Familiar Spirit

“No! I told you before—I don’t want to have anything to do with you. I won’t help you, I won’t bring you someone else to destroy.”

“Then you’d better run, Sarah. You’d better try to escape. It may already be too late.” There was an indescribably menacing tone to the voice.

Sarah had no inclination to argue. In two swift steps she had reached the door to the porch. The big metal knob turned loosely in her hand, and she rattled it impatiently, then tugged. But nothing happened. Impossible though it was, the door seemed to be locked.

From the darkness behind her, she heard Jade’s laughter.

Sarah reached up and pressed the light switch beside the door, and the kitchen was flooded with yellow light. She saw the skeleton key where it hung, still, on a nail behind the door, and although she knew she had never taken it down to use it, perhaps someone else had.

She heard the doorknob of the bedroom door rattle loosely, as if some weak, will-less hand grasped but could not hold it firmly enough to turn it.

“I told you it might be too late,” said Jade.

Sarah clenched her teeth. I won’t be afraid, she thought. None of this is real. Without much hope, she took the skeleton key down. But she could not use it, for the keyhole seemed to have vanished.

It is there, Sarah thought. It must be. Or maybe the door is already open, only I can’t see it. Jade keeps me from seeing it.

The bedroom door was opening. Despite herself, Sarah turned to look, and she saw the gory figure of the dead woman shuffle forward to slump against the doorframe.

Sarah backed away, and her shoulder jarred the back door. No illusion, this—it was solidly shut. She could not walk through it.

Filled with horror, she stared at the thing in the doorway. It was even more gruesome in full light, even more real. The flesh was mottled grey, the blood a harsh, violent red. Where it leaned against the doorframe it left red smears. Sarah could hardly take her eyes from the source of all that red, the raw, gaping wound in the throat.

As if galvanized by Sarah’s scrutiny, the thing began to move again, pushing itself away from the wall and taking a staggering, uncertain step forward. It made a sound—a terrible, high, wheezing gasp. Sarah shuddered, horrified, realizing that she was hearing the corpse breathe, the sound the helpless lungs made as they sucked air through the bloody rip in the neck.

One dragging, bare foot streaked blood on the light-colored linoleum.

Run, screamed all her instincts. But Sarah could not move. Her back was pressing against the door. One hand grasped the useless knob and rattled it desperately, willing it to turn.

Sarah noticed the dress beneath the bloodstains was white, patterned with small, lilac flowers. The thing which had once been a woman, the thing inside the bloody dress, moved its arms, opening them to embrace, and Sarah thought she would faint.

Then she heard Jade’s voice in her ear, feeling the warmth of a man’s breath against the side of her face.

“Run, Sarah. Run away now,” he said.

Her hand still grappled with the useless doorknob, but now, as Jade spoke, Sarah felt it respond, and turn in her hand. She jumped aside, pulling the door open, and as she did so, she brushed up against the staggering corpse. She caught her breath in fear, and then gagged as the stench hit her: the faint, sickly-sweet smell of blood and the much more powerful odor of rotting meat, the smell of inner flesh exposed to air.

But there was no time to be sick. The door was open, her way was clear, and she could run away from the rotting embrace of those dead, clumsy arms. So she ran. And as she ran, she heard Jade’s voice still close to her ear.

“Run away, Sarah. And stay away. If you come back, I’ll never let you go.”

Sarah tumbled down the steps, crying, running faster than she had ever done before.

At last she leaned against her car and in between her sobs drew in long, ragged breaths of the clean, crisp air. Her stomach clenched, and she swallowed hard, willing herself not to be sick. Her mind was blessedly blank. For a while she simply wept. It was a relief to be out in the open air alone, a relief too great for anything but tears. Gradually her sobs died away and she began to recover, to allow herself to think again. Sniffing, she took a tissue from her pocket, wiped her eyes and blew her nose. She stared up at the house, at the light from the kitchen. She couldn’t see anyone in the house, but from this angle she might have been fooled. The bedroom window was dark and showed nothing.