Chapter 21 Naughty Kitty
Celene’s POV
My kitchen... my playes and sink... Someone had been in my kitchen.
I stared at the kitchen like I was waiting for the ghost of Christmas past to crawl out of one of the cabinets, fear bubbling through my veins.
I almost screamed. Instead, I talked to myself like a crazy person.
“Celeeeene,” I whispered shakily. “Are you going mad? Are you seeing things?”
I looked around the kitchen again. Nothing else was out of place. Everything looked normal. Too damn normal. It was like they knew exactly where i placed every utensil in my kitchen, almost like they lived with me.
Wait. Did I wash it?
Had I been so out of my head in the morning that I didn’t remember? No one came into my house except Maria, and I’d been with her the entire day.
“You washed the plate,” I muttered. “You washed the damn plate, Celene. Stop thinking crazy thoughts. You washed it and just don’t remember. It’s fine. It happens, right? Right?”
I nodded to myself like that settled it.
“I just need to sleep. That’s it. I’ll sleep, and then I’ll be alright.”
After my quick pep talk, I finished my lunch and crawled into bed.
Sleep didn’t come easily.
I tossed and turned, my thoughts scattered and restless. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t shake the eerie, unsettling feeling that I was being watched.
I abruptly sat up and flicked on the lights.
It wasn’t fully dark outside yet, but it wasn’t bright either. Something about the in-between light made my skin crawl. The harsh fluorescent glow chased away whatever fragile sleep I’d been trying to slowly cultivate behind my eyes, which only irritated me more. I looked around my room for good measure. Nothing was out of place, which unsettled me.
“It’s either I’m sleep-deprived and losing my memory,” I whispered, “or there’s something in my house. I choose sleep-deprived.”
With that declaration, I turned the lights back off and lay down again, counting sheep backwards.
Eventually, I slipped into an uneasy sleep, my soft black sheets soothing my tightly wound body.
Hazy images filled my mind with images of my father, who lived three states away, and my late mother.
I knew I was dreaming, yet everything felt painfully real.
I missed them. My mum had died six years ago, and my father, unable to handle her loss, had moved states to start over. He found a new job. He was doing better. I loved that for him. But it didn’t erase the loneliness.
I never told him that part.
If I did, he’d come running back, drowning in guilt all over again. I couldn’t watch him spiral like he had after Mum died. I refuse to do that to him.
Even knowing it was a dream, seeing him like that made my chest ache. I wanted to cling to him and weep.
He wore his usual, everyday clothes, a white singlet, a flannel shirt, worn jeans, sandals. His salt-and-pepper hair fell messily around his face, nearly hiding eyes lined with stress and age.
Even in my dream, I could see the new wrinkles I’d noticed during our last video call.
I reached out to brush the hair away from his face, then hesitated, remembering it wasn’t real.
“I miss you,” I whispered, hoping...ridiculously, that he could hear me.
The light around him began to fade, his form retreating into shadows. Even then, his hands stretched toward me like he was trying to hold on.
I reached back, trying to hold on to him a little longer, to touch my mum who stood beside him, smiling... I wanted... I needed...
A sound snapped me awake!
I gasped, my heart slamming as I jolted upright.
“Who’s there?” I called, my voice thick with sleep.
No answer.
My room looked exactly the same. Confused, I asked again, “Is anyone there?”
Silence.
I shook my head and rolled my eyes.
“What am I doing? Playing Ouija board?” It felt very unsettling, especially since I just dreamt about my late mother. Sounds and moving objects were never a good sign. I laid back down, forcing myself to try again.
Thirty restless minutes later, I gave up.
I walked out of my room and paused at the kitchen doorway, scanning the space before stepping in. I filled a cup with water and swallowed it down with some aspirin, my head beginning to throb.
“That’s what you get for having an active imagination, Celene Luther,” I muttered. “Now your head’s banging.”
I turned back toward my room, planning to shower and take a walk, anything to clear my head.
I stopped dead in the doorway of my bedroom.
I blinked.
Rubbed my eyes with both hands.
On my bed—on the bed I had just left few seconds ago—sat a single black rose, neatly placed on top a black envelope.
Fear flooded me. Real, absolute terror.
Goosebumps erupted across my skin as my gaze darted from the bed to the door, then around the room. My feet refused to move.
Someone had been here. In my room...
Blood rushed to my head, my thoughts roaring as my headache doubled in intensity.
Somehow, I forced myself forward. My hands shook as I lifted the envelope from beneath the rose.
I opened it and read aloud.
WHO DO YOU MISS, KITTEN?
My confusion was total.
Who did I miss? What did that even mean? And why did this person care? And kitten? A nickname, really?
I needed to call the police. This was breaking and entering. This was stalking.
I rushed into the living room for my phone—only to find it unplugged from where I had charged it..
Another envelope sat beneath it.
My hands trembled as I picked it up.
DON’T BE A NAUGHTY KITTY. DON’T CALL THE POLICE. GOOD GIRLS GET PRESENTS. NAUGHTY KITTIES GET PUNISHED.
I stared at the notes like they were some twisted scripture, and I didn’t belong in it.
If I couldn’t call the police, could I call Maria?
No. Terrible idea. She’d panic, talk, make noise—and that would only put her in danger.
I wasn’t leaving my house either.
“Maybe this is some stupid sorority boys trying to scare me,” I muttered weakly. “I won’t fall for that rubbish.”
I tore the notes apart, ripped the rose to shreds, and dumped everything into the trash.
I pointedly avoided looking at the kitchen window as it swung open in the wind.
Even though I knew...
I had never opened it.