reading before school started. She sat on the couch and opened the box, removing a book about ancient France. She began reading. Soon she dozed off.
Coraline woke, still drowsy. She felt like she was being carried. She looked up to see that her father was carrying her and her bedroom door wasn't far away. She closed her eyes and went back to sleep.
Coraline had a terrible nightmare. In it, she was trapped in a foggy, cold sphere-shaped room that glowed with a ghostly green light. She looked around, noticing that there was a small door at either end of the room. She realized with a shudder how familiar they looked. All of a sudden she heard the quiet "clunk" of a key turning in a lock. Then one of the doors began to creak open. Coraline ran towards the other door. She somehow knew that if she didn't get there, she was doomed.
But she slipped.
She kept trying to get up and falling, over and over again. Then she felt a pair of sharp, bony hands grip her shoulders. Terrified, she managed to twist around and catch a glimpse of her captor. It was the Other Mother. There was no mistake. She had the same paper white skin, the same hair, writhing like sea snakes, and the same shiny, black button eyes.
"No!" Coraline exclaimed. The Other Mother started dragging her across the room. "Help! Let go of me!" Coraline screamed, kicked, and flailed her arms to no avail. The Other Mother had an iron grip, and continued to drag her through the door, and down a hallway that looked vaguely like the hallway in Coraline's home. But all the paintings were of eyes and spiders, and everything was broken. Chips of paint, wallpaper, and other materials littered the floor. The walls caved in and there were cobwebs everywhere.
Finally they reached a mirror that Coraline knew had once been a prison for ghost children. The Other Mother shoved her through it, and into a dark, dingy room. Then she came in herself. She snapped her fingers, and Coraline was suddenly bound and gagged. She watched in horror as the Other Mother plucked a needle and thread out of thin air. Buttons appeared on Coraline's eyes. The Other Mother cackled evilly. "You can't escape me now, Coraline!" She exclaimed. She brought the needle up to Coraline's eye…
"NO!" Coraline shrieked as she woke abruptly. She was still a little disoriented and completely terrified by her nightmare. Suddenly the bedroom door began to open. Coraline screamed and shielded her face, still afraid that the Other Mother was attacking her. But then the bedroom light turned on and Coraline realized with relief that it was only her real mother standing in the doorway.
"Coraline, are you okay?" Her mother asked, "I heard you screaming."
"I had this horrible nightmare," Coraline explained. Her mother came over and sat next to her on the bed.
"Do you want to tell me what happened?" Coraline told her mother about the nightmare. "That sounds awful! You probably wouldn't want to go to sleep after something like that!" Coraline's mother commented, "How about we go downstairs and eat some breakfast?"
"I'm not really hungry," Coraline replied, "but I'll get up."