Little Footsteps

Alone at home:

Paula was sitting at the kitchen table, still dressed in her nightgown, trying to drink tea, that her aunt had added some liquor. She desperately tried to calm down but her hands were shaking uncontrollably and the tears in her eyes did not allow her to see. Paula was listening to the Parkers who were arguing in the lobby, but she didn't pay attention to their words. Her mind was wandering into what had just happened a few minutes ago and she still hadn't accepted it.

That boy was real. She saw it, but how could it be possible? Paula had not believed in spirits before, ghosts or paranormal entities. She always believed that those things did not happen in real life. They were only stories that people invented when they had too much free time.

Although before Paula had already felt the presence of a child in the house, she did not believe he was a ghost but a real child that Uncle and Aunt Parker kept hidden in the basement. She tried to remember, while swallowing a sip of tea, since when she heard those little footsteps but her memory answered that she had only heard them since she arrived at that house. However, inside of her she knew there was something else. Then she tried to remember that occasion when she saw the nun in the psychiatric hospital. Paula had seen her carrying a small packet in her arms, a packet that looked like a small child. Then Paula felt a chill.

The nun's theme was scary but there was something older...

She kept thinking until she managed to remember it. It had been such a logical incident that she had never given it importance before... until now.

The incident had occurred one day when the hospital was a disaster. That day, earlier, one of the patients had died and everything became a disaster around. Unfortunately Paula witnessed that. It had all happened while she took a shower with two other women, patients too, closely watched by one of the nuns who had sat in a chair by the door.

Those showers were humiliating for Paula. She could never take a shower alone or do her needs without someone watching her, but that was something she had to get used to.

The women took the shower in the three individual showers that had the white and hygienic bathroom when one of them (Paula remembered her perfectly) stood still suddenly and then began to squirm strangely. The woman started screaming in several languages (although Paula didn't know what they were) She said that the demon had gone to look for her, then began to hurt her neck with her nails while screaming creepy.

Things happened very fast while Paula tried to move away, approaching the wall behind. She was trying to take refuge with her other partner who was as scared as she was. The nun got up from her chair and tried to approach the woman while calling the others to help her, but she slipped with a puddle of water on the floor and fell down in a loud way. Just then, the screaming woman hit the wall with a very large superhuman force, and then one of the tiles fell and broke. Then the woman took the piece of tile and cut her neck with it. Blood spread on the floor and the woman fell dead.

Everything had been so terrifying that night, that Dr. Rush authorized Paula to take a soothing pill. However Paula woke up at midnight with noise from a distant door that was closing loudly. Paula began to hear sound of discussions in the distance. Apparently Dr. Rush was talking to the police about the incident of the woman who committed suicide in the bathroom.

Paula tried to sleep again, but it had been so horrible what had happened that she couldn't get it out of her head and then at that moment she heard them... They were soft footsteps approaching her room. And then the door began to open slowly. The girl looked in that direction and then noticed that a small shadow covered the light coming from the corridor. She believed that she was dreaming because it was impossible for a small child to be in that place. Then Paula closed her eyes for a brief moment. When she opened her eyes again, the shadow had disappeared and the door was closed, as if it had never opened. Paula was very confused so she thought she was really dreaming. The next day she only had a brief memory of the incident that she soon forgot completely.