Chapter 3
Daisy’s POV
“Did you love him?” Father had asked me one day after he often saw me moving around the house holding the ring Samuel never gave me. It had been seven years since my death now and six since Samuel’s. I had hoped a lot that he would choose to stay too but he moved on, never knowing that I stayed behind.
“Yes. I guess I did. I never realized this or I wouldn’t have accepted George’s marriage proposal. It was only when I saw him with the ring later on the day of my funeral that I realized the true power of these feelings. I couldn’t even tell him that I understood how he felt at the moment.” I had sadly replied. I was thankful that George was not here but was off on his honeymoon with his new wife Cynthia. I liked her. We would have been good friends if life had chosen to bring us together in some other way. She was a little taller than me and was very beautiful but it wasn’t all her looks. She had the heart and the brains too to be always smart in life and be a perfect life-partner for George.
“Then give the ring to me.” He asked for the ring and I hesitated, being unwilling to lose this last symbol of the unspoken love between me and him. “I will be careful with it and have it back to you in a day.” I trusted my father, but just to be safe, I was going to be with him, invisible of course.
Just before I gave the ring to him, I asked him a question that had often popped up when I tried to think of a life when I and Samuel ended up declaring our love for each other while we were both alive. “Father, if things hadn’t gone this way… if I hadn’t died and Samuel had proposed before I ever met George then would you have given your blessings?”
He was shocked by my sudden question and I got my answer as I read the feelings that went through his face. Shock. Surprise. Anger. Shame. Then the mask slipped on and his feelings disappeared as he tried to lie to me. “Yes… where are you going?” He called out as I disappeared before his eyes.
Then I broke a golden lace from one of heavy and ostentatious window drapes and fashioned a rough necklace by passing it through the ring. Before I left the room, I spoke and my father, who was still staring at the place from where I last stood, turned left towards me. “Father, you should know better. Eyes and the surprised face are the windows of the soul after all.” I promised myself I would never let anyone ever separate it from me. He would regret that hesitation until he would pass away thirty five years later from that day.
Now, tears fall as all my hope dies by the hand of this very necklace. By taking a few things from here and there, I had made a necklace that was almost wearable out of that terrible first piece. I mourn the loss of hope that had snuck in while I dealt with that Nick. I didn’t want to see that necklace just yet and so I kept my eyes closed as the endless tears fell.
As I heard his steps on those creaking stairs, I remembered that the main entrance of the house was held locked. With only a bit of concentration of the telekinetic power I had, I unlocked the door. An unfamiliar voice grunted in sudden pain and my sobs slowed as I tried to hear more about this new stranger. And then what he spoke could have been a dagger across my throat.
“Come on, Nick. I am sorry. Forgive me. The bet’s off. Forget the necklace. Let’s just leave.” This stranger spoke and my eyes flew open. To my horror, and to their misfortune, there was no necklace. LIES! It was all a lie! Then I use these after-death powers once again and kick the newcomer inside and lock the door just as the thief, Nick, yells to the other male intruder to run.
Trust and hope are such sneaky things. They invade without getting caught, only making their presence known when they break within. Hurt and betrayal rise within me as I pull the door open and scream, ‘THIEVES!’
With one wave of my hand, and a large creaking sound, I turn the stairs into a slippery slope and a small part of my betrayed heart is joyed to hear him yelp and then grunt in pain. “Daisy”, he tries to speak as he looks at me. I must be visible again. “I can explain…” while his friend yelps so loud that I entertain the possibility that he lost his ability to speak. That is a pleasant thought.
“You lie to me. You steal from me. You invade my privacy. You break my trust in you. You shatter my hope. Tell me, Nick Demming Peters, WHY should I listen to you?” I scream at his crumpled form at the base of the stairs, which are now regaining their shape, from the top of the stairs. “No. Time for listening is way past. There can only be punishment now.” With that, I flick my hand and both of the thieves slam hard, much to my pleasure, against the wall. The entire house shudders at the force with which they impact. I should be concerned for my home but rage is a blinding force. All rationality escapes when rage overcomes the mind.
I am still not pleased by their suffering and began to control the air that goes into them. They both begin to choke as I scream at them. “GIVE ME MY NECKLACE BACK!” Nick struggles against my invisible binding that still holds the two of them in air before grabbing something from his pocket.
Remember when I said that trust and hope is a thing that sneaks in and is only found out when it dies? It turns out I did have some trust and hope left in Nick that died the moment he pulled out the necklace, my necklace, from his pocket and I am dismayed that I even considered the possibility of my Samuel being in this low-level scum. Oh yes, I had picked some words over my stay in this world for so many years. As he throws the necklace towards me, I remove the air blocks on them and use it to gently bring it to me.
The two still hang in the air and are trying quite hard to gather their breaths while probably fearing that I might decide to choke them again. I try to think of a suitable punishment for the two before realizing that I don’t really care about the newcomer.
He falls to the grounds with an “oomph!” and pull his limbs closer to him, as if trying to make himself smaller would make me have pity on him. “Stand up!” I bark at him and he hurries to do my bidding, even stumbling twice before he succeeds. And then I deal with him. Just like he entered the place by being kicked in by the wooden floorboard, I begin to push him by using the floorboards towards other raised floorboards on which he crashes. I let a few extra kicks happen to inflict pain before I finally have him at the edge of the door. The poor boy is so much dazed that he doesn’t even realize that he is staring outside the door. And so with one burst of power, I have him kicked out of the house with a hard, but not seriously injuring, kick on his back.
“Shawn!” Nick yells after the newcomer who screams, and probably makes his pant wet, as he crashes outside the house. Pleased, I close the door on him. He won’t dare to enter this place ever again. I know the modern slang for that too but I feel that there is no need to stop being a low-grade by use of these brash words anymore. Scum was enough.
“Don’t worry about him. He would be alright. I don’t care about him.” I tell Nick who still looks at the open door in shock but now turns to me in fear. To scare him even more, I slam the door shut and lock it in every way possible. Then I continue. “He wasn’t the one who really did all the things that ultimately brought us to this point, now did he? No, that was all you.”
“Please.” He begs in a weak voice and I am pleased to hear that his voice betrays how badly scared he is. He even looks like he might cry. It seems at least his fear was real when he entered. “I am sorry. It was just some stupid bet. Let me go. Please just let me go. Don’t kill me.” Now he really looks like he would cry.
“Don’t worry Nick, I won’t kill you.” I say in a soothing voice and he responds with a disbelieving ‘really?’ “Really.” I tell him. “Now, what was the bet you spoke of?” Tell me what scared you so badly.
“Um… the bet… oh, you see… the bet was to spend a night in this place. The way to get out quickly was… uh, togetthenecklace.” He speaks the last part so quickly that I have to pause a few moments to understand it. Then it clicks. Maybe I should kept the newcomer, Shawn, as well.
“To get the necklace, huh? And what if you lost?” I ask him, not even trying to control the anger that fills me. N
ick flinches away from me and I smile at his fear. He reminds me now of another thief who had dared to break in here, without the looks of Samuel of course, hoping easy money. By the time I was done with him, even I was worried he might be having a breakdown.
He looks downwards at the height from the ground at which he was held, which should be around 3 feet by modern standards. “If I lost, I would be accepting that I was a coward.” He confesses in a low voice and I smirk, at least I think that’s what they call a one-sided smile now, at such a trivial excuse. Ah, the pains of having a big and untamed ego. It seems I was going to teach this one a lesson he would never forget. And hope he didn’t suffer a nervous breakdown as well.
“Let’s play a game, then shall we?” My words offer a choice but the tone implies that there isn’t a choice to be made. “You want to get out. Get out.” I motion and the door opens. Nick looks relieved and is just about to speak, probably to thank me, when I interrupt. “I haven’t allowed you to speak. I am not done yet.” The relief disappears and the fear returns again. “You won’t have things easy. Escape this place before the night ends or stay until I leave, which is still 50 years away. Think of this as a game, would you? Now to take you to the starting room.”
I smile as I see him look around in fear and mourn at the sight of being bound when freedom is so close. Through the open door, I see Shawn look at the open door in surprise and then run away. Good. By the time I look back at Nick, I see that he has made a plan. It doesn’t take even a second to figure it out. Once I put him on the ground, he would make a run for it. So I simply push him up. “Up you go, Nick.” Then using my scary voice, I add, “Into the attic.”
He screams and I can’t help it. I laugh. To him, it probably sounds like a witch’s cackle. If that is required, then I am ready to be a witch for him. Because nobody messes with Daisy McCain.
I let his rising body hit the wooden roof on purpose before I shift some boards away so that he can finally go into the attic. Then I speak, and let the voice echo throughout the house.
“Alright, Nick Demming Peters. This lesson, if you manage to learn it in time, will teach you some manners. One, you should not lie. Two, you should never steal. Three, you should never toy with other people’s emotions.
The rules of this game we now play is simple. To get out, you must find the necklace and get to the main entrance before dawn, which is now 10 hours away. You like pretending someone you aren’t, don’t you? So switch back to your pretend mode and go through these puzzles created by the one you impersonated. Each room has a puzzle and out of the ten rooms, only one holds the necklace in a hidden spot.” I move and quickly place the necklace in its temporarily hiding spot. Making sure I didn’t leave any signs of my presence, I return to the top of the main stairs and continue speaking.
“There has to be a catch, right? There is. Every time you fail to solve a puzzle, you end up back in the attic at the start. You can go back through rooms you have solved if you want.” I speak and take a pause before adding one last rule in a not-really-so-helpful voice. “And Nick, don’t get injured. This isn’t a hospital. You aren’t getting healed. So watch out for loose rotten floorboards as well.” And with that, I disappear and move to the attic, where Nick stands frozen in his place in fear.
I think of getting a good start for the game and an old little saying, that I often used to tease Samuel with, comes to mind and I chant it. “Liar, liar. Pants on fire.” With that, I set his pants on fire. It wouldn’t burn him but would definitely scare him.
His sudden scream of fear fills my devilish soul with joy.