Belle
Belle
As if I'm having an out of body experience, I feel my torso and limbs twist and turn in my sleep restlessly.
The whispers won't stop. They are like a leaking tap irking me to get up and close it tighter.
Belle
Belle
I open my eyes. Only when I hear myself panting I realize I'm out of breath, and am fully drenched in sweat as if I'd just come back from running a full day marathon.
Belle
Grabbing my hair and groaning out loud, I lift and thrust my limbs into the air. This voice won't stop calling me. I feel like I'm having a headache without an actual headache.
"Belle, what happened?" Penelope says.
Belle, the other voice in the room whispers again.
Having enough of it I turn to the kid. "Penelope, is there anyone else here?" I ask her.
The girl looks around, narrowing her small eyes at every nook and corner of my dark room, and looks back at me and shakes her head.
I sit up, pressing my temples tighter while feeling wet and sticky, and just plain disgusting, from my sweaty body. The whispers won't shut up!
Belle
"It's coming from outside," I say, looking up and suddenly realizing the voice has gone distant, as if the culprit had teleported out of my room to outside the house. I go to the window. Penelope follows me. She and I look out over at each side of the street.
I don't catch anything suspicious except for the hefty raccoon that's sizing up our neighbor's trash can. "Do you see anything?" I ask Penelope. "No," she says, "what are we looking for?"
But the voice sounds like it's coming from down the street. I can almost sense the direction it's coming from. But I see nothing where I'm looking at.
I turn around, and go pick up my t-shirt and pajama pants from the floor beside my bed and start putting them on.
Belle
"Where are you going?" Penelope asks.
"I need her to stop calling me," I say, tucking in my pants' drawstring into the waistband.
"Who's calling you?" she asks.
I pause and look at Penelope. "You can't hear her?"
She shakes her head.
I mutter to myself, "Dammit, am I really imagining things like Chris suspected?" Or maybe Chris jinxed me.
Belle
After wobbly getting my feet into my house slippers, I open my room door carefully to sneak out. Penelope follows me saying, "Where are you going? Who is calling you?"
I whisper, "There's a spirit outside, calling my name. She won't stop." I wince at the light creak the tread of the topmost step of the staircase makes when I step on it.
"Why is she calling you?"
I grab the handrail and start tiptoeing down the stairs. "I don't know," I whisper even more quietly, since the rest of the house occupants are on the ground floor.
"Is she your friend?"
"I don't know her."
"What if she hurts you?"
