“It won’t,” I reply stoutly.
Sabine cocks her head, but doesn’t answer. She stares out the window across the hall, and makes no motion to leave. I stare at her over the top of my book.
“Was there something else?”
I don’t want to be rude, but I really want a minute alone, and something about this woman puts me on edge. She knows things better than I do… she knows Dare better, and she might even know me better. It’s unsettling.
She turns her gaze to me, wise and old, and I fight the urge to flinch.
“We should read your cards again,” she suggests. I do flinch now, and she chuckles.
“It’s not a scary thing,” she assures me. “My family has been doing it for hundreds of years. My mother, her mother, her mother. And so on.”
“Only the women?” I ask, curious now. She nods.
“Only the women.”
“Why?”
Why am I asking? This is clearly all lunacy.
She doesn’t bother answering.
“Have you been feeling all right?” she asks instead. I hesitate. Did Dare tell her I’d gotten sick?
“Yes,” I finally lie. “Perfectly fine.”
“How about sleeping?” she continues. “Have you been sleeping well?”
No.
“Yes,” I lie again. “Fine. I don’t need any of your tea.”
She smiles again, her teeth ever grotesque.
“That wasn’t why I was asking. If you experience any… disturbances, do let me know.”
Disturbances?
She glances at me knowingly before she shuffles away and I wonder what exactly she knows about me, and how does she know it?
I watch her disappear down the hall and it isn’t until she’s long gone that I realize that I have chills and that goose-bumps have lifted the hair on my neck.
I rub my arms and make my way quickly to the safety of my bedroom.
No one can see me.
I’m invisible.
There’s a sheet and blood and water.
There are stones and moss and sand.
SeeMeSeeMeSeeMe.
But they don’t.
Everyone bustles around, their faces turning into blurs.