For a moment I stiffened and felt unable to move. I felt tears in my eyes. I felt like a child, whimpering helplessly as I felt ghosts touch me, whispering and pressing close until the air felt thick.
I wasn’t a child though and sitting here wasn’t going to help me. I had to make it out of this cave. I didn’t want to die here.
“Fuck,” I hissed out. I pushed from the rock and aimed the flashlight in front of me. I stopped, choking on another gasp caught in my throat. My eyes traveled over blurry, ephemeral shapes swaying all around me.
I pressed my back against the stalagmite rock and tried to focus but couldn’t. Something was really wrong with me and fresh blood kept sliding into my eyes. Forward were ghosts, backwards were ghosts. My splinter began burning again and I groaned through my teeth, unable to stop noise from coming out.
“Boo.” At the edge of the stalagmite, the little girl was peaking out. I watched as her long limbs stepped out, they creaked like the floors of the haunted house. “I found you,” she said in delight. The splinter meant she’d never lose me.
My head swam, my sense of equilibrium was destroyed. The creaking of her bones sounded so similar to the haunted house that I forgot for a moment where I was. Suddenly I saw the haunted house again. I could feel its sinister tone, hear its creaking while wind howled through the attic.
“No,” I gasped, stumbling forward, barely staying upright, swaying on my feet. I pressed into the collection of ghosts in front of me and they swarmed me. Up close I could see some looked liked miners. Hard hats and buttoned-up shirts. More than miners too, older ghosts rich with a primal antiquity—no modernity to them at all.
Their bodies pressed in, smelling of mold so pungent it clogged my nose. I coughed on their scent. It felt like dust was coating my throat.
I felt the textures of their clothes. I felt their hands gripping my shoulder and arms, pulling my hair, touching my cheek. Fear burst inside me. This was my hell.
I screamed, terror slicing through me. I remembered a drawing I’d seen of the Grecian afterlife—a pit with a swirling mass of dead spirits reaching out and moaning. I wasn’t sure that wasn’t where I was now, an endless pit of moaning souls pulling me down, drowning me. Maybe when I bumped my head I actually died, left the world behind, and fell into the pit.
My whole arm was searing in pain though, reminding me I was alive, but the little girl was coming closer to fix that.
“Ava, over here,” Thomas said in front of me. I pushed through the ghosts.Thomas, I remembered. The climber. Save him. Yes, I was here to save him. I couldn’t think straight so I was clawing at thoughts and holding on to them the best I could. Save the climber. Leave the cave.
“No,” the ghosts said with big mouths and frightened eyes.
“Not that way.”
I ignored them, gritted my teeth, and pushed through them. They clawed at me, grabbing my clothes, tugging my hair, snatching my ankles.
I pushed through them, panting, sweating, in pain, my head swimming. I pushed against the fear too, pushed past it to survive. I breached their clutches as they begged me not to proceed.
I fell onto a smooth raised rock, taking long slow breaths, trying to fill my lungs as my muscles trembled for rest. There was a powerful ache in my skull that made all my thoughts messy. The flashlight had slid further back on the smooth rock.
The ghosts reached out but wouldn’t step closer to the raised area. I pressed my head to the rock, laying down. I watched as their arms stretched towards me but came up short.
I won that small battle for whatever it was worth. A small laugh huffed out of me. My eyes started to close. I was so exhausted.
“Ava? There’s something in here. Can you see what it is?” Thomas was here, right next to me now, only a few feet away. Could he sense the ghosts? Is that why he kept saying something was in here? Or was it just the skeletons that bothered him?
I rolled over on my belly and my head throbbed. I crawled, dragging myself huffing and puffing. Moving was hard. My body was giving up on me. The flashlight was somewhere, the light flickering out. I pulled myself a few more feet until I reached a wooden box. I set my head to the ground and panted. I was so tired. I just needed to close my eyes for a moment.
“Oh, Ava,” Thomas said in dramatic pity. The words sounded more like amusement than true sympathy. Thomas hummed. I reached out and touched the wooden box. It was smooth and cold to the touch. It was long, similar to the length of a coffin.
“You’re here,” I said in a sigh of relief. My voice wasn’t loud but it didn’t matter, it echoed in the sudden silence—the ghosts now curiously quiet.
It felt as if something slimy brushed against my leg but I didn’t react. I had to conserve my depleting energy. All I wanted to do was lay down. Lay down and go to sleep. Was I dying? Was this the end? Survive a horror show only to die right after?
“You finally found me,” Thomas complimented. He sounded different now—excited, amused, entertained. I cracked my tired eyes open. It was pointless. There wasn’t an ounce of light, the flashlight had gone out.
“Where are you?” My voice was a whisper.
“Right here,” a voice said in my ear and the feeling of warm slime slid onto my shoulder. I jerked away without thinking. My head was slammed with pain, punishing me for the quick movement. I pressed my palms flat to the ground, spreading my fingers out to try and center myself as I lay there groaning.
Something strange was going on but my head was swaying—a ship at sea—and my hand hurt so bad. I could feel it blackening past the wrist now, crawling up my arm towards my chest. Even if the ghost girl didn’t touch me the curse would still kill me.
I felt like crying. I was beyond help. It had happened so fast. Even if we hadn't been in the cave I’d have never made it.
“Get away from there,” I heard the ghost girl call, her voice scared. What could scare ghosts? The thought swirled in my head, my eyebrows pinching.
