Page 77 of King of the Unsightly

“Adeline Rose Winters. Do you need to be cleansed again?” a woman’s voice buzzed from behind me.

I shuddered.

No. No. It wasn’t her. I was hallucinating like before.

It couldn’t be her. No, I knew it wasn’t her.

This was Fell’s plan.

I still couldn’t breathe; it was like someone had pried open my ribcage and viciously played operator with my lungs, hitting all the sides as they plucked my insides out.

My chest tightened and my heartbeat lashed against my ribs and shook my resolve.

I couldn’t stop myself from twisting my body to see if Fell decided to play tricks on me again.

I gulped hard as Mrs. Kelley crawled out of the murky water resembling a ghoul rising up to haunt the living. She craned her head, and it cracked and snapped back in place.

My breathing hitched again, and I clenched my nails into my chest. My breaths came in short and uncontrolled shots, like daggers digging into my throat.

“I can’t do this. Not now.” I gasped and shook my head, but she wouldn’t disappear.

Kaschel grabbed my shoulders and squeezed. “What’s wrong?”

My concentration warped, and my hands trembled relentlessly even with his firm grip grounding me.

Kaschel’s voice gradually drowned out until he faded into the night, and the darkness swallowed us both.

A similar smell of mildew and bleach caressed my nostrils.

The clanking of metal chains resounded off the wooden floors as the coldness seeped into my bare legs. My shallow breathing was inaudible as footfalls rang from above.

Fragments

Step.Clank. Step.Clank.Step.Clank.

Mrs. Kelley rounded the corner, and my eyes widened. My body shook, and I fidgeted with my fingers until I couldn’t take it.

I scratched and scraped; my nails dug into the floors, splinters impaling my fingertips as her clicking heels became unbearable.

Her blue eyes pierced the superficial light and shone like hell flames in the basement.

The place I so adamantly tried to forget.

That I desperately wanted to burn from my memories.

I thought I pushed them so far down I couldn’t remember, yet here I was reliving it like I turned sixteen again.

One treacherous breath escaped me as her pungent vanilla fragrance mixed with cigarettes wafted into the room and turned my stomach inside out.

Her bobbed brown hair with streaks of gray bounced as she swayed closer to my side—not a single strand falling out of place, just as I remembered.

Mrs. Kelley clicked her tongue and arched her over-plucked brow. “You’ve been telling the neighbors of your sight again. Haven’t you? Tsk-tsk. You know what this means, don’t you?” she asked in a hushed tone, delicate and hollow against my ears.

I could never find the courage to confront her—not even now.

I turned away and lowered my head, avoiding her hostile stare.

In my mind, I screamed over and over again; she couldn’t really be in front of me. It was a cruel trick. It would end eventually.

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