Thanks a lot to emma . ray, best beta reader of the world, for your support, advices and time.
I also would like to express my gratitude to all of you for taking the time to read, and to review for some of you. This means the world to me.
I woke up a while after, sitting in an old armchair that was still covered by a white linen, facing the door which was now wide open.
What the fuck happened? Ooooh... my heaaaad...
I ran my hand in my hair, feeling a little bump on the back. I must have fallen or fainted or something. It was pitch black outside and the only thing I could see was the tiny bit of light coming from downstairs. I had probably turned on a light while I was with my mom.
I rubbed my eyes and rested my head on both my hands. The last thing I remembered was that I had heard something and that I was locked in. I had no memories of sitting here or hearing my parents come back. Then how the hell did I end up on this chair?! And who unlocked the door?
I decided to go check if my parents were home, just to ease my mind a bit. I had always been keen to run tonnes of scenarios in my head so right now my brain was almost boiling. The most logical explanation would be that my parents walked in on me and sat me on this chair, or that I had walked there myself and fallen asleep. Then what's that bump?
I started to walk slowly towards the light, afraid of falling, putting both my hands on each wall while I was working my way downstairs. I decided to leave the door open, afraid it wouldn't open later, and walked towards the light that was coming from the second staircase. I had probably turned this one on while mechanically touching the walls. I found the light switch and shut it down, just to be sure this one was responsible for the stair's light and once in the dark, I noticed a sort of glimmer coming from the attic.
"Are you shitting me," I whispered.
I was there less than a minute ago and there was no light. No even a light source. What the heck was going on?!
This was the perfect moment, probably once or twice in a lifetime, where all your instincts kick in and you have to fight them with all your strength. Everything in my body was screaming at me, telling me to go, to run, to just turn on every switch and run to my parents - who, according to the lack of any other light, weren't home yet. I just wanted... my mom. First I couldn't open the door, second I awoke on a chair I had no memory of sitting in, third I had a bump on my head and now there was a freaking light coming from the attic? Hell no I wasn't going back there.
Or maybe I should.
Just to check.
Maybe there was a totally logical explanation for this, maybe the moon was glowing and was bathing the whole place in a white light, or maybe an old mirror was reflecting it and directing it towards the stairs, giving the impression that the light was filling the place?
"Come on Paige, you big old sissy." I said to myself.
I felt the panic all over my body but resisted with everything I had. I walked slowly, careful, to the end of the corridor, stopping at the door opening on this floor, looking up towards the stairs and the second door. I bit my lower lip, I bit hard, to give me strength to go back up there. This was a bit too much for a first evening in a new town and a new house.
The light was even stronger there, illuminating the whole staircase, so bright that I hadn't even seen it as clearly in broad daylight. Shit shit shit.
I put my feet on the first step. Good. Okay. Now the other one. I started to climb, but in this moment I wasn't me, I was seeing myself from above, as if the anxiety that was crippling through my whole body had projected me outside of myself and I was unable to stop. But then I did. I stopped. I was at the top of the stairs, watching what the source of the light was. Watching but not seeing.
Some sort of big blue ball of light was floating in the air, slowly moving up and down, irradiating the whole place. The centre was so clear it was almost white, and the edges seemed to be evaporating into thin air, as if the ball was pulsing on a heartbeat's rhythm, letting its light evaporate like fog when the sun rises. It was truly mesmerising. I was as scared as I was attracted to it. I took a few steps towards it – WHY?! - and mechanically raised my hand to touch it.
The contact was electrifying, and as my fingertips touched it the light became so strong that it blinded me. I raised my hand over my eyes to try to discern what was happening but I miserably fell as I was walking backwards to try to gauge the phenomenon.
I was on the floor and the light faded, allowing me to regain sight and to discover what had become of the ball.
A young woman was standing in place of it, turning her back on me as she was moving towards the window. She apparently didn't know I was there as my fall had hidden me behind a big wooden trunk.
She was glowing a strong light blue luminescence, same as the "bubble" before her, and I was able to see the moon through her. She was wearing what seemed to be a roman toga but it was really hard to define the vision as she wasn't tangible, she was like a... the word wasn't even forming clearly in my mind.
I managed to stand up - I still have no idea how I did that - and a wooden slat cracked under me, revealing my presence. She turned in my direction and smiled. I stopped moving. If it had been possible, her smile could have enlightened the whole place more. She took a step - well not really a step as she wasn't really walking, more like floating - towards me and I took one back.
"Paige..." she said.
There was an overload of information freezing my brain right now, I was in serious need of regrouping. She knew my name. She was in my house. She was a...
"Ghost." I said. I was aware that my eyes were wide open, fixated on her, and it took me all of my strength to give a quick look behind me, trying to gauge where the staircase was. She was still moving in my direction and I was trying to put as much space between us as possible.
"Paige..." she said again, almost supplicating.
"DON'T COME NEAR ME," I shouted.
"I'm not going to hurt you..." she said softly, raising her arm in my direction.
I violently recoiled, stopping her movement. She kept her arm stretched towards me and her face dropped in apparent sadness due to my reaction. I was assessing her, trying to decipher what the hell was happening, how she knew my name, and who... what...she was exactly. She took a few "steps" back, allowing me to relax a bit. She didn't seem to be maleficent and my first shock was starting to fade away as fear was slightly losing ground to curiosity. Her eyes were looking at me intensely, as if she was trying to see through me, as I was able to do her, or to read my thoughts.
My breath was shaky, and it took me a minute to be able to speak.
"What are you?" I managed to ask.
She was looking at me softly, almost pained by my question. Didn't she know how strange it looked to me? One minute ago there was a giant blue ball of light in my attic, and a minute before that there was nothing.
She sighed softly.
"Your soulmate." she answered.
My...
"What?!"
This didn't make any sense. Not even remotely. Soon she was going to tell me I owned a pet dragon or something.
"Don't you remember?" she asked.
Distress was noticeable in her features and her voice. Although almost transparent, her eyes were glowing from a clearer light than the rest of her. They were like floating candles, easily discernible in the ambient darkness.
"Remember what?"
I wasn't even hoping for an answer that would have made sense, I was so stunned by everything that I thought by making her talk, I could manage to escape the attic.
There was nothing that could have proven to me that she was tied to that place, but I thought that if I was able to escape the room, she might stay there and I could run towards a place where light would be able to save me. She might have seen my inner fight as she answered: "I am not going to hurt you Paige."
"That's exactly what somebody who would want to hurt me would say."
She closed her eyes, as if my words were hurting her on a physical level. Even if she didn't have a body.
"You can go," she said without even looking at me. "I won't follow you. I'll stay here until you want to talk to me."
She didn't have to say it twice. I walked slowly towards the stairs, my eyes not leaving her sight.
I closed the door behind me and ran down the stairs, skipping steps as my legs moved fast, turning on every light as I passed switches, and sat on the front porch in a foetal position.
Okay Paige. Calm down. Think.
So. There was a ghost in the attic. At least I think it's a ghost. She didn't seem evil. She was pretty nice. And she was pretty too. But still, a ghost. An "it". Not an actual person. And what's with the soulmate thing?
I scoffed at the thought. I had one soulmate and he had the name of Spencer. A guy. My boyfriend. I had never believed in such things. But I had also never believed in ghosts before that. This was probably a trick, maybe she was an alien who wanted to take control over my body or something like that. I had read a lot of reports on UFO sighting and I always thought it was fascinating, even if my rational mind had told me it was bollocks. But it was still more believable than life after death.
Fuck.
I was completely lost, shaking as I was trying to make sense about what had happened. The whole thing had only lasted a few minutes but everything was branded in my mind. I was hoping for my parents to arrive shortly to comfort me and to tell them about the presence in the attic.
But let's be honest.
They would never believe me. They would have to see it with their own eyes but it might have disappeared before that happened, and then what? They would think I was trying to play a trick on them because I was mad they had dragged me here and the nice mood they were in would fade.
I was considering calling Spencer to tell him about everything but he would probably think I had watched Ghostbusters while I was stoned.
I started to laugh. I was really asking myself "Who I'd wanna call" and I think my nerves broke down. I was trying to whistle the tune as tears of laughter were blinding me. I was thousands of miles away from my boyfriend, from my best friends, I was living in a small town, away from everything, my parents weren't there and I had seen a ghost in the attic that was supposed to become my room at one point.
I was literally losing my mind.
As I was starting to make a terrible decision my parent's car appeared in the driveway. Great, they were probably going to have a lot of questions if they saw me like that.
I wiped the small tears that had formed and stood up to greet them properly. My dad parked the car and they both walked towards me, talking lightly, but I saw some concern in my mother's eyes.
"Paige, are you okay?"
"Yeah mom, no worries. I was upstairs and thought I'd come say hi when saw the car arriving. Plus I'm starving, I hope you brought me potstickers," I said with a smile, recognising a typical Chinese restaurant logo on the bag my mom was carrying.
"Of course," she said, smiling back at me.
She handed me the food, the smell of which awoke my appetite. My last meal was hours ago and consisted of some donuts we ate at a diner along the road.
My dad hadn't said anything, gauging me as he passed by.
"Did you have a great night?" I said, following them in the house towards the kitchen.
"It was acceptable," said my dad. "Our waiter was clumsy but the food was okay."
My mom tried to contain a laugh as she was looking at me, mimicking my dad's frown and mouthing his words with exaggeration. I feigned a smile, hoping the few pleasantries we had exchanged would be enough for them to leave me alone with my potstickers and my thoughts. And I was right.
"We're gonna go to bed, we're tired by the long journey," said my mom. "I hope you don't blame us for leaving you again. I'll prepare your bed in one of the rooms on the first floor. It's remote enough from ours so you can play music if you want."
An hour ago I didn't believe in the paranormal but right now I was also starting to wonder if something had possessed my mom. She was so sweet since we got here...
Reason kicked in. Of course she was. They had separated me from everything, it was logical they'd try to ease my transition.
"Cool mom, thanks," I answered.
"Paige," said my dad. "I know the house is fairly remote but if you could think about the electrical bill and not turn on every light next time we are away it would be appreciated. You are not a kid anymore, it's time you conquer your fear of the dark..."
I'm not afraid of the dark you butthead, there is a freaking ghost in the attic.
"Yes dad, I'm sorry."
"It's okay" said my mom, tapping my shoulder with her hand as she was passing by me. "Just turn off everything okay? I'll leave the light in your room."
"Thanks mom. Goodnight!"
"G'night," mumbled my dad.
"See you tomorrow Paige, we have a big day ahead!" said my mom, a little bit too enthusiastic to be a hundred percent genuine.
I waited to hear their door close to put the food on the counter. I sat on a high footstool and started to devour everything they had brought me, without any thought on the possibility they had brought more for tomorrow's lunch.
Once I had eaten more than enough to nourish a baby hippopotamus I took a few deep breaths and touched the bump on my head again.
As the minutes were passing by and becoming hours, I was starting to think I had dreamt the whole thing. That I had fallen, and then fallen asleep, and that everything was just a weird nightmare induced by the Tales from the Crypt comics I had read in the car.
I looked for my bag and decided to go for a walk around the house. The smell of chlorine had always appeased me, and I knew that smoking a small joint with my feet in the water would be calming and would erase the crazy stuff that had happened. I stopped moving for a few seconds, listening to be sure that my parents were asleep. Nothing. Good.
I rolled up a "magic cigarette", found a flashlight and went outside towards the pool. I sat on the edge, took my boots off and plunged my legs into the cold water. My dad had made sure the pool had been fixed and was in perfect condition for when we arrived so that I wouldn't lose even a week of training.
I turned off the flashlight, enjoying the calm and the lack of light. No light, no blue bubble, no ghost. The sound of the long drags I was taking on my joint were very calming as it was familiar and regular. The marijuana burning, the paper consuming...no sound other than this one. I didn't even want to be stoned, but just calm enough to be able to sleep in that house.
I put my hands backward on the ground, raising my eyes to the starry sky. I started to sing very softly, losing myself in the big canvas in front of me.
Starry, starry night
Paint your palette blue and gray
Look out on a summer's day
With eyes that know the darkness in my soul
It was getting late and the joint was starting to fulfil its purpose. I stood up, taking my shoes in one hand, drying my feet in the grass nearby, and my eyes were drawn towards the attic's window.
I knew I would have to go up there again at some point.
Not now.
But soon.
