Phantom Chained

Chapter 5. Realisation. Ingrid.

A bright flash cut into my eyes, almost painfully, and awoke me from the dream-like state. Sophie knelt beside me and raised a flashlight to her chin, making an ugly grimace. The result proved to be quite creepy. The moment I opened my mouth, Sophie snapped her fingers under my nose and then made a zipping motion before her lips. I remembered our deal and nodded in confirmation.

Sophie grabbed her phone and tapped the screen, showing me a timer counting down.

22:50

I nodded again then immediately froze, trying to fight the intense nausea. My thoughts swirled around as if inside a tornado and were strewn everywhere, making it very hard to think clearly.

Meanwhile, Johan was busy waving his shovel around, burying what was left of the ritual objects into the dirt. Sophie poured some bottled water on his hands, affirmatively slapped him on the back and waved at me as if to say 'let's go.'

My body became stiff from sitting for so long and didn't want to follow my orders. However, the worst of all was the feeling of an aching heaviness under my stomach, akin to menstrual pain. I bit my lip and continued walking with a single wish: to get home as fast as possible.

After climbing down the other side of the hill we picked up our bicycles that we hid in some roadside bushes and returned to town.

When I arrived home, the porch had an idle display of a late Saturday afternoon. Olaf was busy carefully fixing the terrace fence while mom was napping away on a nearby hammock, wrapped in a warm comforter. When I walked by, Olaf muttered some sort of greeting while clenching a pair of nails in his lips.

"Back already? What time is it?" My mom drowsily raised her head and checked her phone. "Almost midnight! Come have something to eat, I made paella today. Or did you have dinner at Sophie's?"

I spread my arms, cracked a smile and ran inside to avoid any further interrogation.

And made a beeline straight upstairs, to the bathroom.

'Jacket and shirt go straight into the washing machine. Jeans and socks as well.' For a couple of seconds, I just stared dumbfounded at my blood-soaked underwear... 'So it's my period after all, but why? This is way too early, it hasn't even been two weeks since the last one!'

'Whatever, I guess it happens. I'll sort it out later.' I threw my undies into the trash, and myself into the shower.

Hot, then cold. Hot again, almost scalding. And then cold again. Why are showers always so damn hard to adjust?

I closed my eyes, shivering under the freezing waterfall. My memories were slowly falling back into place since I left the scene of the ritual. Blurry and fragmented visions which I was trying my hardest to erase with the rough sponge.

'You've got to be kidding me! Maybe I'm a pervert, one of those... necrophiliacs, I guess. Br-r-r. Yes, definitely a pervert, I mean what else could I be? To get so turned on inside a graveyard, to... Yes, I finished on that damn gravestone! And not even once... This is a complete nightmare!'

I pressed my head against the shower wall. I can't really say that I'm prone to emotional turmoil, but for some reason, my adventure to the graveyard has left a persistent feeling of filthiness, as if I've lived in a sewer for days and all the shit has permeated every cell in my body.

Weird and completely disgusting. Seriously, I just had to stick my nose in black magic! And what now? Let's just hope that it's only my imagination going wild after yesterday's horror marathon. Which were three "Insidious" movies in a row. Who knows what else I might imagine after that!

I jumped when my phone, which I left on the sink, suddenly decided to announce a new text. After wrapping myself in a towel I climbed out of the shower and glanced at the screen. What does someone need from me this late?