Ouroboros (being rewritten)

Moving In ✔️

The absence of warmth was what woke me up, trying to get my legs closer to my chest and cover them with my hoodie. It took me a few seconds of squinting and batting my eyes to remember where I was; looking out the window of the car, at the unfamiliar surroundings made my chest hurt a little, this pinching in my heart caused by what I was losing and didn't seem to gain. I had never been such a big fan of the heat in California but after a few years I had gotten used to it and now that the sun wasn't shining bright above us, this small town in Pennsylvania looked rather small and grey in comparison, giving it a gloomy and eerie atmosphere. My aunt Donna was looking around as well but in a much more pressing manner, trying to find a sign somewhere.

"Do you know where we going? " I asked, still a bit sleepy and not really thinking much of it.

"Does it look like I do?" She snapped as she took a wrong turn and almost cut off another car, making them honk at us. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath before getting the car moving again, this time in the right direction. "I'm sorry honey, I'm just a bit tired."
I didn't think too much of it, after all, she had done most of the driving and she was moving into a new home too, it was affecting all of us. After a few minutes of her muttering the name of the street under her breath trying to find it, she finally smiled and stopped the car in front of an imposing house.

"There we are, girls." She said putting her chest on the steering wheel to look at it through the windshield. I lunged forward as well so did my little sister from the backseat. She took out her headphones and looked very unimpressed by what was in front of us.

"That house looks haunted," I said, making sure no one was looking at us through one of the windows upstairs.

"Oh come on Rose," Tessa said opening her door and stretching next to the car, waiting for Donna to go in first. "You've been saying all the places we've visited had either a bad vibe or were straight-up haunted, grow up a bit." Coming from my little sister it hurt me to actually agree with her on that one; the house was covered in an old black coat of paint but other than that, the colours of the newly remade letterbox and the maintained cut lawn were a good indication that the house had been cared for. Donna was already walking to the doorstep, Tessa on her heels and when I called after my little sister to come and help me with the luggage all she did was showing her freshly manicured hands. Of course.

They were waiting for me to turn the key and open the front door and as soon as it was opened, Tessa sprinted up the stairs, yelling which bedroom she was taking; we had already seen pictures of the inside of the house and I had my sight on one particular room and I suspected my fifteen year old sister to be standing in it right at that moment.

Donna had called the furniture remover to make sure the house would already have our belongings and we'd only have to clean the place up  before calling it our own. I slid my finger on the top of the fireplace,  collecting the dust on it and leaving a trail behind, revealing the original colour of the mantle.

"Well that's going to be fun, " I said, holding my finger for my aunt to see.

"Go upstairs sweetie, put your stuff in your room and I'll call you girls to order the pizza for tonight." Donna looked tired but happy to be here, the least we could do was to at least try to like it as well. I picked up my suitcases and walked upstairs, waiting in the middle of the corridors leading to the different rooms. The place could home at least 5 people if everyone had a room to themselves, making me wonder why the price was so low, to begin with.

"Tessa" I started, loud enough for her to hear me but not for our aunt downstairs, "If you're in the bedroom with the balcony, I'm telling Donna where you were last weekend." A few seconds later, she walked out of the room at the very end of the corridor, her head low and closed the door of the room the closest to the staircase.

At least the house was comfortable enough, moving didn't have to be such a bad thing after all.