It was the middle of the night and everyone was sound asleep, except my mother. Something bumped her feet violently. She found herself laying on the floor in the middle of the bedroom. Dazed and confused she looked up and said "If you're going to use the bathroom then go." When her eyes adjusted to the darkened room, she realized she wasn't speaking to any of the members of our family. She stood frozen looking at a chubby pale skinned little girl in a white night gown who was looking back at her. The little girl's hair was curly and her eyes were as ice blue as the Arctic oceans. My mother couldn't formulate words no matter how hard she tried. In shock, she frantically reached for her rosary that she keeps under her pillow. The little girl started walking towards my mother, not once taking her ice cold blue eyes away from my mother. Mother’s hands tightly grasped the rosary trembling and drenched in sweat as she struggled for air while reciting a Hail Mary. The little girl stood over my mother as she stared into her soul. Frightened and helpless, she finished reciting the final verse... the girl stepped back and vanished into the dark nothingness behind her.
That next morning, everyone sat around the table eating their food and making small talk. The window in the dining room was opened.There were heavy, dark clouds in the sky and the wind ferociously tossed up the dry autumn leaves across the gravel.
"Honey, could you pass the salt?" I noticed mother was lost in thought.
"Mom... the salt?" I waved my hand in front of her to snap her back into reality but she stared at the wall. She had not even touched her food. I glanced back at my father and he looked back at her.
"Is everything okay?" He asked. There was a long pause in the midst of forks and knives clashing against the plates. I couldn't read if she was tired, or sick but I suspected something was wrong.
"There was a little girl..." she said in a drowned out tone. We all looked at her puzzled.
"What?" said father.
"There was a little girl in the bedroom last night." She responded.
Dad sighed in disbelief and said, "You were probably dreaming." He had a similar response when I mentioned the tall man in the corridor.
My mother slammed her hands on the table, "It's true! I am not making this up, both of us have seen some weird shit in this house! How do you explain the fact that both your daughter and I saw the same dog? How do you explain the television turning on by itself!? And what about the radio changing frequencies on its own?!?" She was furious at my father's disbelief but I could tell she was also terrified.
Father abruptly shot up from his seat and tossed his napkin over his half eaten plate. "I'll be watching television, when you two decide to stop with this haunting bullshit, you're welcome to join me." He stormed out of the dining room and marched into the corridor to the family room.
I was helping my mother wash the dishes as she put the rest of them away. "I believe you mom." She walked over and kissed my forehead, "I know you do, sweetie."
We turned on the radio to ease the tension. The song was a Spanish cumbia by famously known Selena Quintanilla. My mother and I started to dance, and for a moment everything felt normal. Everything felt okay. When out of nowhere the radio changed frequency to an English radio segment about WWII. My mother went over to fix it and moments later it changed back. She got upset and yelled "I don't understand English, put it back!" and then the frequency changed back to the Spanish station but the song was over so mom turned it off completely. We could hear my dad cracking up in the living room. As we finished cleaning up the kitchen and making sure everything was nicely put away we went into the living room to see what dad was having a laugh about. We sat down for a couple minutes then the TV screen switched to white noise and got so loud we had to plug our ears. After a few minutes of white noise, the screen went completely BLACK and there was dead silence. All of a sudden we all heard a loud sound in the kitchen of dishes breaking and pots and pans tumbling on the floor continuously. We rushed to the kitchen expecting to have to pick up broken glass yet oddly enough, there was nothing on the floor. All of the dishes were stacked just how we left them. We were all surprised to see that everything was intact. I looked at my father and he had a very puzzled look on his face, all he managed to say was,
"What in God’s name…?" He quickly looked at my mother and she had a stern expression on her face. “Do you believe us now…?”
TO BE CONTINUED...
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