The Sight

Chapter One: Awakening

Whoosh, whoosh, bang! Clara wakes up and looks out into the dark, black abyss trying to determine what hit the fragile, worn out window. The shutters go crazy due to the harsh Allentown, Pennsylvania winds. "There must be a storm raging," Clara thought to herself while looking back at the digital alarm clock. Realizing she only had 20 minutes to get ready for her new job she jumps up and dashes to the bathroom. As she is staring at herself in the cracked mirror she puts her long auburn hair in a pony tail, brushes eyeshadow around her hazel eyes, and glides a soft pink lipstick on her semi-chapped lips.

Clara makes her way to The Times for work. "That's the lady who moved into the abandoned house", "Does she know what she got herself into", "I bet she has no clue", everyone around Clara whispers. "Do they honestly think I can't hear them", Clara thinks while holding a firm, unbothered expression. She sits at her desk and starts on her new assignment for the month.

Clara leaves to go to the town deli for lunch where she runs into Father Fletcher. "Hello, I haven't seen you around town before," Fletcher said to Clara as he introduced himself. Clara responded, "It's nice to meet you, my name is Clara." "What brings you to town, Clara?", He asked. "I just moved here from New York, just need a change of scenery", Clara responded. "From the big city, well you'll definitely have a change of scenery here", Fletcher chuckled.

As Fletcher was about to leave the deli Clara stops him and asks nervously, "Father, if you don't mind me asking, I've been over hearing others talk about the house I moved into, about how it's haunted, you wouldn't happen to know anything about it would you?" "Well, that depends on which haunted house you moved into?", Fletcher jokes. "The old, abandoned house off of Ripley Mill Road", Clara responds. Fletchers smile fades away and says in a serious tone, "I'd be careful if I were you, nothing good comes from that house, now if you'll excuse me I need to get back to the church." Once Father Fletcher left Clara contemplates on what Father said, but then realizing she needed to get back to work, she decided it was the least of her worries for now.

"5:30, already? Guess it's time to go home." Clara gets up and gathers all of her belongings. On the way home she couldn't get out of her head what Father Fletcher said about her house, what did he mean nothing good comes out of that house? She had not been living here for too long. She had only moved in towards the dog days of summer and Clara could see another storm coming. As she stepped out of her classic VW Beetle, that was a graduation gift, she immediately smelled burning ozone. Seconds later a bright flash and loud crack almost scared her out of her stilettos.

After gathering her senses she took a good hard look at the so called haunted house. Clara reveled in its latent beauty as she wondered what it might look like restored. Another crack of thunder rang out as she noticed her bedroom curtains were swaying as if someone had been standing there watching her. With a pang of panic and confusion Clara desperately searched her mind to remember if she had locked the doors and windows. After careful consideration and retracing her steps she concluded that she had imagined what she saw.

Slowly but steadily Clara makes her way up the worn, brick steps fearful she was wrong. Standing at the door, reaching for the knob, bang, crash! Clara turns around to see what caused such a ruckus, to her relief it was only a cat, with fur the color of Midnight and Emeralds for eyes, who had knocked over a flower pot. She studied the feline for a moment and noticed it lacked a collar. Clara had always wanted a pet. "I think I'll name you Twie," Clara said as she picked up the cat and took him inside with her. Twie made himself right at home on her plush, velour ottoman.

Clara makes dinner for Twie and her and then decides to watch a movie. After an hour into the movie she nods off in the velvet chair. Meow, scratch, scratch, meoooow, awakens Clara. She looks over to see Twie scratching at a blank space on the wall. "I must've been asleep for a few hours", Clara thinks to herself. As she looks back to the television she realized it cut off on its own. As she tries to wrap her head around why it cut off, the television cuts on for a split second and shows a silhouette of a woman in a white gown. Instantly she shot up and began to quiver in fear.

She turns to the fireplace where she grabs the coal poker to defend herself. Shes now certain she's left a window or door unlocked and someone was there. Clara slowly made her way through her home to check every nook and cranny. Finding that every portal to the house is factually locked she resigned to exhaustion as her reason for seeing things.

After quelling her fear she feels a rumble in her stomach and makes her way to the kitchen for a small bite to eat. After the quick snack she made her way upstairs to change into her robe. Clara begins by kicking off her heels, then starts to unbuttoned her blouse. A strange feeling of uneasiness washes over her soft, porcelain skin. Quickly, Clara covers her chest in fear of some peeping Tom watching her strip. Looking around, she investigates her windows and closet only to find nothing. Shrugging it off, she finished taking her suit pants and throws on her plush robe. On her way to the bathroom she heard a loud knock with what sounded like scratching and hissing. Running down the stairs she finds Twie tearing apart the wall that he was previously scratching at.

Clara moves the unpacked boxes in front of the wall to try to stop Twie from ruining it. They then proceed to head back up the stairs for Clara to take a shower and retire for the night. Twie prances onto the bed and Clara heads to the bathroom. Drip, drip, drop goes the leaky faucet in her bathroom. Clara attempts to stop the annoying sound and fiddles with the handles, to her surprise it stops.

She disrobes and turns the shower to the hottest she can handle. After the shower warms up she steps in and lavishes in the heat. As the water runs down her back, she dips her head backwards to soak her auburn mane. Clara poured a generously sized dollop of shampoo into her palm and began to lather it in. Following the rinsing of the hair she took to lathering soap onto her loofah to clean herself.

Screech, scratch, screech, scratch, Clara hears as she rinses herself. After everything that happened today Clara is reluctant to get out of the shower to investigate. As she turns the faucet off she reaches for her robe that was hung on the hook beside the tub, but for some reason it wasn't there. She swiftly pulls back the curtain to see the lights flickering in the already dim bathroom and a drenched, semi-translucent girl standing in front of her, looking at the ground. Clara tries to reach out to the girl, but immediately the girl looks up. Clara wonders to herself, "Her... her face... what... what's wrong with her face...."

For Clara, everything goes black...