Samantha
I felt insane. I looked insane. I was insane. Everything about what I was doing not only screamed crazy, it was also illegal. Why had I let Rachel talk me in to going to that psychic? I didn’t even believe in psychics! I don’t. Present tense. So why was I standing in a graveyard, in the middle of the night, sweating like a pig, digging up my dead best friend? Because I was insane.
This was exactly why I didn’t have a boyfriend.
“Oh come oooooon,” Rachel said, flipping her auburn hair and tugging my hand, “it will be fun. And helpful! Dani would totally want you to move on and find a new best friend and live your life.” The street we were on was unfamiliar to me and as the sun began to set a frigid chill crept over my skin.
Rachel had always been the third wheel to my friendship with Danielle; we always considered her annoying and way too in to herself. Not that Danielle wasn’t in to herself. Not that I would EVER tell Danielle I thought she was in to herself. The rub was that Rachel remained the only person in the whole Olympia area that still spoke to me. Besides my parents and big brother, but that doesn’t really count. Everyone else blamed me for Danielle’s suicide.
If we hadn’t had the biggest fight of our friendship in front of EVERYONE in the cafeteria things might be different.
“Besides,” Rachel drawled on, “it’s been almost three months and seriously you need to snap out of it. Prom Queen elections are coming up and I need you to help me run!”
We stopped at a store with a black façade and the name “Madame Yosemite’s Shop of Wonders” scrawled in silver, glittery paint across the front. How original. Rachel ushered me inside where a man with a curtain of greasy black hair leaned against a glass counter that held rows of healing crystals. The walls were lined with shelves of books all pertaining to the supernatural. Tarot cards and wee gee boards were on sale on a spinning display rack. The whole interior was dimly lit and painted in black.
“We’ve got a 9 o’clock appointment,” Rachel said to the cashier.
He jabbed his thumb toward the back wall, which was actually a giant, heavy, black velvet curtain. Rachel flipped her hair again and dragged me toward the curtain struggling to pull it back, using all the weight of her tiny frame.
A woman in an over sized, multi colored, sequined dress and head matching head wrap sat at a round table covered by a purple velvet cloth. She motioned for us to sit and said in a creaky voice, “Welcome children, I am Madame Yosemite.” I couldn’t help an eye roll.
She read us each our cards. Rachel hung on every word while sat back, trying to stay mildly interested. I was just glad Danielle hadn’t come up yet. Then she pulled out a small crystal ball, placing it on a gold stand.
Madame Yosemite turned to me, “You non-believer,” she said, “you’re in for a big surprise tonight,” she held her hand over the ball as it started to smoke and glow, “Danielle needs your help.” I felt the muscles in my stomach tighten, it hurt to hear her name out loud, “you have to go to her, now. She needs you.”
I stared blankly at Madame Yosemite, “I can’t. She’s gone; she’s dead.” I said the words bluntly, annoyed at the thick eyes lashes and caked on make up Madame Yosemite wore.
She scoffed, “being gone is not so much the same as being dead. Danielle may be dead, but she still needs your help. You have to go to the cemetery, she’ll be there.”
“Of course she’ll be there, she was buried there!” I yelled.
I stood up sharply, knocking the table and sending the crystal ball rolling off to the floor. I stormed out, Rachel sharp at my heels. I attempted to block out her annoying apologies on the ride home. I dropped her off, thankful for the silence, then decided to ride around for a bit. I needed to clear my mind and driving always calmed me down.
I didn’t have a destination in mind, I just rode along, absentmindedly turning left or right. Then I found myself parked at the cemetery. I sat there for a long time, turning Madame Yosemite’s words over in my mind. That’s when I remembered my dad had left his yard work equipment in my trunk.
The shovel hit the once shiny shell of the coffin, now scratched with dirt. “Danielle,” I said, “if you’re really in there then I take back every thing I said about psychics being crazy.” I tossed the shovel out of the hole I was now standing in and stepped back, “I mean you died, I was at your funeral. You couldn’t possibly be here now. But she said you were and… it’s been hard to say good-bye. Not to mention that all I think about these days is you and the last time we saw each other… I shouldn’t have yelled.” I felt the tears threatening at the back of my eyes and shook my head.
I sighed. Not only was I breaking the law, now I was talking to myself. She’s not here, not really, I told myself, Dani is dead. I stared down at the coffin wondering if I should open it. Could I really handle seeing her rotting corpse? I wanted closure, but this felt more like a desperate attempt to get my best friend back. And insanity, it felt like a whole lot of insanity.
Then I heard a knock. I looked around to see if anyone else was there, but cemeteries aren’t exactly popular hang outs-unless your name is Buffy. I heard the knock again and this time someone spoke, their voice muffled, “Sam? Sam is that you?”
I did the only logical thing to do, I screamed. Panic stricken I scrambled out of the hole, collapsing onto the cold, crisp grass. My heart pounded as adrenaline coursed through me. Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God. My mind raced: it couldn’t be her. How could it be her? There was no possible way it could be her! It had to be some sort of monster mimicking her voice or something! I didn’t know what to do; I hadn’t exactly been in a situation like that before. I finally gathered my courage and peeked over the edge of the grave at the coffin.
A moment of silence passed and I contemplated running. Then I thought, what if she is in there? What if I don’t open the coffin, rebury it and Danielle is in there, alive? I didn’t want to be the girl in the horror movie that everyone screams at to “run you stupid bitch, run,” but something was in there. Whether it was Danielle or not, something was definitely in there. And I had come all the way out to the cemetery because a psychic, who charges $40 an hour, told me to.
I grabbed the shovel and reached it down into the grave, catching the lip of the coffin lid I began to pry it open inch by inch. That’s when I saw a hand with pink sparkly painted finger nails pop out, pushing against the coffin lid. I jumped and fell back, tripping over a rock and landing in the grass again, and watched as a very alive Danielle stood up out of the coffin, brushing dirt off of her black dress.
“What am I doing here?” she asked, tossing her hands up in exasperation.
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The End...of Chapter Two
Any reviews would totally rock!
-RL
