NECROMANTIC

eleven.

You ever went somewhere creepy, and instantly felt a chill down your spine? Creeped out?

Like someone's watching you?

Here's the thing. If you've ever had that feeling, it's probably because you are being watched. By a ghost, spirit, whatever. But don't let it bother you too much – they can't hurt you, even if they want to, and you won't see them – unless you're me, obviously.

From the moment we slid through the hole cut into the chain link fence, I saw them. There was an echo – someone jumping from about five stories up, a young male patient, in a smock, which billowed as he fell, before he hit the ground violently, and there should've been the sound of the impact, the crunch of bones being pulverised, but instead, he simply flickered out of existence, to jump all over again. And there was about five others, wandering aimlessly in grounds in front of the hospital. Three of them stopped walking to stare at us as we walked, one with what seemed like vague curiosity and the other two with eerie, blank expressions. I tried my best to ignore them, pushing back tears and reaching out to clasp Rob's hand. He glanced back at me and smiled, before giving my hand a little squeeze and turning to look forward again. "Don't tell me you're creeped out already? We're not even in the building yet." He teased.

His words felt like a slap, though I knew he'd said them with innocent, purely jokey intentions. My lip began to wobble so I bit down on it, hard. "No." I said defiantly, using everything in me to keep my tone calm and level and to focus on Rob, the living, the warmth of his hand, the way his fingers felt, than the dead around us. "It's just that the ground is uneven and who knows what shit is lying around. I'm clumsy enough as it is. I need the balance."

"Ok." He chuckled. "I believe you."

The lobby wasn't any better. There were all kinds of spirits, walking, some sitting on the abandoned chairs in the waiting area as though in eternal anticipation of their turn with the doctor, or the news of a family member's health or condition. What struck me, of all things, was that there was so many people here, like an actual, functional hospital, and yet it was silent, save for the sounds of Mae, Rob and my feet, walking slowly, echoing in what to them was an abandoned foyer, an occasional crunch as one of us stepped on broken glass or dirt, and our breathing.

"Should we do it here?" Mae suddenly asked, her voice a jolt in the previous quiet, making me jump – and some of the ghosts turned their gaze to her. Some though... some looked at me. I didn't look at any of them, but I could feel their eyes on me, like spiders on my skin. Some of them knew I could see them.

"No!" I said quickly, my voice even louder than hers, even more of a shock – and it'd been a mistake, because now all the attention, living and dead, was on me. I swallowed, hard. "No, not... not here."

Rob raised an eyebrow, smiling and shaking his head with disbelief. "You want to go further into this place?"

No, of course not. "Yeah... it's just a reception area. Not so scary." I didn't sound the least bit convincing to myself, so I could only wonder how false I sounded to Mae and Rob.

Mae looked at me with knitted eyebrows for a moment, before her expression cleared, and she shrugged. "Fair enough. Let's go look for another place then."

We made our way down the corridor, footsteps echoing. I kept my eyes either ahead, on Mae's back, or on Rob and I's clasped hands. At some point, Mae reached into her pocket, the paper bag the board was in crinkling, and she pulled out a flashlight, flicking it on, the beam long and yellow. She pointed it down the hall and I had to clap a hand to my mouth quickly to muffle my scream, as the flashlight illuminated so many. Horror movies get it wrong. So wrong. It's so much worse, more horrifying than they could ever portray. And Mae looked over her shoulder, with a grin, completely unaware of what was in front of her, around her. "Wanna go a few floors up?"