Emoh
As I stood, looking out the window, the picturesque snow was interrupted by something subtle. Perhaps it was just a change in atmosphere…or perhaps it was a smell. It wasn't the cookies baking in the oven…I turned around and opened my mouth to speak to my grandmother…but no one was there.
"Grandmother? Are you there? The cookies are going to burn if you don't come back down…"
Yet there was no response. Not a stirring in the house. I could have sworn my Grandmother was right behind me. I turned to the stairs, which seemed a shade bit darker than they had been a moment before. I started climbing up them. The more I walked, the darker my surroundings got. Still, there was no sign of my Grandmother. Looking ahead of me, I saw a flash of light.
"Grandmother?"
I finally reached the top of the stairs. I turned to the shut and unwelcoming door of my grandmother's bedroom. Reaching towards the slightly shining doorknob, I heard a faint growling. Growling? Turning around I saw a dark, but small figure rushing me. In my panic to get away, I fell backward, and down the stairs. The next thing I knew, I heard a series of thumpings. Soon, filling my vision was a bundle of fur.
"Gizmo?" I sighed with relief, only to come to the sudden realization that Gizmo, my Grandmother's dog, had been dead for years. He had died in his sleep of old age. So how was he clearly alive in front of me? Were we both dead? And why didn't he want me to go into Grandmother's room?
As I was pondering these questions, a scorched smell started to fill the air. The cookies! I got up and ran to turn off the oven. Black smoke billowed from the oven, filling the kitchen. I reached the oven and turned the knob that controlled the oven. Staggering out of the kitchen, I collapsed in one of the chairs in the living room. I didn't have a lot of time to relax before I heard the door to the second downstairs bedroom creak open.
"What's that smell?" My great-grandmother(who I called Nan) asked.
"It-it's the c-cookies Grandmother had been cooking…" I stammered.
Nan had died a little over a year ago. She had been reportedly awake on her bed when she died. I couldn't begin to understand how she was standing here in front of me, without anything wrong with her.
"Grandmother's not here. She's on vacation, remember?"
Somewhere, faintly, a memory that wasn't a memory, that seemed false, incorrect, surfaced out of the depths of my mind. But that couldn't be right. The last thing I remembered was getting in my parent's car to drive to my Nana's house for Christmas. This house seemed like my Grandmother's house, but the surroundings seemed different. Where was I? Subtly, upstairs there was a creak, like someone trying to walk softly, or getting out of bed. It was coming from Grandmother's room.
"Who's upstairs?" I demanded
"No one, right now. We should go see if anyone else is joining us." She responded. She had a hint of a smile playing across her face for some reason. What did she mean by 'we should go see if someone else is joining us'? Her wording was confusing. We headed up the stairs. Instead of the darkness that I had experienced before, there was light spilling out from the crack beneath the door. Nan reached out and grasped the doorknob strongly, with no sign of weakness in her grip. As if ripping off a band-aid, she flung the door open to let the light bleed out into the hallway. After my eyes adjusted, I see
Only sparkling ice…
I turn around to my Nan, but she is gone, along with the door. It makes me wonder if they were even there in the first place. I slowly walk to the bed. Laying there is…me. I'm not moving, pale as the ice surrounding me. I turn around and see a dog bed in the corner. In the bed is a non-moving dog. Gizmo. In a second bed lays Nan. I suddenly feel very tired. However, something tells me that if I even close my eyes, it will be the last time I open them. Yet, the want for sleep is something that the human body can't overcome, and I drag myself to the bed where the other me is sleeping. Weirdly, the other me doesn't seem solid, and I slide myself to perfectly match his position. I fall into the most peaceful sleep I've had in a while.
For now…because this place isn't home either.