I wake up to my parents screaming bloody murder from down the hall. I had no instincts but to run toward my parent’s room. I slam open the door… my heart stops for a moment to the sight I saw.

I woke up again. A nightmare, that’s all. No need to worry. The only thing I didn’t notice at first was the ton of weight pressing down on my chest. It felt like I was being crushed alive. Looking at my chest I see a pair off sickly knees draped in a white—slightly stained— dressing gown. Looking up even more I began to sweat as I tried my hardest to move even just a finger. It was a woman with thinned ragged hair, sunken eyes and rotten teeth, all her retched features painted atop green tinged, greasy skin. She looked like she had been crying with how bloodshot her piercing eyes were. Her body was lanky and frail, she look like she had been starved for days, the bones protruding like meat in shrink wrap. The dress was loose around her neck showing her pencil thin clavicles, that led to her skinny arms then… her boney hands that held my face.

She leaned toward me like a rusted hinge, her greasy face almost touching mine.

“You’re special you know. You have a gift like no other.” she breathed with a coarse hollow sound past her blue lips. “You must find me… before they find you. It’s almost too late…Emilia.” The words sent a shiver down my paralyzed body. What does she mean?! 

I suddenly hear the scream of a young girl, and I awake to my own screaming. Springing upright, I look around my room shaking with terror. 

“It was just a dream.” I whisper to myself. “You’re safe.” My breath begins to quicken again. “I’m safe! It was just a silly nightmare!” I stay sitting up, I wrapping my blankets  around my shoulders to cover myself from whatever was just inches away from my face.