The Wildflower and the Poltergeist

∙ love ∙

            She saw it again—the small girl, Elise, smiling at her with the same toothless grin that haunted her for nineteen years. Her black hair was a nest of tangles on her head, and her face was red after hours of soaking underneath the summer sun. "Come on, let's jump," she said as she giggled with delight, ecstatic from all the soda she'd been drinking that morning. The wind smelled like the sea—the sea, the wretched sea that swallowed her friend and left her lifeless body floating. She hated the sea—she loathed the sea. They stood at the end of the wooden dock, the beach hidden by a steep hill of barnacle-studded rocks.

"Please don't," Abigail begged, choking on her own tears. Unlike Elise, she was no longer a little girl. She was an adult in this dream, dressed in her nightclothes and shivering. "C'mon Abby, it'll be fun," Elise laughed. "No, Elise," Abby said, louder. "C'mon, c'mon, don't be a party pooper. It's not that deep!" Elise argued as she approached Abby, grabbed her by the wrist and ran towards the edge. Before Abby could do as much as scream, Elise let go of her.

"C'mon, Abigail, try to save me this time." Suddenly, her childish features were contorted into a malevolent expression—she was mocking her, taunting her for the sin she never wanted to be reminded of. Elise faced her, her piercing blue gaze digging into Abby's soul. Then, with a malignant smile painted on Elise's red face, she fell back. Abby heard the sound of Elise's small body splash into the water, and panic overcame her. When she stared at the waves, Elise was nowhere to be found. The water turned black and the dock melted underneath her feet, causing her to tumble into the pitch-black sea.

She was drowning, unable to move or resurface. Elise's face unfolded, her features contorted and out of proportion—her eyes too big for her face, her mouth too wide. All she saw was Elise, and the sound of a news anchor from a local TV station reporting the death of a five-year old girl at the beach. Most of the words were vague, but Elise's voice was clear:

"Why didn't you save me this time, Abby?"

When Abigail awoke from what was neither a state of consciousness nor a state of sleep, she felt slightly feverish. She knew that a cold was definitely brewing inside her, so she called her boss and told her that she couldn't come. Her daughter would be agitated, considering the fact that she claimed to be 'allergic to the nerd stuff.' Abby knew she'd receive a good dose of scolding from the nineteen-year old college drop-out the following day—well; at least she went to college. Abby could never afford it—mainly because she ran away from home when she was eighteen. If only she stayed, she could've earned a degree at least half a year ago.

Dreams are for halfwits—her foster parents told her that every day. Before she was picked up by a provident couple at the orphanage, she lived in a small town by the sea. Her biological parents died in a fire while she was an infant, and whoever was watching over her at that time decided to abandon her at the chapel doors—a cliché.

When she ran away from her foster home, she didn't feel an inkling of guilt, mainly because she never felt attached to the people who raised her. To the Harlows who never had a child of their own, Abigail was just a trophy child—someone they'd present to their acquaintances during extravagant dinner parties and ignore whenever they were at home. Abby was glad that she was able to wear the uniforms of prestigious schools and live the easy, expensive life, but she always felt suffocated. She was afraid that as soon as her marks started falling, her apathetic foster parents would suddenly become aggressive and eventually disown her from their house. Fortunately, she managed to graduate from high school with enviable remarks from her teachers and the dean. Her parents weren't proud of her, they were proud of themselves for having raised such a meritorious child.

"Abigail, I have a question for you." Meredith Harlow was a rather lean woman with very hard, symmetrical features. Her blonde, iron-straightened hair reminded Abby of the color of sand during sunrise and her grayish-blue eyes were the color of the sea during winter. Meredith was a neurosurgeon and had very veiny arms and legs, which explained why she always wore gloves or long-sleeved shirts and dresses. It was half past eight, Abby remembered, when her mother suddenly walked into her room while she was busying herself with the story of Dr. Jekyll and Mister Hyde. "Yes, mother?" Abigail asked politely as she slowly closed her hardbound book. Both of her parents enjoyed the company of books, but Abby basked in them.