Why me?

Part 10

"What do you mean, he's dead?  I just talked to him, he can't be", Alice said in a worried voice, looking at Berta with teary eyes. She seemed like she'd faint any second.

"Just because someone's dead doesn't mean you can't talk to them, you ugly child", Berta told her in an amused manner as if she were enjoying Alice's suffering and confusion. Although she saw that Alice needed to sit down, she spread across the bed and closed her eyes. "I'll sleep now and you better not disturb me, little one. You can go clean the attic if you're done with the garden. Oh, and do give my regards to your dead friend should you see him any time soon".

Alice started slowly walking towards the stairs, her mouth slightly open from the shock she just had and her fingers were shivering as if she had Parkinson's disease. She just wanted to disappear, she thought she was going mad and that the old hag was "just" trying to scare her to death, and that she was not truly believed.

"I am becoming insane", she murmured to herself as she put one leg in front of the other and then repeated the slow cycle.

"Indeed", she suddenly heard a whisper and hot breath tickled the back of her neck and she quickly turned, letting out a horrified gasp.

The voice was rather soft, but also very deep and bone-chilling and she began to think it came from her head, when it once again said the words: "Indeed you are", now in a louder voice and the echo spread through the house.

Now she was sure that there was not just something wrong with her, but rather... It was something about the house. Or something in it. 

She quickly started running up the stairs, constantly feeling that there was something right behind her, but when she turned around, it seemed that the something was always behind her back as if attached to it. She started panicking and crying since no matter which way she turned the something followed right behind, preparing to kill her, stab her, push her.

Alice dropped to the ground and started rolling over the floor, as if she was trying to rub it off of her, to make it disappear, yet with each turn she felt herself sink into something sticky or at every other turn she could not feel anything, but could smell an odor of death. It was there. It was on her. And Alice couldn't do anything about it.

"Ah!", she exclaimed, then let out a loud cry, then a scream.

"WILL YOU SHUT UP ALREADY?!", Berta screamed from downstairs, frustrated. "I'M TRYING TO SLEEP!"

As soon as Berta said that, Alice suddenly felt freed, as if the thing on her disappeared in a matter of a second and her body was free again. Quickly getting up from the floor, Alice ran to her room, terrified.

When she ran in, Alice quickly covered her head with her blanket and once again, just like the first day, her head fell onto the pillow that made her agony and heartbreaking cries quiet, almost not hearable.

"Oh, come on now, don't you cry, my little child". Alice's eyes opened and then widened, obviously with shock. It was her mother's voice!

She quickly uncovered her head, rubbed her eyes with her knuckles and looked around the room. There was nothing there, yet she could swear that she heard the soothing, beautiful voice that used to sing lullabies and tell stories to her, that used to calm her, tell her she loved her... Alice felt tears forming in her eyes again, but quickly wiped them away.

"You'll be okay, darling". There it was again! Alice again turned around and the voice started talking again. "Just follow-", Alice's gaze went up to the ceiling and she screamed. There was a woman there, laying on the ceiling as if holding on to something. She was naked.  "-the rules", there were many voices now, some woman, some men ones, growling combined in between.

The woman's hair was black and her face pale like a doll's. There was crimson blood dripping down on Alice's bedspread. When Alice screamed again,  the woman started slowly de-attaching from the ceiling... A second later, she was falling right towards Alice and when she was an inch away from her face, the woman screamed and threw up blood at her, but before Alice could do anything, she felt something cold and sharp stab into her stomach...