Of October

Possessed

OCTOBER 9

9:37 P.M.

"That's the website they were talking about?" Automne said aloud in disbelief. She was genuinely disappointed. No wonder it was called 'Scary for Kids', she thought. The site was poorly designed, the "scary" images were all but scary, and there were ads everywhere. If the girl already felt skeptical about summoning ghosts, now she felt like a complete idiot. Did her friends—some girls from school—really believe that amateur bullshit?

"Just play once," they'd said. "It worked for me. Try it out!" Oh, and whatever. She would give it a shot and have a good laugh.

"Let's see... 'Ghost Games', huh." She scrolled down the page: there were a lot of games you could play that were said to summon ghosts and demons. With a sigh, she clicked on the first one: Hide and Seek Alone. She quickly read what it was about and laughed.

A doll? Lame. Just go and make some friends, loser. Automne clicked on the next game, the Midnight Game. Sounded like a huge waste of time—seriously, spending three hours and a half walking around your house in the dark to escape the "Midnight Man"? Who had that much time to lose?

The other games were just as long and as bad. The worst thing, she noticed, was that each game had the same warning: This is a very dangerous game. Do not play this game. You could end up hurt, possessed, or even dead.

"Or bored to death," Automne sighed as she clicked on the Closet Game. As she read the game's rules, however, she took a slight interest in trying it out. She only needed a closet, which she had, and matches. Plus, it didn't take hours to play.

That's it, she decided and went to get some matches. And then she waited until it got dark.

"Goodnight, fam!" Automne called out to her family, shutting her door. She had taken a quick shower before, and deep down, she was excited to try the game. She admitted to herself she was hoping—just a tiny bit—that it would work. But she knew it wouldn't. It's like when you're a kid with some epic fantasy stories going through your head. You know they're not real, yet you can't help imagining.

The truth that Automne refused to see, however, was that she hoped the ritual would work only to be on the same level as Winter, who claimed to see ghosts. In other words, she was envious.

The girl read the game rules once more before shutting off her Mac. She took the book of matches and switched the lights off, including the aquarium's blue neon. A plaintive cry was heard from the other side of the door.

"Sorry, sweetie. Not tonight," she told Snowflake. I don't deserve that cat, she thought.

Oh, she did. Before.

The room was now dark, except for the street lights outside that sent stripes of faint light on the walls. Rolling her eyes, Automne pulled the curtains closed. Now, she was in complete darkness.

Stand in the closet for about two minutes, facing the closet door, she recited in her head as she stepped inside the closet and closed the door. Here she was, standing in the dark of her closet and counting the seconds, feeling dumb as hell. After exactly two minutes, she held a match in front of her and felt her cheeks redden as she said out loud: "Show me the light or leave me in darkness."

Fucking ridiculous, she told herself with a smirk. Then she waited. The website had said that either she would hear "faint whispering"—she didn't hear shit—or the match would light on its own. It also said not to turn around, or "You will be dragged into eternal darkness." The girl wanted to laugh.

But then, she heard it: faint mumbling. The thing was, the bathroom happened to be next to her room, more specifically behind the wall of her closet. Chances were that she had simply heard her mother or her brother. At least this made much more sense than that... bull...shh...

Why am I dizzy? Automne clumsily tried to light the match, in vain. She felt numb and sleepy, and her head spun. Yet, she was resigned to play the game to the end.

She finally lit the match and blinked as the sudden light attacked her pupils. The warm smell of smoke filled her nostrils: she let out a pleased sigh—and accidentally blew out the match in doing so.

"Shit!" She fumbled and tried taking out another match but only succeeded in dropping the small box on the floor. As she knelt to pick it up, her head suddenly started to feel heavy—it was the same feeling as drunkenness, minus the nausea. Within no time, her head met the floor, and her eyes shut on their own as she fell into a deep sleep.

Automne woke up in her bed the next morning, with no memory of collapsing inside the closet. Instead, she thought the ritual simply hadn't worked and that she had gone straight to bed right after. But she hadn't.

And here I was. Boy, would I have some fun messing with the poor human.