Papercut

The evening had just settled in and I could see the beautiful Sun as it sat on the curved horizon. I had recently become a housemaid or housekeeper for a wealthy family known as The Chateaus. It was my second day, so I felt pretty confident in my abilities of housekeeping. Prior to my job, I practiced by cleaning hotels and even learned from my auntie, a retired maid. As I continued to gaze out of the quartz framed window pane I heard Mrs. Chateau call my name.

"Miss Amelia, I am I need of your services!" She cried from the opposite side of the ballroom.

"Yes, Lady Chateau?"

I answered. "You've missed a spot. I told you I wanted this entire ballroom clean and you left a speck of dust on the family grand piano!"

As she continued to scold me I started to stare and marvel at the marble coated instrument. It glistened as the light from the ceiling's chandelier bounced off of its surface and poured into my irises, it was beautiful. Eventually, I stopped daydreaming and realized that I had not stopped being scolded.

"What nerve! This is a two-billion-dollar piano and you think you can just leave it all filthy? I expect this to be handled by the time I get back. Do I make myself clear?!"

With a dejected look on my face, I mumbled.

"Yes, Lady Chateau."

She yelled at me again, "Speak up because I don't think I heard you!"

I spoke a little louder this time.

"I said yes Lady Chateau, I won't be so careless next time. I'm sorry for my laziness."

She looked at me with pity.

"Next time it won't be sorry."

Deep down I wanted to talk back but I know that probably would've resulted in me getting fired, but I couldn't let that happen because I needed the extra income. So I dealt with the verbal abuse that she'd been ruthlessly beating me with.

"Lady Chateau?"

I tried to ask her a question and she gave me a look, so I continued on with my curiosity.

" Who're these people, with Mr. Chateau, in the paintings on the wall, if you wouldn't mind madam."

She answered me with a firm and sassy attitude.

" If you must know, it's my husband's ex-wife and his daughter. They passed away two years ago and he doesn't like to talk about the subject so I suggest you stop asking questions and get back to your work."

I responded to her sassiness with a calm voice.

"Sorry Lady Chateau for asking."

In her crimson ruby heels, she walked out from the ballroom, so I continued my cleaning. An hour had passed by and I had just finished my cleaning of the ballroom. I looked out the window and it seemed dark out, it was maybe around seven or eight hundred hours. I had heard Lady Chateau call my name from the other room on the opposite side of the hall.

" Miss Amelia!"

I quickly turned around and begun to fast walk as to not keep her waiting.

"I'm coming, Lady Chateau!"

It took me about fifteen seconds to walk down such a lengthy hall, but at last, I'd arrived at the door of the master bedroom. I knocked, "Lady Chateau! I'm making my way in."

I opened the door to see her fixing her makeup in the mirror and while she was doing her eyelashes she asked of me a task.

"Miss Amelia, there are plants in the private library. I'm giving you permission to enter so you can go water them. Here."

Lady Chateau handed me a watering pail that felt half empty. She rushed me since her and Mr. Chateau were to leave to go to a fancy rendezvous, on a yacht for the wealthy.

"No dilly-dallying now. Escort yourself from the room."

I nodded my head so she knew that I understood her clearly and as asked, I walked out of the room. I started to walk down the long hall once again as I began to think to myself.

"I wonder where Mr. Chateau is, I haven't seen him all today. He's probably getting all fixed up for the party gathering."

As I've said once before, it was a long hallway and I could've sworn I'd been walking for what felt like half an hour. Mr. and Mrs. C had already left to the ball and I'd forgotten my way to the library. The home of the Chateaus is at least twice the size of a normal mansion and I figured that eventually I'd get lost sooner or later in this house. I kept walking, passing multiple doors as the sound of footsteps from my loafers echoed through the halls. The lights began to get dimmer the deeper in the hallway you went, so it wasn't easy navigation aside from it being a straight line. My legs began to get tired so I'd just turned and opened a random door, luckily it was the library and the plants were a straight shot. They were right across the room so I let out a sigh of relief.

"Finally! My legs feel like wet socks."

I started to make my way across the room when I thought I heard a voice, it sounded like that of a little girl.

"Amelia..?"

I stopped, centimeters in front of the plants, before I began to freak out because this time I was for certain that I heard it. I heard it once more and it sounded like it was coming from the direction of the plants.

"You don't like this place, do you?"

As the voices came from that direction the leaves of the plants began to make gestures as if the sound I was hearing was coming from the plants themselves. It kept speaking and in doing so, its voice became more clear and less distorted as it started to say full sentences.

" Father didn't like us. He put me and mommy away so we couldn't be happy anymore. I don't like the other side, it's cold here and I just want to go home. Help me, Amelia, before father sends you away too. When he gets tired of his old toys he'll throw them in the trash like me and mommy."

I had felt like I was losing my mind and was paralyzed with fear, I could barely speak.

"W-What-tt?"

The voice began to get a bit higher, almost as if she was getting angry with me and it got louder as well.

"You won't help me? I'LL MAKE YOU PLAY WITH ME AND WE CAN BE FRIENDS FOREVER AND EVER AND EVER."

As she finished up her sentence I thought I saw a ghost rise from the plants and impaled with fear, I dropped the pail of water, spilling it on the quartz crystal floor.

I quickly turned around and ran for the door, not making it at least a foot away, and slipped due to the stream of water that had trickled in my direction.

KRUNCH!

I had twisted my left ankle and scr.a.p.ed the entire bottom of my right arm, effectively ripping the sleeve from my white maiden's dress. Blood began to drip down my arm and I turned my head around to see the specter phasing through bookshelves at a rapid pace in my direction.

"My arm. It feels numb and my ankle, I can't."

The spirit was almost upon me when I used my left arm to violently snap my ankle back into place and then I forced myself to stand. I had finally managed to completely stand up before I was swiftly tackled by the ghost. I was pushed against a wall, but she'd entered my body, possessing me. She tried to control me, but I fought desperately for dominance. After about fifteen seconds of fighting for control, my body stopped, becoming immobile, standing, as if it were a statue. My heart has stopped and my insides felt cold but I was still alive from what I could tell. The door in front of me was open and to my surprise, I hadn't noticed Mr. Chateau who'd been standing there for an amount of time that I was ignorant to. With a disgusted look, he told me,

"What you have seen and what you know must be purged. You know too much of my past and it's best I send you to the other side."

From his pocket, he'd pulled out a diamond-encrusted pistol as it's shine glistened from the little amount of moonlight that shone through a single window.

PWAH!

A flash. A single bullet had thrust my head back to the surface behind me, bouncing my skull off of the wall, leaving a splash of blood to stain. He lowered his firearm and began putting it back into his pocket before turning around to leave the library. Mr. Chateau has heard a slushing noise and swiftly did a complete 360 to see what was behind him. It was the noise of my head, the bullet was fading away as the hole in my forehead began to heal with steam seeping from it. The hole was fully healed as if I'd never gotten shot initially and I stood up once again. This time around I had lost control, I thought it was me being possessed but it was more simple than what I expected. My soul had merged with that of the specter and I became a hive of two minds. With a horrified expression, Mr. Chateau had again drawn his firearm and let from it, a bullet once more. The bullet had zipped through the air only before stopping in front of my nose, I had focused my vision on it, stopping it and robbing it of its velocity. The projectile fell to the floor and I gave Mr. Chateau the most fear-inducing stare that seemed to cause his body to seize up. He seemed petrified but was clearly still breathing and shaking, but couldn't move so I began to slowly walk over to him. He tried to fight it, but it was pointless, his physical capacity wasn't enough to break free of the fear he'd been injected with. Within a few seconds, I was standing in front of him, our faces only centimeters away.

"Wanna know something, Mr. C?"

I whispered in his ear. I'd made my arm untouchable by physical means and slowly put it through his gut and as it phased through, I could feel my cold essence begin to spread into his warm body. From the inside of his stomach to the surface of his skin, his body began to quickly envelope itself in ice so cold the room around us began to freeze. The man had become a statue of ice and frost, incapable of moving, I'd assumed that he was dead.