The Ghost's Diary 👻 ✓

08. The Painting

It is Saturday morning and Allison just texted that she and Ethan are coming over. I gave them my address yesterday at school. I do not even know why I am doing this

This eventually had to happen. I couldn't avoid it. At least, Ms Bragge has gone to the market to get groceries and Dylan is nowhere to be seen.

I have always avoided bringing people from school here.

Some kissups suddenly want to be your best friends after they see a place like my house. I have enough problems in my life and having a fake friend would the total synonym of those problems.

But I have a feeling Allison and Ethan are not like that. They just seem different. They are not like the rest of the people I've met at school. Over the years, even though because of my own preference, no one really attempted to befriend me.

But like someone said, "Man is a social animal."

But, I am a girl.

School projects, activites, sports, never have I found someone who would want to be friends with me. Well, except for Allison and Ethan.

Both of them have been friendly to me the entire week. Allison now usually sits with me in chemistry and Ethan sits beside me in English.

Allison even called me her friend.

I walk out to the garden to see them making their way here.

Speak of the devils!

Allison spots me. "Lindsey! We're here!" She comes running over.

"Don't disturb the neighbours, klutz!" Ethan says with a grin on his face.

These two.

Allison comes up and embraces me.

"Okay, okay! Just come on in."
I say trying to break from the girl's hug.

"Wow, a girl who doesn't like hugs!"

"Yeah, yeah. Come in."

I lead them in.

Allison is completely aweing right now. She looks around the house with wide eyes and her head turning at every possible degree.

"Wow, you live here?"

"Well, yeah. My family has been living here for a lot of years."

Actually more than two centuries.

Ethan seems unaffected by this as he asks, "So, where are your parents? It is a Saturday."

I stop in my tracks leaving both of them to stare at each other.

"They're... up somewhere..."

That's not technically a lie.

"Um... all right..."

Since the years have passed, my sorrow for my parents' and sister's death has just become a dark memory in a corner of my mind.

I started to find it useless to weep for my loss. I did not want to show anyone the pain that I felt. And I definitely am not ready to tell these two.

They may seem trustworthy but just not yet.

But after all these years, I still feel a pang of pain in me.

I recover myself from these memories and,
"Lindsey, Lindsey..."

It's that voice again!

"Did you guys hear that!"

"What?" both of them ask simultaneously.

"Didn't you hear that? I heard a voice calling me."

"We didn't hear anything."

"Lindsey..."

"You must have heard it, now?"

"Actually, didn't someone just call you?" Allison says.

"I heard it too."

I am not crazy! But I'm getting a bit hyper now.

"Lindsey, calm down, okay?" Ethan says putting a hand on my shoulder.

"Lindsey....."

That voice is coming from the attic!

I run to the attic with Allison and Ethan behind me. I open the lock with my key.

"What is going on?" they both demand.

"I heard voices calling me from here!"

We all enter the attic.

"Maybe, we should call the police."

"Or maybe, a psychaitrist?" Ethan suggests under his breath.

"I am not crazy!"

Ethan walks up to a board with a cloth covered over it. As he moves away from it, his belt gets entangled with the cloth and it falls down to reveal a painting of...

"It's you!"

"Sorry?"

I look at a picture of a woman who looks like an elder version of me. She is wearing a long yellow dress and the background, I think, the artist has added themself.

"Isabelle Clarice Knightley."
Allison reads from the bottom of the frame.

Thank goodness, it is not me!

"She looks just like you but older," Allison says.

"Yeah..." I say weakly.

"But if the woman in the picture has the last name 'Knightley', then she may be a distant relative. So, you don't need to worry that you have a long lost twin or something." Ethan reassures me.

"Yeah." Allison walks up to the painting. "But she is pretty."

"Thanks..."

My fingers touch the portrait's tips-- a thin layer of dust coating them.

This is so wrong.

Hope you guys like how the story is proceeding.

Bye!