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“Oh my God! What’s happening?” she yelled.
“Turn the fuck around,” Freddie ordered, and I saw her move to face the door.
Fear of a horrendous death consumed me. My heart raced, and adrenalin shot through my veins. We were getting shredded by a force too evil to control. I wanted to give up, but I knew Icouldn’t, not as long as Luna depended on me to keep her safe. Not as long as my best friends held on. If they held on, I would hold on as well, no matter what this hellion threw at us.
The wind howled, as if it had a life of its own. As if it hated us and was purposely trying to destroy each of us to get to Luna… to get to Carrie Ann.
We locked our arms in even tighter and stood closer to shield her, to protect her, to keep her from this vile evil force.
Our blood oozed down our legs and arms and pooled on the floor around us, splashing back up on us with the force of the wind. If this kept up, we would all die soon, and they’d find us lying in our own blood, together, forever haunting this evil building until one day, someone tore it down and laid waste to the haunted grounds.
It was right when I didn’t know if I could do this for one moment longer when Luna screamed so loud, my only thought was to continue to keep her safe for as long as I could stand, until my last breath.
“We’re not afraid of you!” she yelled, her body pressed up against mine, her arms wrapped around my waist. “Go away! Boris and Carmen, go away! You don’t have any power here anymore! We know the truth. Carrie Ann isn’t your daughter. She was never your daughter. You took her away from her mother, her father, from her sister and brother. You tried to make her your own, but she was never yours. Her name is Matilda… Matilda Darling. Her mother was Chantel Darling. She had a brother named Hank, and sister who still loves her, named Henrietta. Matilda knows the truth, now. We all know the truth, so go back to hell. Leave this house forever! Your power over Carrie Ann has vanished. It’s fucking over! Now gooooo!” And she threw her headlamp down the hallway, where it bounced off the wall and shattered. The light dimmed slowly, like the thing had life and was now dying.
I thought about how much I loved this brave woman. How much I loved Vince and Freddie. How I would lay down my life for any one or all of them. At once, I knew that none of this was real. Like a voice in my head told me this was all a mind game. It wasn’t real.
The blood.
The wind.
The rain.
None of it.
It was all some sort of elaborate mind game. A ghostly trick.
I felt my own scream forming in my throat, and when I closed my eyes for a moment, to gather my strength to tell this devil from the bowels of hell, to leave, everything changed.
The wind abruptly stopped, and I partially opened my eyes.
The debris vanished.
The blood was gone.
When I completely opened my eyes, everything seemed normal.
The lights were back on, and we were dry once again.
We continued to stand arm in arm for a few more moments, each of us were too unsteady to move.
Even the thunderstorm had stopped.
Then, in the very next heartbeat, Carrie Ann’s door slowly creaked open, and we were surrounded by the scent of roses.
“Do you guys smell that?” Luna asked in a whisper, as she continued to hold onto me.
“Roses,” Freddie said.
“The scent of roses,” Vince echoed.
I was still too shaken to speak, and as I slowly slipped my arms free, emotions surged through me, and I couldn’t help the tears that flowed down my cheeks. Luna came over and gave me a warm, tight hug, then Freddie embraced us, along with Vince.
We just stood there like that, loving each other as the strong scent of roses engulfed us.
Then, before we could get ourselves untangled, a high-pitched giggle bounced off the walls, and as it did, we couldn’t help laughing right along with her.
“You’re free, Matilda,” Luna finally said, as she turned away from us and bravely walked into the playroom. “You’re free to join the people who love you… the Darling family.”
