The Soul Catcher (Harry Styles)

17 - Game On

"I think fearless is having fears but jumping anyway."

- Taylor Swift

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A cold blast whiffed through the room, churning my hair up.

I sank back down on the couch, unsure of what to do next. Should I wait until Elaine returned or should I see if I could find anything useful?

The basement. I hadn't seen a staircase that went down, only up. But if Ada said there was a basement, there had to be one.

Maybe it was hidden? Like in those crime thrillers where you had to pull at a torch or extricate a book from a shelf to reveal a hidden door.

It didn't sound very likely, but up to this point, it was my only clue.

Carefully, and in a lame attempt to avoid making noises, I tiptoed out of the lounge and down the hallway to the room that looked like an abandoned library.

One wall held a huge bookshelf, covered with old and dusty books that threatened to fall apart any given moment. There was a semi-tall bookshelf on the right wall, otherwise the room was only occupied with a small desk.

I scanned the desk again, but just like last time, there was nothing on it.

My eyes analysed the wall with the bookshelf – or rather, only the bookshelf, since it covered the whole wall.

"Don't tell me if I have to take every book out to see if there is a hidden door," I mumbled under my breath. This couldn't be happening right now.

I cautiously took a step forward, expecting nothing but the squeak of the wooden floor below my feet. However, the wooden floor beneath my feet transmitted into sand.

Grimacing, I put one foot in front of the other. I genuinely didn't like sand in my shoes, but I wasn't afraid of it. If the twins could read minds, they should learn how to differentiate between useful and useless information.

"Good try," I snorted, mentally facepalming. Sand. How scary. "If you think you can ma- aah," a scream escaped my lips when the sand changed.

It wasn't any kind of sand, like the harmless one you'd find at a playground. No, it was quicksand. Cheers to the twins, that was definitely one of my biggest fears.

I frantically lifted my right foot, but it was stuck in the sand. My left leg wouldn't budge either, it felt as if my legs were disconnected from my system.

No matter how hard I tried, no matter how much I begged, the sand threated to swallow me. My knees were already covered in sand, and I desperately tried to push it away with my bare hands.

The only thing that brought upon me was sand on my hands. "Stop!" I shouted, hoping the twins would hear me – and just talk to me.

But every word escaping my lips, every panting breath I took, seemed to make it worse.

They had me, and there was nothing I could do. I was stuck and I would die, without being able to say goodbye to my friends. Poor Elaine would be on her own.

Elaine.

Her name shot through my mind like lightning. How often had I told her that it was all just in her mind? That nothing really was happening to her? That she was semi-safe, not in danger to die?

I had to listen to my own advice. I was safe, I couldn't die; I was already dead. The twins were messing with me, wanting to break me. I couldn't let them win.

I convinced myself, feeling a rush of power run through me. And just like that, the quicksand vanished.

Standing safely in the middle of the old library, I was free to move again without any signs that something had just happened. Because nothing had happened.