I am you..

They entered through the main door, the woman and her two daughters. With flowing white togas, clinched at the waist, they looked like the ray of sunshine, I had been waiting for God knows how long.

“Mother, is this where we will live?” The younger one with golden locks, and the face of an angel spoke up.

The woman looked around with and expression of sorrow mixed with disdain.

“Yes, Runa this is our home now.”

The girls ran around the small home, which took not more than 10 steps to cover from one end to another. It was a stone house with low white ceilings and claustrophobic white walls. The only place divided was the bathroom with a cane door. The kitchen, bedroom and sitting area were seamless in this small home with no divisions.

Another entered through the main door, a priestess with religious symbols tattooed all over her arms and shaved head. She walked around the ten steps and crossed the length of this humble abode. She stopped right under the roof, where there was a small hole to stream sunlight through. She cocked her head towards the right, looked up at the roof, let the breeze from above wash over her shining and tattooed baldness and looked at the mother.

“This place is cursed!” she spoke.

“Cursed?! But we have to live here, there is no where else to go.” Said the woman in absolute despair, holding her two girls.

“I did not say that you have to move.” Said the priestess. “There is a restless spirit haunting this place, we need to get rid of it.”

“How do we do that?” asked the woman with tears in her eyes.

“We prepare for the ritual now, I have everything with me. I will need your help to set things up.”

They then set about to prepare for the ritual, and while I waited to write what comes next; I decided to look for the restless spirit. How difficult would it be to find a ghost in a house that can be covered in just 10 long strides? I looked in the bathroom first, nothing, went to the kitchen area, nothing, went to where they started the ritual and there standing in the watering hole. I saw her.

She did not belong here, this house was now theirs, the woman and her two girls and she needed to go.

I could hear the priestess chanting in the background, she had drawn strange religious symbols all over the wall and lit a fire in the centre of the house. She believed that only with the combustion of fire and water will the spirit leave this house.

As her voice grew louder, so did the fire become larger and thunder rolled outside.

The priestess came over to the watering hole to fill up the round vessel. I knew that when she does that final act of pouring water over fire, this soul would disappear from the house.

Shouldn’t I ask her, if she was ready to go? I looked back her, and she seemed scared. For a moment I felt pity, but then i realised that the dead have no place here in my story. This story was about the woman and her girls.

I gathered courage and asked her, “Are you ready to go?”

She spoke in tiny voice, “I don’t know. “

“You don’t have a choice, you can’t be a part of this tale” I reprimanded her.

I looked behind me, the priestess was poised with the vessel to pour water over fire and vanquish this ghost.

But wait, shouldn’t I ask her who she is, and how did she come into my tale.

I looked back at her and asked, “Who are you?”

And as I finished my sentence, I felt excruciating pain throughout my body, as if someone was trying to rip my very essence into shreds.

The priestess had poured water on fire, and the ghost spoke, “I am you.”