7. Githany
Githany
A magenta blow-up couch in the corner, a purple and blue lava lamp on the nightstand, and rainbow room dividers leading to the bathroom.
This is the room I grew up in. The pink and white canopy bed I begged my parents for sits centered against the far wall.
I wanted to sleep under a canopy so badly.
Canopies seemed so whimsical in fairytale movies.
It ended up being so hot in there I tore the gauzy fabric down in the middle of the night.
This decor is from a very specific time in my life. An eight-year span. And during those eight years…
My gaze shoots to the closet.
If the room is the same now as it was then, there’s a good chance it is in the closet. Top shelf. Brown box.
Githany. A familiar whisper is uttered from behind the door.
My parents bought new decorations for this room after the incident. They thought it would help.
What would have helped is burning that box.
I doubt even flame could penetrate the board and planchette.
I can still see the letters arched across the wood.
The yes and no. They’re branded behind my eyes.
I can never remember the message that was spelled out.
We were too busy giggling to pay attention.
Each of us thought the other was moving it.
We never stopped to consider it could be real.
The board didn’t even belong to me. It was from one of the other campers. I don’t even know how it ended up in my possession. It took me weeks to figure out it was here.
Out of all those girls, why was I the one chosen?
That’s a mystery I may never figure out.
The rest of the girls present for the game are long gone.
All dead or missing. There’s no proof that their deaths were related to the game, but I know they were.
It’s too big of a coincidence not to be. The reality is, I’m cursed.
The dead bother me daily, and still, I’ve never run into anyone from that night.
I’ve looked, even tried a small seance a few years back.
An idiotic and beer-driven idea. My words were a beacon for the dead.
Especially deceased campers. The patch of woods I worked the spell in is now a mess of lost souls.
Which means I ruined one of my favorite nature spots and still didn’t find out anything new.
All I know is something terrible happened that day and I’ve never been able to escape it.
I suppose I should be grateful I got my dark ability instead of a horrific death. Though I did get the dead themselves. Every day, lurking about.
Outside of this nightmare reality I’m in, the real board is buried in the backyard of my childhood home.
It didn’t want to be hidden away. I could feel the anger.
My hands blistered from tip to wrist when I slammed the shovel into the dirt.
All ten nails split when I pressed the box into the earth.
I had to do it. Leaving that game in the house when I moved away was not an option.
Thanks to that game and its fury, I started my first day of college unable to even hold a pencil. The nails healed, but I still have scarring from the blisters.
A scratching rakes across the other side of my closet door. The slow dragging of nails scraping down wood.
As a child, I never left my closet door open when I slept.
Children seem to have this instinct to keep their closets closed at night.
What is it that plants the seeds of fear in us so young?
Who decided closets were where monsters hide?
I hated that closet even before the board took residence on one of the upper shelves.
More scratching assaults my ears. This time accompanied by a deep wheezing. What the hell is in there?
My lava lamp continues its hypnotic formations.
The contents bubble up and fall back down, its pace unaffected by the horrors outside the glass.
If something comes out of the closet, I might be able to throw the lamp at it.
I don’t know how easily those things break, but the liquid inside has got to be hot enough to do some damage.
Fists pound against the inside of that door, rattling the NSYNC poster on my wall and sending CDs tumbling off my dresser and onto the pink shag rug.
I can’t stay here.
I didn’t see anything else in the pitch black before my childhood door showed up. Only darkness. Still, there has to be some other way. If I have to, I’ll crawl around in that giant room in the dark until I find one. My door appeared. Surely something else will take shape if I search hard enough.
Hunt is out there somewhere. I’ll have to be clever if I want to avoid running into him again.
As I reach for the bedroom doorknob, I pause. My right hand is blue. Not like low-circulation blue. Closer to grey-blue. Dead blue. Sliding my sleeve higher reveals even more blue skin. What the hell? I need a better look.
I shove through the brightly colored room dividers and into my bathroom. Flipping the light on pulls a gasp from my already-panicky lungs. The blue is swirling up my neck now. Raising my sweater reveals blue patches across my chest too.
The handprint that ghost left behind is long gone. What did she do to me? She’s dead. They shouldn’t be able to affect the living. I’ve never seen anything like this.
I need to get to a hospital.
Fighting the now-tangled room dividers, I bolt back to the bedroom door.
The knob is so cold it sends pain radiating up my elbow. I haven’t even gotten it unlocked when the sound of a chainsaw sends me stumbling backwards. It’s loud. So loud. Hunt must be right outside.
My calf still burns where he sliced it. Would he do worse if given the chance?
I’m forced to make an undesirable choice.
The monster in my closet, or the maniac at my door? Neither is appealing.
Awareness prickles at my neck, drawing my gaze to the floor. Even less appealing are the eyes watching me from under the bed. My muscles lock up.
How long have those been there?
My neck practically creaks as I turn it, slow enough not to grab the attention of whatever is watching me. The gap beneath my bed is unnaturally dark. Two red eyes pierce the shadows.
It’s an illusion. It has to be. A monster under the bed is an irrational fear. No one’s actually heard of a real monster under a bed.
The eyes blink. Definitely real. I take several steps back. The eyes follow, sliding beneath the bed from one end to the other.
Fuck there really is something under there.
Where do I go? What the hell am I supposed to do?
The tip of the chainsaw bursts through the bedroom door.
Wood splinters, pelting me in the face. I shuffle away, panic pulling a guttural sound from my throat. The sound morphs into a scream when something grabs my ankle. The darkness from under the bed is wrapped around me, and now, it has teeth.
“Githany,” Hunt snarls from the doorway. He carves a path straight down the middle and into the carpet.
Wrenching my ankle loose from the dark thing sends me tumbling to the ground. I’ve got to hide.
The closet it is.
Flinging the closet door wide, I expect to see some type of monster milling amongst my old clothes and shelves of childhood mementos. My hands are raised and ready to confront whatever has been scratching at the inside. Only…
This is not my closet.
The door slams behind me, the knob striking me in the left hip. The sound of Hunt’s chainsaw hacking into my bedroom has been snuffed out by carnival music.
I’m back in the clown room.
Neon lights, circus tunes. This is Madness’s room. Which means he’s in here somewhere.
The chainsaw bursts through the closet door, barely missing my left ear. My plan to sneak quietly through the room is ruined by the sound of my own scream.
I’m launched into action.
Splitting my gaze between the closet and the space before me, I hurry deeper into the clown room.
There aren’t any decoy mannequins this time. My gaze sweeps from one end to the other. The room is at least three times larger than before but the layout is similar. I take off, tracking the path I took when we crossed through the clown room earlier this evening.
The second left should lead me past the tunnel of hands and to the curtain separating this room from the next.
My boots screech as I skid to a halt. The hallway is different. The blacklight arrows pointing the way out are gone.
The floor is wet. Backing out with quick steps gets me away from the dark liquid and back on dry ground. Each step leaves a red boot print on the concrete floor. Is all that liquid blood?
I’ll go the other way.
Pain shoots through my forehead when I spin around and slam straight into a wall. No, not a wall. It’s a mirror. That was not there before.
My confused reflection stares back at me. Sweaty hair clings to my forehead. Smudged mascara rims my eyes. The blue skin stretches even farther than before. I’ve looked better.
I turn back toward the bloody hallway. It’s gone.
Instead, I’m staring at dozens of reflections of myself. Red letters painted across the ceiling read “Hall of Mirrors.” Great. This is one of my least favorite attractions.
Finding a way out is as hard as I remembered. Every few feet I slam into another mirror.
“Oh, come on!” I groan.
Several ghosts have followed me into the maze. A towering man stares blankly ahead. A woman with a bent neck mutters something about regret. They don’t have endless reflections like I do. Each ghost only appears in one pane.
Laughter belts around me. I spin, looking from mirror to mirror. Empty, empty, and then there he is. Madness leans against a mirror, arms folded over his muscular chest.
“Lost? Try laughing, it might help.” He chuckles again, and the sound rises in pitch the longer he carries on.
“Show me the way out,” I demand.
His laughter stops, body hunching forward slightly. “Answer a question for us.”
I cock a brow, folding my own arms to match his stance. “What’s the question?”