Jan. 11, 2008
1:00am
Panama St.
“Who wants to play with this strange paper plate I found?” What was I doing here anyway? At one am I’d probably be in bed or playing late night games. Well, at least I wasn’t alone…my sister Nikki, Anna Russo, and some girl named Ambrosia DeBruler accompanied me. And why was Amber here? I can understand Nikki being my sister there, and Anna being me and Nikki’s friend we’ve known our whole lives… but why Amber? She was a brutal and horrid girl that rode my bus. Well, she does live on the stop right before mine… could that possibly have to do anything? To look on the bright side of that chilly night, which was hard because it seemed to me somebody was following my every step, Amber wasn’t mean tonight. I stared down at the plate held in my frozen and numb hands, remembering the dream I had before I mysteriously found myself on the road to the palm island ferry, (which wasn’t that strange being that I live on palm Island). The dream had to do with a paper plate, and somehow you could fly on one. Well, could this be a dream strangely connected to my other one? I pretty much answered my own question, no. It all felt so real; the sound of each of my footsteps rang through the night, and my hands as numb as ever trying to warm themselves in the frosty wind. Well how did the paper plate hold me in my other dream? I thought, then remembering my question’s answer, you idiot! Paper plates can’t hold a person…this is real life you’re talking about, not a silly dream! Right after I pulled myself back together a gust of wind blew, blowing the paper plate away from my own two hands. There it flew, up in the sky, almost as if it was following the full moon’s glow. My eyes followed its movements; going back and forth gently, like falling paper, only in the opposite direction. As it hit the light of the moon, I lost its path, then looked down the misty road. Where was everybody? I heard a bit of laughter at the end of the road figuring that’s where they were… all the way down there. I glanced at the dark water and for a moment I felt a gentle hand reach out to my shoulder. Turning my head swiftly, I found no one to be there, and quickly sprinted down the road. I didn’t want to stay by the water, picturing creatures and dead people slowly come out of it, which was strange for me, living on an island the water usually felt like home, only safer, but not tonight. Thinking and receiving images of these thoughts, I increased my speed… the road never seemed so far, I had to walk down it everyday, yet those walks all seemed quicker then that run tonight. Gasping for air, relieved I had made my destination, I saw nobody at the small concrete walls, curved slightly with “Palm Island” imprinted in blue, on the pale white. I traced over the letters which I usually did as I was waiting for the bus to arrive. However, I could only reach the ‘L’ in palm, till I remembered why I was here. I looked to the other side of the beaten up, double laned road, to see Anna standing on the other side. Forgetting to look to the left or right I immediately crossed the street. “Where are Nikki and Amber?” I questioned, impatiently awaiting my answer.
She tilted her head slightly, as if not knowing a single word I said, then answered, “Amber had something to show to Nikki, a place…” Her face had gone blank, showing only the expressions of sorrow, pain, and worry. She paused for about a minute or two, until I pushed her onward. “a place that she said was a fake spook, but it will scare you half to death… they left an hour ago… I haven’t seen them ever since they disappeared into the fog.” I could completely understand, now realizing the fog’s misty arms wrapping around my feet like a snake and its pray. Hearing footsteps behind me I turned my head and found Nikki and Amber with pale expressions upon their faces. Right as they reached three feet away from me their expressions turned from darkness to glee.
“Alex, Anna! You guys have to go with us! It was so amazing and unbelievably fun! Please!” Nikki shouted, jumping in excitement to go again. I looked at Anna persuading her to go, yet she shook her head and left. It was only us three in the dark fog, and I said I’ll go, waiting to see what an amazing place this was after all. Repeatedly telling me to keep going, Nikki got there first, and I followed right up behind her, Amber being the last to arrive. I didn’t see a single thing; my eyes tracing Nikki’s finger to where she was pointing, all I saw was a thick fog very low to the ground. Nikki then bent down, and signaled me to do so, I bent down behind her, Amber doing the same, and there was a yellow-white glow, leading to a hole. There was one step after you entered, however you have to crawl, being a foot tall. When you past the step there was a white, glowing tunnel, the light not allowing you to see five inches ahead of you. The tunnel’s walls were embroidered with the creepiest faces, one of the faces being the creepy Jesus face shown on the commercial of One Missed Call, the thing that creepped me out the most on the commercial. The faces faded away, and Nikki told me to make a turn. A rush of bitterness flowed through my body giving me a chill on all hands and knees as I glanced behind Amber and saw a black figure go by. I told Nikki to crawl faster but she decided to ignore me. After about a half hour of being spooked by crawling in a bright tunnel, Nikki stopped at the intersection of all this white, to pitch darkness… “This is as far as we got. We decided to stop here and go get you guys, that’s what took us an hour…” Nikki said, and I looked at Amber but she just nodded. Nikki turned her head at me and smirked. She took one crawl forward and I lost her.
“Are you gonna go or what?!” Amber said, rolling her eyes in impatience. “Where’d she go?” My pupils widened as I stepped into the darkness, trying to receive as much light as possible, which was impossible. It was darker than the night we escaped from. You couldn’t see a thing, yet to me it felt as if every soul flew gently by me. All of this darkness reminded me of the dark figure I saw on our way here. I felt the queasiness in my stomach pleading my brain to get the heck out of here, but I pushed forward. I crawled faster and faster searching for light, or a sound. Usually I enjoyed peace and quiet, and the dark, but it had all seemed like an enemy right now. Speeding, my legs and arms moving as fast as they could I ran into something not hard, yet not soft. My sister.
“Nikki,” I whispered, and received no reply so I tapped her and repeated “Nikki,” My voice as light as ever flowed through the darkness and came back to me as footsteps. I turned my head to find Amber behind me. “Hello, Nikki?” I said.
“Alex,” finally I received an answer just barely, “I don’t know…” Her soft voice hit Ambers hears and wrapped around her brain.
“Great!” Amber said in a loud whisper, “We’re lost!” I was actually surprised she figured that out, being in the stupid, not mental, but below average classes she realized that we had no idea where we were. I told Nikki to keep going, my stomach talking a way out of here. After a few steps I heard a high pitch scream, a few bangs and a loud thunk at the end.
“Nikki?!” I screamed waiting for a reply. “Nikki!” I reached my hand out to feel no one ahead of me. I moved slowly forward and as my hands took there last step, there was nothing but a sharp metal. I grasped onto that, being the end of the tunnel…Was this the way out? Hoping so, I bent over it and pushed off. With a little too much power on pushing I Hit a cold wall, this had been a bang that echoed. The fall didn’t seem to end so I tried to hold onto something, something that will keep me up, and safe. Just as I put my hand on the wall to search for something in the darkness, a thick liquid came dripping down the wall making it extremely slippery. “Ew!” I said as the substance trickled from my hand to all the way down my arm. I recognized the feeling, and realized it had been blood. This made my stomach even queasier and I began to become light headed. My eyes blurred and then all I saw was nothing, for I had fainted on my way down. “Uh,” was the first word to come out of my mouth, awoken to a hard hit. Amber was sitting beside me and Nikki was looking out the door. As my eyes got focused I noticed light shining through a window, and a man starring through the window. He looked like Freddy, or Jason in Freddy vs. Jason. I sat up and got as far away as possible from the window. My heart froze, and plunged its way down to my stomach as I remembered what happened in the tunnel. On the other hand, my stomach jumped with glee to the fact there was an escape. A door wide and tall open, which was a good thing and bad. It was good for there was an escape, bad for there was a killer dude outside the window, able to get in.
“Guys…He’s coming to the door!” Those were the words I shouldn’t have let come out of my mouth. Just as my tongue slithered the last word from under my breath, the murderer stopped in the middle of his slow steps and waved his hand in a signal. When his hand came back down, hundreds of beaten up children came running to the door. With scars and stitches covering their face, I had mistaken a child for Chucky. I thought they were going to burst their way in, and slowly slice bit by bit, enjoying ever second of it. However, all they did was quickly shut the door and lock it with seven locks. Bolts, screws, and nails were hammered through thick pieces of white hot metal, nothing able to cool it, and locked tightly to the door and window. The only natural light I’ve seen in this unbelievable adventure, vanished as the last piece of metal was placed on the window by the kid I mistaken as Chucky.
Darkness, once again didn’t seem like an ally to me as usual, but a foe. My eyes capable of searching the darkness, being that they could adjust to no light, failed me once more. I didn’t know where neither Nikki nor Amber was in this dark filled room. Getting ready to whisper to them, I noticed a flash of an even darker black then the space surrounding me. I quickly turned my head towards the direction the black figure floated to. Within a sound of two clicks, a very small lamp lit up, lighting the whole entire room of the small area, except one corner. The light had been right underneath the place I’d fallen; far away from that corner; in fact it was in the direction I saw the creature went, but no body, at least no body I witnessed, had switched on the light. Suddenly, out of the darkness of the corner, that same black figure I have seen through this adventure, creepped towards the light. I turned my head, in search of Nikki, or Amber… I was alone.
The black figure, just a few feet away from where I was, crept toward me without a sound as its ghouly feet hit the old wooden floor boards beneath me. Through this adventure I had been afraid, not sure what of, but afraid. Although the murderer, the faces on the walls, and the children mildly freaked me out, making me regret I ever crawled through the tunnel, they were not my main fear. It turns out; my main fear had followed me into its home, and traced my every move. Not getting a good glimpse of it until this very moment, it inched its way right to my body…
…With a single tear rolling down my cheek, and my eyes as watered as ever, my head faintly fell down to my chest as the creature grasped my left shoulder, leaving a lonesome hand print beside my elbow… “Ahh!” I screamed, waking from a very horrid nightmare, although I didn’t remember a single detail of it. Where was I? In my house? No. On the street? No. In the tunnel or in that room? No. I turned my head to the right side, not taking notice of the millions of kids with ripped clothes and scratches and scars upon their faces sitting down at picnic tables, eating, I saw the room I was recently in before I fell incautious. Amber was hoping a brick wall escaping as Nikki stood beside the wall, signaling me to come with her. I rose to my feet and limped over to Nikki and hoped the wall. As soon as I reached the top of the brick wall, I turned my head towards the place where I had the most amazing thing happen to me, and every one of the children gave off an evil smirk, just as I saw the dark creature race back into the tunnel, where it belonged.
Jumping off the high wall, I had a miss landing and smashed my head against the black concrete of Placida road, which was the street Panama lye… Bells, cathedrals, and chimes ringing in and out of my head, I awoke to my alarm clock, muscles aching for a reason I hadn’t known. I was in my bed! Turning my alarm off, I remembered the dream that had occurred last night…not the one with the paper plate, but the Ghost Tunnel…and receiving a flashing image of the ghouly hand that had reached out to me in that room, I checked my arm. There lye the Black Hand print that made me faint just a few hours ago. So it wasn’t a dream after all…