You might find this chapter a little disgusting – or maybe not. I just want you to feel warned…
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The woman has turned their back towards them. She is a small and very skinny person, looking so frail that Danny is sure she'd break into pieces by the slightest touch. Not that he feels any urge to touch her anyway.
She's standing there, back turned on him – and Sam – and she's crying, her shoulders heaving with the sobs. And every now and then she speaks but her voice sounds strange to him.
Danny's beginning to feel uneasy, an uncertain feeling – he doesn't know where it comes from – putting a slight pressure on his stomach. Something isn't right, but he forces himself listen to what she is saying, pay attention to every squeaky sounding word that comes from her mouth.
Her name is Mrs Kinkley – he doesn't know her first name – and her sixteen year old daughter has been missing for twenty-six hours now. There's little hope, Danny thinks, to find the girl alive – since it has taken the woman twenty hours to come forward. Twenty hours of her daughter missing and she finally decides to go for help. Danny still finds it hard to believe.
Now she's standing here, crying her eyes out.
"Now, Mrs Kinkley, we need to know exactly; when was the last time you saw your daughter?" Sam asks shooting an annoyed glance at Danny who's remained silent since they've entered the house.
"You won't find her", the tiny woman just says in between her sobs. "She's gone for good."
"Mrs Kinkley, there's a good chance, we'll find her", Danny now finally tries to say reassuringly even though the strange feeling has become even more intense. He doesn't know what's causing this but he does know he wants to get out of this place as soon as possible.
"Mrs Kinkley", Sam starts to speak as well now.
"You don't understand", the woman interrupts her, suddenly raising her squeaky voice and making the ever so cool Sam wince. "She left me. Can't blame her. With what I've done to her. If only I'd had a chance. But it was too strong…"
"What was too strong?" Sam demands to know.
"The decease."
"Why would you think that?" Sam's adamant.
Silence for a moment. A long moment. Danny is about to come to the conclusion he doesn't even want to know any more, when she speaks again.
"Look."
Just the one word is sending shivers down his spine, unpleasant shivers, and he feels his stomach churn.
"Look what it's done to me." And then she turns around to face Sam and Danny. Only – she has no face. Where there might have been the features of a normal looking woman once, there is nothing, only something… well, messy. Like an open wound. One eye is missing, as is the nose. The other eye looks blind and only still there is the mouth, like a black hole, moving as she repeated her sentence: "Look what it's done to me…"
There's a scream, making him wince…
… and the next moment Danny found himself sitting bolt upright in bed, shaking and panting and sweating. He could feel his heart pounding fast in his chest and he needed a while to realise he had dreamt. And probably had been awoken by his own scream.
TBC