Camelia Day lay on her bed, earphones plugged in her ears with no music playing. The residence was nearly empty, everybody having gone to the Halloween party at Joy Kidd, ignoring the weatherman’s forecast of a storm heading fast toward Fredericton. That’s where our interview began – Camelia and me in her room.
“I’ll see Sophie tomorrow, but she’ll be out of commission after a night at Joy Kidd,” said Camelia. “But even without her, we still might see something. I’m glad you’re here. I thought that maybe you could help after I read that séance bit in The Bruns in April.”
A flash of lightning briefly lit up the dark sky outside Camelia’s window – followed by a crack of thunder. The lights in the dorm flickered once, then twice and then went completely off. I was waiting to see if the ghost would present itself, but I wasn’t sure.
Camelia fidgeted. She slid down on her phone screen and turned the flashlight on. We seemed to be the only ones that had lost power; I could see the bright lights from the ongoing party if I looked out Camelia’s window.
She went over and locked the room door, and went back to her bed. As soon as she touched the bed, my ears were assaulted by a scream so horrifically loud I burst my eardrum. The screaming stopped, and was replaced by a moaning. I turned to Camelia, and she looked rather nonplussed. The moaning stopped.
Camelia took her earphones out of her ears.
“This happens rather often,” she explained. “I’m surprised it happened with you here – it didn’t for the proctor.”
She listened, cocking her ear, listening for the slightest sign that the scream wasn’t imagined. The scream came again.
“I wish the damn thing would just shut up! Don’t worry, it gets even worse – watch this,” Camelia said, turning to the door.
She unlocked it and walked casually outside. Despite her confidence, I could tell she was uneasy. After all, I was only in my first few months as a member of the Séances in the SUB team. I was hired after the mysterious disappearance of two reporters last year.
I heard sniffling coming from one end of the hall and Camelia pointed her light in that direction.
“Hello?” The sniffling continued. I followed Camelia into the hall and saw someone laying crumpled on the ground.
“Megan?” called Camelia. She ran and wrapped her arms around the small girl. “Megan what happened?”
Megan jumped the moment Camelia’s hands touched her and screamed again. “It’s me! It’s Camelia, what in the world happened?”
“Oh, Camelia.” She relaxed and sat up again. “There’s something in here! I came out of my room and it was standing right there – all white. I screamed and tried to go back into my room but it started coming towards me and then it just… disappeared when you opened your door!”
Anybody else might have thought Megan had imagined all of this – but the experiences Camelia had explained when she called me in to investigate seemed pretty based.
“Come on. We have to get out of here.” She helped Megan up and they headed to the stairs. I followed along behind.
We stumbled down the stairs. I half expected something to jump out at us at any moment. Camelia breathed a sigh of relief when we took the last step to the ground floor.
Then the breath got sucked right back into her when she saw what was standing at the end of the hall – right in front of the door and right on cue, another crack of thunder boomed through the sky.
Another bloodcurdling scream from Megan.
The thing was big. That was the first thing I noticed. Camelia hadn’t seen it before, only sensed it and seen the ectoplasmic trails, so I wasn’t prepared for the translucent figure before me. It was wearing a UNB Reds jersey which was dotted with red spatter. His right hand was actually dripping with blood. It seemed to drip onto the floor in slow motion. His left hand clutched a half empty cider bottle.
Camelia’s eyes widened as we looked at the walls around the spectre – there was blood on the floor, on the walls, everywhere.
The thing started moving towards us, just sort of gliding smoothly over the blood-slick floor.
Camelia and Megan backed right into the wall and the creature was right in front of them, his red eyes staring right at them.
Camelia shivered and Megan flung her arms around her, wailing, and Camelia gladly hugged her back, waiting for the impact.
But it never came.
“Dude can you help me mop this up? I came over from Joy Kidd, and I spilled the cider all over the floor,” he said. I knelt down and ran a finger through the red liquid on the floor, and brought it to my lips. It was cider. But the green slime that was beginning to drip from the vent above
There was only a split second between the long-fingered hand punching through the vent cover and Camelia’s disappearance. It grabbed her by the ponytail and dragged her into the vents.
I still haven’t been able to find her. Megan and the guy from Joy Kidd tried to help me, but there was only ectoplasm. I was sad to lose someone on my first SITS case, but I will post an update if I find out anything else about Camelia Day.