"Who has seen the bride?" The room grew silent eventually, as all attention was focused on the pale little girl and the teenage girl, who looked so much alike, like siblings. They wore a frown, which hardened their already rotting faces, and fixed their stares carefully on the scared adults, as they crammed themselves at the locked exit, yelling and banging on the iron door.
"Michael! Michael!! Please help!" Nina yelled, as she noticed a slight movement from the older female.
"Who had seen the bride?" The little girl said, with a wide grin curving around her jagged, rotting lips.
They sighted something dropping down the little girl's face and mouth - dark, slimy worms, which crawled slowly down her face. Then, there were whispers of a thousand ear-piercing, but soothing voices, saying things that neither of them could understand.
The electric LED lights buzzed and turned off, as the whispering chants increased. The little girl's eyes turned coal black, and her teeth widened, exposing rows of piny teeth, leaving the adults scared to their marrows.
Jayjay ran, and the others followed, fleeing in different directions, with the thoughts of escape on their mind. An inhumane screeching sound could be heard, screaming loudly, and the house seemed to obey its instructions, as the doors shut on their own, with banging sounds, as the adults drew nearer.
Judy ran into a dark corner in the hallway. The dead girls were out of sight at this side of the house, and it was dead silent. She sighed softly and slumped slowly into the wall, scared and careful that someone was approaching. She hid carefully near an old ceramic vase container, with dead, decaying flowers, whose dead leaves still served as a shade.
She placed her palms over her face and sobbed silently, as the events that had occurred previously replayed in her mind. What had she done to herself? She sniffled. She let out a sneeze, running out of air in the airtight corner, and instantly regretted it, as she recalled the two dead girls.
Everything was going to be alright, she assured herself. She was going to leave the dead house alive and unhurt.
Judy peeped out into the empty hallway, only for the unimaginable to happen. She felt a knife plunging deeply into her eye sockets. She turned sharply in pain. The dead teenage girl was staring at her, with a blood-dripping machete.
Judy's screams were drowned out by the screeching sound, as the house seemed to come alive, determined to claim its next victim.
*. *. *.
Nina slumped on the worn, torn sofa in the living room, her mind paralyzed by fear and uncertainty. She couldn't think of a viable escape plan or muster the courage to follow the others in a desperate bid for freedom. The gruesome images of her colleagues, Tonia and Vicky, hung like slaughtered animals in a butcher's shop, refusing to be banished from her thoughts.
As she sat there, her gaze wandered to a marble tablet attached to the wall, its surface etched with cryptic words that seemed to taunt her. The letters danced before her eyes, a jumbled mess of secrets and mysteries. With a newfound sense of purpose, Nina stood up, the creaking furniture emitting a loud, piercing squeak that echoed through the room like a scream.
She approached the tablet, her footsteps heavy with trepidation, as if drawn by an unseen force. The words on the tablet seemed to shift, rearranging themselves in a maddening puzzle that beckoned her closer.
Getting near to the tablet, she took out her cellphone and flashed its torchlight on its dusty surface. Nina wiped the dust that had covered its surface with her hands and proceeded to read the words written on it.
"Georgina"
"Oyidiya"
"Tare"
"Ngozi"
"Samantha"
"Aisha"
"Bimpe"
"Wura"
"Essiele"
She stops reading as she realizes they were all female names and had nothing to do with her. She sighted something again and tries to leave. A small, insignificant stainless knob attached to the tablet catches her attention. She reaches out to touch it but pulls away, thinking it might be a trap.
"Georgina was here," she reads out words carved at the wall side.
"And Oyidiya too," she reads out in a mumble.
"No escape but try," she reads out.
"Avoid the hallway, Bimpe," she reads out.
Who were these people? Did they die in this house too? Nina asks herself. She feels a chill run down her spine as she wonders if she's next.
"Check out the knob," was the last word on the wall side.
She hesitates a little, fearing the worst might happen if she opens the knob. But she reaches out fearlessly and touches its tip, pushing it silently open.
As she opens the knob, a small door hidden behind the tablet swings open, revealing a narrow passageway. Nina's heart races as she wonders where it might lead. She takes a deep breath and steps into the passageway, leaving the living room and its horrors behind.
*. *. *.
Maple Tree layout, Ógozi Abriba/Mkporo White storey house, 22nd December 1993. Motisha Odeghe, a nineteen-year-old American-Nigerian female, sat on a wooden armchair under the mañana tree in their yard, reading a copy of Romeo and Juliet. She rolled her eyes at how the star-crossed lovers had fallen pathetically in love. Perhaps she didn't have much of a choice. She had only engaged in the novel because of their new neighbors and crush, Tristan Collingwood, the biracial boy who had just moved into their neighborhood back in Dallas, where they lived. Now, she was reading the novel to impress him at their art class after their Christmas holidays.
"Tish, have you seen the bride?" She heard a familiar tiny voice say in a frightening tone. She looked up from the book to face her kid sister, Coraline.
"She is in the house somewhere with Michael," Tish grumbled in frustration, wearing a frown on her beautiful face.
"Are you reading that because of Tristan?" Coraline smirked, standing with her hands on her waist.
"Mooo...oom," Tish yelled to shoo her sister away from the peaceful reading atmosphere.
"Am sorry," Coraline whined and rolled her eyes, fluttering them afterwards in a cute manner.
"Duh," Motisha rolled her eyes and continued with the novel play.
"Dad! Mom!!" Cora called as she leap-walked along the way. "Have you seen the bride?" She asked, but there was no reply. She stops halfway as she sees a red liquid oozing out from the bedroom door belonging to her parents. She carefully opens up the door, her heart racing with anticipation and fear.
As she pushes the door open, she's met with a sight that makes her blood run cold. The room is in disarray, and her parents are nowhere to be seen. But what catches her attention is the trail of blood leading to the bed, where a figure lies motionless, covered in a white sheet. Cora's heart skips a beat as she realizes that something is terribly wrong. She takes a step back, her eyes fixed on the figure, and that's when she sees it. A small, delicate hand peeking out from under the sheet, with a gold ring on its finger. The same ring her mother wore on her wedding day.
*. *. *.
The metal door creaked open, and Nina walked into the ruin of a room. It was an empty, dark room that smelled of dust and decaying furniture. She held her nose to avoid the scent of the dirty room. She sneezed as she breathed in the dusty air and flashed her torchlight at the walls. The faint light revealed a room that seemed frozen in time, with cobwebs clinging to the walls and a thick layer of dust covering everything.
She shrieked, inching slowly backwards, as she sighted the gravestones rolled up at the end of the room. She turned to leave, but her curiosity got the better of her, and she stopped to find out whose gravestones they were. She walked over to the first gravestone, her heart racing with anticipation, and proceeded to the next ones, realizing they were badly damaged.
"Oganze Odeghe, Wife and mother 1943-1993," she mused inwardly, her eyes scanning the inscription. She walked over to the next gravestone, her torchlight casting eerie shadows on the walls.
"Coraline Odeghe," she read out, her voice barely above a whisper.
She flashed the torchlight in the direction of the fourth gravestone, her heart sinking with a sense of foreboding.
"Motisha Odeghe, ever loving sister 1975-1993," she read inwardly, silencing her rapid pants.
Nina cupped her mouth with her hands as she heard the petrified scream of her friends from the living room. She stepped back, her eyes fixed on the gravestones, and lay flat near the last one. Laying flat on the ground, she shrieked in horror as she saw the last name engraved on the gravestone.
"Michael Odeghe, Loving brother and Fiancée 1963-1993," she gasped, her eyes wide with terror.
The realization hit her like a ton of bricks. These were the graves of Michael's family, and the dates... they all died in 1993. Nina's mind raced with questions. What happened to Michael's family? Why did he bring them to this house? And what did he have to do with their deaths?
Tish and Cora were never really existed. They were dead and buried in this room.