1: It’s A Dead Body, Not A Boy

ASHTON

The peeling pepto bismol pink paint that reveals a hideous wallpaper underneath and the disheveled furniture can’t mask the desperation within the crumbling walls of Mysteria Manor. Even the high vaulted ceilings of the Victorian mansion can’t close its eyes to the death that lurks inside. In fact, it showcases our torment. Today it's a small, dainty body that sways from one of its supporting beams.

This place should be swarming with cops, hell a priest to put shame on us, but why should the town of Fallen Oaks care about an operating safe house full of neglected and forgotten teenage girls when those who should’ve loved us unconditionally don’t.

Curiosity urges my feet to shuffle forward along with the others, gathering, gawking at the scene either in pity or intrigue. Virgil, the grounds keeper, crawls along the framework to reach the dead girl. He isn’t the spryest of the bunch that’s for sure. His old wrinkled body seems more fragile than fit as he wipes his brow already sweating from such little effort.

He tugs restlessly at the rope in hopes of sliding her back to the balcony of the third floor, but only struggles even more. Switching tactics he decides to try to lift her body up when the knot can’t be loosened or moved. Her limp limbs flop in motion with the relentless tugging of the rope.

“Just cut her down Virgil. She’s already dead.” The cold voice of Mysteria Manor’s matron causes me to cringe. Not just from the sheer volume of it, but the cruelty of her statement.

Imogen Winston is as heartless as she is attractive. Her sleek dark red hair is cut just below her jaw with excellent precision, her deep blue eyes are perfectly framed behind a pair of black rimmed glasses. And even though she patrols thrown away, disturbed teenage girls in a crypt-like house, her clothes are impeccable. Always a black pant suit. I guess you can say she’s always ready for a funeral.

And here at Mysteria funerals are quite common...well at least burials. This body will be buried with the rest in the acres of land behind the house that has been turned into a cemetery. Not by choice of course, but for the need to deposit all the girls that have died here. All twenty three of them.

Ms. Winston is already moving furniture out of the way in anticipation of the drop. The screech of table legs against the worn wooden floor drowns out Virgil’s grumbling. My eyes lock onto the institution’s headmistress as she signals for him to get on with it. 

I wasn’t going to look. I shouldn’t look, but the sawing of the rope is almost as audible as the snap it makes as it breaks, calling for my attention. I catch a glimpse of the body free falling in the air before I can get myself to turn away only mere seconds before she hits the ground. The sickening thud it makes as it slams against the floor will forever echo in my eardrums.

The crowd of girls all rush to where the corpse lands. All eager to see if the whispers of who it is are true. I peer between heads and shoulders making sure not to touch a single girl in the process, to see for myself even though my stomach is tossing. You would think that after seeing more dead bodies than I would like to admit, I would get used to it, but it still nauseates me.

Number thirteen also called Seraphina is nothing more than a tangled mess of twisted limbs. The rope is still knotted around her neck, embedded into her skin. The bloody scratches and ripped off chunks of flesh speak louder than any dead body could. She struggled in agony until she finally died.

The past few days she had been raging about something lurking the halls, something dark, evil, feeding off all the bad mojo that’s constantly brewing within Mysteria. And now she’s nothing but another tragedy locked away within these walls.

“Poor thirteen. I didn’t know she had it in her.” Addison, number twenty three sneaks up behind me. A quick glance over my shoulder shows her chewing on a piece of jerky, her bright orange hair, from a botched dye job, is a frazzled mess from her most recent haircut. In one of her meltdowns she got a hold of a pair of scissors and poorly chopped off her long locks right above her shoulders.

I guess we all have a bit of suicidal tendencies in us, some stronger than others. Mindlessly, I rub my forearm, the raised scars are like little speed bumps in what’s supposed to be a smooth glide of my fingertips.

Depending on who you asked each and every cut was deserved. Some were supposed to end my misery while others were nothing more than sacrificial.

“Maybe because it wasn’t intentional.” I point to the jagged skin around the rope. “That’s a lot of work for someone to go through to chicken out on.” I glance at the ceiling. “How in the hell did she get up there anyways?”

There are definitely quicker ways to die at Mysteria, some of the other girls here could even be included in those options. If not something prowling outside.

“Just because you want to off yourself doesn’t mean that it’ll feel good.” Addison hastily replies.  She leans over my shoulder trying to get a closer look at the body.

Every one of my muscles stiffens at the prospect of her bumping into me. A graze of her chin on the top of my shoulder. A brush of fingertips to balance herself as she goes up on her tippy toes. It’s only once her feet are firmly back on the ground and she’s no longer hovering, I relax.

“Maybe.” I still don’t believe it though, but she wouldn’t be the first one to kill themselves to get out of this place…if they even do get out of this place after death.

“Back to your rooms!” Ms. Winston demands stopping the gossiping whispers. “It’s a dead body, not a boy. Back to your rooms.” Her long skinny arms shoos us away. “Lock down until supper.”

There’s a harmonious groan, but we all comply, because if we don’t, she won’t hesitate to give us a large dose of sedatives to help us along. She doesn’t accompany us up to our rooms, she just expects us to obey. She’s the ring leader to our circus acts, spouting demands but never really caring.

Addison trails behind me. I can hear her slippered feet shuffle across the floor. We’re halfway to our confinement cells when I hear a familiar chuckle. Phoebe. One of the first girls to get discarded. She’s just as heartless and cruel as Winston, but then again it isn’t the easiest to develop pleasant feelings or behaviors when there is no example to draw from.

She mainly sticks to the shadows, but every once in a while she peeks her ugly head out to spread torment. She doesn’t have any spectacularly abnormal abilities like some of us. For all I know her parents died and she got carted off because no one wanted her, which is even sadder than being purposely discarded.

“Out of my way ghost girl.” Phoebe's hateful sneer is unmistakable.

It all happens so fast. I barely catch a glimpse of Addison stumbling on her feet, hands flailing through the air as she soars in my direction. Time seems to stand still as she collides into my unexpectant body sending us both to the floor in a heap.

Tangled limbs. Tangled nightmares.

The institution fades away only to be replaced with a little girl’s room. 

A small unicorn lamp is the only beacon of light in the bedroom. There isn’t much to illuminate. A small desk, bookshelf only half full of books and a few toys, along with a bed. A bed with a small shaking girl on it. A quilt pulled all the way up to the tip of her nose. Nothing but her eyes stick out, darting around the room, searching for something.

Addison’s eyes. Even in the poorly lit room, I can recognize her judging blue eyes anywhere. Wisps of her once blonde hair stick out around her head.

I can practically hear her heartbeat, see her restless limbs quiver beneath the blanket.

The scrap of something moving startles even me. Her tiny gasp is in sync with my own. Together, even though she’s unaware of my presence, we search the room and both of our eyes land on the object at the same time. She unfolds the blanket, uncovering herself. Her small body creeps to the edge of the bed. Whereas I take two steps forward.

A toy horse balances on the edge of the desk for a blink of an eye before plunging to the floor. We stare at it in wonder before it slides across the floor smashing into the furthest wall. Addison scrambles back under the blankets, lips pursed in a tight line doing her best to keep her scream locked away.

I become frozen in place as something sucks all the warmth from the room. My breath becomes visible, the tips of my fingers become so cold I swear they start to go numb..

Addison’s chattering jaw clenches shut when a loud menacing hiss fills the room, it only stops when an opaque figure of an older man manifests a couple feet to my left, he glides across the room oblivious of me. Then without warning the night light flickers before going out plunging the room in thick, suffocating darkness. The man becomes completely camouflaged.

A scream rips from Addison’s mouth, ear piercing against the silence. Footsteps thunder down the outside hall. That hateful hiss fills the room again. Unable to see and relying on nothing but the sounds that fills the room, I hear, barely audible, stuttering feeble cries for help tumble out of Addison’s mouth, fear making it impossible for her to speak.

The room unexpectedly becomes engulfed in light as her parents rush to her bedside. I squint against the sudden brightness, but once my watery eyes adjust I spot Addison sitting in the middle of the bed with her arms wrapped around her knees, the blanket half on the floor, half crumpled up at the foot of the bed. She rocks herself back and forth, muttering.

But her parents don’t comfort her, they stand there with horrorstruck faces staring. I can see what their eyes are drawn to from across the room, it makes my own chest tighten painfully. Two large reddish purple bruises in the shape of handprints mar her forearm.

Seconds before her parents barged into the room cutting the ghost’s atrocious hiss short, it formed words. They rattle in my head as the quint bedroom fades away. 

Help me.

“Ashton?” A voice calls before something soft bounces off my shoulder.

My head throbs as the institute comes back into view. I catch a glimpse of Addison’s slipper next to me. “Did you throw your shoe at me?” I mutter before flinging it back at her.

“Sorry. You were unconscious and I tried shaking you awake, but then realized you probably weren’t waking up because of me shaking you, so I didn’t know exactly how to wake you up without...touching you.” Addison finally stops rambling as she stands several steps away, almost at the door to her room. Afraid to come near me. Very few people know what a single touch can do and everyone that knows is easily terrified.

When I meet her eyes I watch her hand slowly rise with her index finger pointing at me. “You’re bleeding.” She quickly pulls back her arm and knots her fingers together. My own eyes are unable to stop looking for the mark that still stains her arm.

Instinctively I dab at my face, searching for the culprit of said blood. I cringe as I graze a slice on my eyebrow. My pale fingers come away red. “Maybe Winston will give me some drugs to dull the pain.” Honestly, I’ll be lucky if she gives me a bandage.

A smile twitches the corners of my mouth as I’m unsure if I need the drugs for my throbbing head or for Addison’s nightmare that is quickly turning into my own fear burrowing in the pit of my stomach. I haven’t even thought about being scared of ghosts when there are so many other creatures out there.

“If you get the good stuff you have to share. I am your best friend after all.” She flashes me a big smile hoping there is no anger between us.

“Correction. You're my only friend.”

“Still counts.” She mutters, never losing her smile.

Our laughter mixes together as we take the last few steps to our rooms. Addison gives me a sheepish wave as she steps through the threshold to her room with nothing but her thoughts, debating on which nightmare I saw. Because with an affliction for seeing ghosts I’m sure she has more than one.

Like a thoughtless zombie, I shuffle into my own room, shutting the door behind me. Routine. I’m comfortable with routine. Contentment is something I strive for.

I too am left with my thoughts of Addison’s nightmare. I didn’t pry because I know how much it hurts her to talk about her parents. How her seeing ghosts terrified them more than it did her. How they dropped her off here without looking back hoping that whatever was haunting her would leave with her.

The sound of Ms. Winston’s heels startles me as she clacks down the hall.

I shuffle to my bed and drop onto the lumpy mattress and listen to those obnoxious heels strut loudly down the hall. Her footsteps come to a stop for a brief second or two before clacking against the floor again. Repeating several times.

Clack, clack, clack. Silence. Clack, clack, clack. Silence.

Her heels are at its loudest as she approaches my door. Silence. I can see the shadow of her feet seeping in from under the sill and then there’s a faint snap of a lock reminding me that we’re not not in some group home, we’re in a prison.

“Ashton. Ashton.” A hushed whisper repeats my name slightly louder with each repeat. “Ash.”

I shimmy down to the foot of the bed, resting my head on my folded arms and whisper back through the only vent in the room. “I’m here.” I say unamused.

“Well, duh. Where else would you go?” She replies back cockily. She doesn’t wait for me to reply back before quickly spitting out a slew of words. “We have a situation.”

She says them so fast I almost didn’t catch it. “A situation? What kind of situation exactly?” I can practically hear her labored breath through the small vent. “Tell me you did not see Seraphina.”

She whines in response, afraid to admit it. Seraphina must be determined to be heard. She’s only the fifth dead Mysteria girl to show herself to Addison even though there are so many others. I wonder what she has to say so badly.

I can’t help the words from rolling off my tongue. “She knows she’s dead right?” Inconsiderate or not.

“I think.” She pauses. “I mean it would be kinda hard to miss the floating rope tied around your neck, right?”

“What does she want? I mean, she can finally leave this place, but decides to haunt it instead.”

“Maybe it’s unintentional,” she says using my own words against me. “Maybe…”

“Don’t say it.” I repeat the words over and over and over again in a quiet mumble. Even though she can’t see me it doesn’t stop my head from swinging back and forth in a fierce shake. This isn’t what I meant when I said it was unintentional.

“Maybe she can’t leave because...” A loud gurgled rumble cuts off her words.

“Really?” I interject.

“What? I’m hungry. How much longer until dinner?”

I hop off the bed and start to rifle through my stash. I sneak bread and fruit from the kitchen every now and then. “Open it.” I say as I grab a hold of the bed and slide it away from the wall.  Inch by inch, slowly and quietly it slides on the wooden floor without making too much noise.

Using our fingernails we pry the poorly screwed on vent cover off the wall. At the same time each of us bow our heads to peek to the otherside. Addi gives me a bashful smile. A deep breath fills my lungs as I stick my hand through the hole. Goosebumps break out over my arm from the creepy feeling that attacks me every time I have to do this. God only knows what’s lurking in the small gap between the two walls.

I drop the wrapped food once my hand breaks through to the otherside. I hear the soft thud as it hits the ground freeing me to get my hand out. Like a bat outta hell, I jerk my arm back through ripping off little bits of the wall in the process.

Addison squeals with excitement. “Are you sure? Aren’t you hungry?”

“I still have stuff if I get hungry.” I don’t tell her that I won’t be hungry for a while after seeing her nightmare.

“You’re the best!” She chimes.

“I know. Now put the vent back on before we get caught.”

I stand into a stretch debating on what to do. I could sleep. It would be so easy to sleep my life away. Read the few books I have. I grab one off the vanity and fan through the pages. All of them are blank. “Damn it, Mia.” I shout into the room. Who does she think she is, coming in here and swiping the words from my books? 

Apparently, I’m bound to just stare at the ceiling in boredom...something I do quite a bit actually. But then a rumble of thunder sounds in the distance pulling me to the window.

Dark gray storm clouds are building, gradually blocking out the pre-setting sun’s rays. Gusty winds rattle dying leaves off of their branches. A storm is brewing. Sadie must be pissed about something.