A Dance With Death

|| Chapter 16 - Monophobic ||

                     

Gwen leads me out of the room. I notice how comfortable she is walking within the hospital. She doesn't care about the people passing right through her, she doesn't care about how unknown people are to her presence, unlike me. But then again, what reason does she have to care? What reason do I have?

She leads me into a room, which is much smaller than the one I was in. The room is also dimly lit. The white curtains on the window are tied to the sides. The set-up of the room is quite similar to mine. And on the bed, I see a woman. Her dark red hair is long and straight, unlike that of Gwen's and her face is dull and lifeless. Her face is pale, yet beautiful.

"I've been staring at her all my life." I see Gwen standing on the other side of the bed. "She kept growing older. Her life was taken away from her."

"I'm so sorry," I say foolishly.

"It's okay."

She cocks her head to her right. One might expect to find her sad or grieving. But she shows no sign of either. She just stares at her other self, with no emotion in sight. I guess she's tired of feeling sorry for herself.

"So what happened?" I blurt out. "Sorry, I was . . ."

"It's okay to be curious," she says. "It's a common ghost emotion. I just don't like thinking about those times."

"If you don't want to tell me, it's fine."

"No. I'll tell you." She motions me to sit down on the chair behind me. "I must warn you. It's a sad story."

"I'm no stranger to sad stories," I say as I sit down.

She nods and gives a small laugh. "Sure," she mutters. She pauses for a while, her smile disappearing, not sure how to start. She sighs. "So my father had this habit of gambling," she finally says, her voice losing its shrillness, as solemnity fills her. "And it was bad. He was addicted to it. My mother, my sister and I suffered for this habit of his. Though he was good at it, he wasn't the best. He lost sometimes, but he would make up for it by winning more money than what he had lost. We at least got our every-day needs.

"But one day, he lost a huge amount of money in a game. He lost most of his money for it. No amount of games or jobs could bring that money back. I was eight at that time and my sister was fifteen. We were in a huge debt. Stress for payment was haunting us from everywhere, but we didn't have any money. My parents had fought a lot during that time, and each of those fights would end with my mother being beat up by my father. Those were terrible times." She speaks with no hesitation throughout her narrative, but by the end, her voice cracks.

"So my father took a loan from one of his gambling 'buddies', as he liked to call them," she continues, trying hard not to break down. "He wasn't able to repay it for two years. Clearly the man got pissed. He got a few of his men break into our house. My parents weren't home. They started yelling at us, demanding for my father. We were kids, we couldn't do anything. We just cried. So those monsters started beating us up. When they weren't satisfied-" she swallows, "-they shot her. They killed her! They shot her four times!"

Her eyes start to reflect the rage in her. She grips the arms of her chair tightly. "They killed her..." her voice fades. She bends her head low. I can't make up whether she's crying or not. She groans before saying, "I kept screaming and crying. But it was too late. And then they beat me again. I fainted and never woke up again." She buries her face in her hands.

I shouldn't have asked her. Why did I ask her? I made her go through those painful memories all over again.

"Later, I found out that after the incident at our house," she continues, her voice muffled, "they found my father and shot him too. The police never found the thugs. They're still out there, free. My sister's killers have yet to pay for what they have done."