Innocence Lost

The elementary school stands dark. I walk the hallway. A little girl is missing. Adults move through the halls.

A teacher steps out of her classroom. Her face is pale. She asks whether the police found fingerprints inside. I lean toward my father and speak low. The worry about fingerprints feels wrong.

We enter the room. Chalk dust hangs in the air. Lockers line the wall. A sound comes from one of them. I open the door. The girl lies inside. She is not breathing.

The teacher who asked about fingerprints stands nearby. No one speaks. The hallway stays quiet.

I wake up

Beneath The Surface

    In the last light of day, I'm at my father's house. It's old and dark. I have a simple job: carry a bag of garbage to the kitchen. The shadows grow long and I feel scared, like a kid alone in the night. I see a ghost - a lady wearing an old-fashioned bonnet, drifting by the kitchen.

    I rush outside, spilling my fears to my dad. He steps inside and climbs the creaky staircase. I follow, my eyes adjusting to the dim interior, and there she is again, the ghostly lady, halfway up the stairs. My dad is at the top. I'm stuck at the bottom.

    Then, something strange. The ghost comes down the stairs and plants a deep, hard kiss on my lips. It leaves me shaken.

    Later, we swim in the nearby lake. The house ghosts, supposedly wiped out by my dad, are nowhere to be seen. But as we swim, something pulls him under. The ghosts are back, angry and looking for revenge. He's struggling, crying out for help.

    "I didn't mean for you to kill him!" I shout at the ghosts, but they don't listen. His last scream echoes as he's dragged under for the last time. The lake, still and silent, becomes his grave. Revenge, it seems, is served cold and deep.

I wake up.