“Please, hurry before Hillary comes.”
“Hillary? What did she do to you?”
“See for yourself,” Hillary said jumping in front of Kathy.
Kathy screamed, startled by Hillary’s sudden appearance.
“Mom, get her, get her,” Caleigh yelled.
Kathy was breathing heavily. She didn’t understand what was happening.
“Here’s Caleigh, Mom,” Hillary said, pushing aside some of the containers.
Kathy gasped and let out a high-pitched squealing sound.
“Caleigh?” she asked, leaning in closer to pull off the mask. But there was no mask.
“Oh my God!” she shrieked hysterically. Her knees became weak and she fell to the floor, almost on top of Caleigh. She was crying hard and shaking like a leaf. It was hard to think, as if her brain had stopped functioning. She could hear Caleigh calling to her, crying for her, but it took all of her effort to reply.
Finally, she said “what...what happened to you?”
Kathy forced herself to look at Caleigh’s disfigured, bloodied, blistered face. She gasped again she stared at Caleigh’s dry, lidless eyes.
“Hillary...” Caleigh cried, “I...I can’t move....”
“What did you do?” Kathy shouted, turning to Hillary. She stood up, grabbed Hillary by her tee shirt collar and shoved her back violently.
“What did you do?” she screamed loudly, anguished.
Hillary lost her balance and fell back. Her face turned beet red with anger.
“Keep your hands off me!” she shouted back furiously.
Hillary lifted the quilt and threw it violently to the side, revealing the bloodied remains and the knife, which she snatched up.
Kathy’s eyes widened when she saw the pile...the bones, the bits of flesh, the entrails...all within Joshua’s blood-soaked clothing.
“NOOOOOOO!” she wailed sorrowfully, dropping to her knees and lifting up Joshua’s little red fire engine shirt—the same shirt she had put on him earlier. She shook her head back and forth and opened her mouth as if she was going to say something, but nothing came out for a long while.
“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” she finally lamented, hugging Joshua’s shirt. She began sobbing uncontrollably.
“Mom!” Caleigh shouted, “Please help me!”
Kathy felt too sick, too weak to even move. The air felt too thick to breathe. Kathy struggled to catch her breath. She thought for sure she would have a heart attack. She trembled helplessly where she was.
“Please, Mommy,” Caleigh’s voice piteously squeaked.
“Caleigh,” Kathy replied, “get up...get up, Caleigh….”
“I can’t,” Caleigh cried, “I can’t move...I can’t feel my body...I’m, I’m—”
“Paralyzed,” Hillary said, finishing her sentence.
“Why, Hillary?” Kathy cried sadly, “why did you do this?”
Hillary laughed maniacally. It sent a shiver up Kathy’s spine.
“Why do you think?” she said angrily when she finally stopped laughing.
“You’re sick, you need help...I should have taken you to someone, I should have—”
“Shut up!” Hillary screamed, “You should have stopped him from hurting me, that’s what you should have done.”
“Please, Mommy....” Caleigh begged.
“No, Caleigh, Mom’s not going to help you. She didn’t help me...she’s not going to help you.”
“Yes, Caleigh, I’ll make it right.”
“Ha!” Hillary exclaimed, “It’s too late to make anything right now.”
Kathy leaned forward and hugged Caleigh as they sobbed in unison.
“I’ll get help,” she said softly as she released Caleigh’s body and stood up slowly. Hillary stood in her way.
“No, Hillary,” Kathy begged, “Please...she needs help.”
“She needs help...I needed help...did it ever occur to you that you need help?”
Kathy tried to step around Hillary, but Hillary blocked her way again.
“Please,” Kathy sobbed, “no more, Hillary...look at what you’ve done....”
“Not me…you did this,” Hillary replied, “you and Dad...it’s not my fault, it’s not my fault,” she shouted.
Kathy pushed her way passed Hillary and began running toward the stairs. As expected, Hillary caught up in no time at all, used all of her weight to ram into Kathy and knocked them both to the floor. Her mother squirmed under her body, trying to stand.
Kill her...do it now!
“Nooooo!” Hillary shouted, “I can’t, I can’t....”
“Can’t what?” her mother asked nervously.
Hillary couldn’t think straight over Caleigh’s shouting and whimpering.
“Shut up Caleigh, or I’ll kill Mom, you know I’ll do it!”
“No,” Caleigh cried, “please don’t hurt her.”
KILL HER, the voice roared in Hillary’s head.
“I CAN’T!” Hillary shouted. Too much was happening. She didn’t feel well. She needed to throw up.
Kathy stood up slowly and began running for the stairs. Once again, Hillary pounced on her. They wrestled on the steps until Hillary stabbed the knife deep into her thigh. Kathy let out a sharp, loud scream.
“Mommmmmm,” Caleigh sobbed.
Hillary pulled the knife out and watched the blood pour out of the wound.
“If you try to run, if you try to call for help, I’ll kill Caleigh,” she threatened, “I’ll cut off her head just like I cut off Dad’s head...and Joshua’s.”
“Joshua…” Kathy cried as she thought about the body parts she had seen by his clothing. But she didn’t see his head. Where was his little head?
“Did you like the way he tasted?” Hillary asked sneeringly.
Kathy gasped. The realization hit her like a locomotive. A mournful groan escaped her mouth before she doubled over and hurled up everything she had eaten.
“Aww,” Hillary said, “all that good food, wasted.”
Caleigh was appalled to hear that her mother had eaten parts of her brother. She whimpered softly as she remembered how horribly he had died.
“Walk,” Hillary demanded, after Kathy had stopped throwing up. She prompted Kathy to return to Caleigh’s side. Kathy’s legs felt like rubber as she walked across the basement. She didn’t know how she had managed.
“Sit on the floor,” Hillary said and Kathy was happy to comply. She didn’t know how much longer her wobbly legs could support her weight.
“You’re going to help me...understand?”
Kathy nodded slowly. Her eyes were dull and blank as if her spirit had abandoned her.
“I need you to help me carry Caleigh upstairs...to her room.”
Kathy stared catatonically at Hillary. Caleigh’s whimpering grew silent. She heard what Hillary had said and was glad that she would be moved out of the basement. Maybe Hillary would let her mother help her now.
“Grab her feet,” Hillary directed, as she positioned herself by Caleigh’s head, stooped down and locked her forearms beneath her underarms. She was still clutching the knife in her hands.
“Grab her feet,” Hillary repeated louder and her mother slowly moved closer to Caleigh and did as she was told. Hillary stood up and compelled her mother to do the same. Kathy struggled to get to her feet but managed somehow.
“If you do anything stupid,” Hillary warned, “I’ll slice her throat open. Understand?”
Kathy nodded robotically.
“Now walk. Hurry, she’s heavy.”
Hillary and Kathy carried Caleigh’s limp body up the basement stairs then rested a moment before proceeding. When they finally got her up to her room, Kathy dropped her bound legs to the floor and began crying. Under the bright lighting from Caleigh’s room, she could see every wound, every blister, and every single speck of blood perfectly clear. She didn’t really look like Caleigh at all, with her bruised, swollen face. Her eyes were the worst. They were so dry that her irises looked dull
and clouded and her pupils were dimpled inward. Were it not for her frequent moaning, Kathy would have thought she had died. It broke her heart to see her youngest daughter like that. How she must have suffered….
Hillary dragged Caleigh to the far left side of her bedroom and propped her upper body against the wall in an upright position.
Kathy sat on Caleigh’s bed on the opposite side of the room. She was afraid that she might faint.
“Good,” Hillary said to her mother, “Just watch, don’t move.”
“I don’t feel well,” Caleigh cried out and began moaning loudly.
Hillary placed the dangling piece of duct tape back over Caleigh’s mouth, using just a few strips of the masking tape to hold it in place. It merely partially covered her mouth, but it was better than nothing. There was no longer a need to secure it properly. She was just tired of hearing Caleigh’s noise. Her head hurt so bad it was throbbing.
“Are you cold?” Hillary asked, “Why do you have goose bumps?”
Caleigh’s goose bumps had nothing to do with the fact that it was nearly twenty degrees cooler up in her room than where she had been crammed behind the hot water heater and boiler. Rather, Caleigh’s body had given up.
“Yet, you’re sweating too...are you confused?” Hillary joked.
“She needs help,” Kathy whimpered, “please...please, Hillary.”
Caleigh knew she was close to the end. She didn’t know how much longer she could go without medical attention, but she knew that this was one of those now-or-never moments. She began shrieking under the tape, and shaking her head. She was trying to say something, but her words, her proclamation of love to her mother, was undecipherable.
Hillary could see that Caleigh was growing desperate. She thought that she was begging for her life.
“Haven’t you caused enough pain, Hillary?” her mother cried. She grabbed Caleigh’s pillow and hugged it against her chest, like a child with a security blanket.
The floor underneath Caleigh became wet as she emptied her bladder, unbeknownst to her.
“Eww,” Hillary said scornfully, “Caleigh, you’re an animal. Don’t you smell bad enough already?”
“She’s going to die,” Kathy cried, feeling utterly helpless. She rocked back and forth nervously, clutching Caleigh’s pillow tightly.
“Yes. Yes she is...” Hillary said fiendishly, brandishing the knife.
The time had come. She’d had enough fun with Caleigh. She had been hoping to prolong her suffering but now she had someone else to torture. She would make her mother watch as she killed her sister.
Caleigh looked up her Hillary. Her red-rimmed, dry eyes followed her sister’s slow movement. They looked even more sunken in than before, especially within the puffy, dark circles underneath.
“It’s not too late,” her mother pleaded desperately, rocking, rocking…comforting her pillow baby.
“Shut up!” Hillary shouted, turning to face her distraught mother.
Caleigh seemed to be mimicking her mother’s pleas. Her cries grew more and more frantic, desperate. Without warning, Hillary walked over to her right side, shoved the knife deep into her upper arm and twisted it fiercely. Caleigh felt it immediately. Even partially muffled by the tape, her agonizing scream was loud and raucous. It made Kathy drop the pillow and cover her ears with her hands.
Hillary gave the knife a final sharp twist before prying it free from Caleigh’s arm. Blood poured out of the opening like a fountain. Hillary smiled as she crouched down and stuck her bloodied right index finger into the seeping hole. She twisted her finger within the wound, digging her sharp nail into Caleigh’s severed muscle. She poked her finger in and out of the hole, relishing in the squishy wet sound it made, while Caleigh—and Kathy—cried out.
Hillary pulled out her finger and licked off the bright red blood that covered it. It was a taste she had come to love and she wanted more. She dropped the knife and put her lips over the cut, lapping up the blood as it spilled into her mouth. She bit down on the lesion, tearing the wound with her teeth. She bit off a piece of Caleigh’s flesh, then another further down her arm and another on her leg. She continued to bite various parts of her sister’s body as if sampling a delicacy.
Kathy watched on in terror, unable to move. She was back to hugging the pillow, but instead of rocking back and forth, had her nails dug deep into it. Her knuckles were white from clenching her fists so tightly.
Caleigh was crying and screaming. She had only felt the bites on her upper arm, but knew that Hillary was slowly devouring her body, piece by piece. Hillary was licking up the streams of blood that flowed from Caleigh’s wounds. Caleigh shook her head, crying out, begging Hillary for mercy.
Hillary kneeled before Caleigh and ripped the tape completely off her face. There was no longer a need for it. Caleigh would soon be silent for good.
“Please let me go,” Caleigh begged, “It’s not too late, no one will know it was you, I won’t tell anyone, I won’t tell....”
Hillary just shook her head slowly, apathetically. She leaned forward and gnashed her teeth into one of the lacerations on Caleigh’s bruised face. Caleigh let out an ear-piercing scream as she turned her head away. With her teeth, Hillary shredded the tender flesh on Caleigh’s face like pulled pork. The skin that once covered her cheek flapped down. Hillary could see straight to Caleigh’s cheekbone. Blood gushed from the opening like a raging river.
“Pleaasseeeee,” Caleigh wailed, “don’t do this to me...don’t do this to me, Hillary...please, please don’t—”
Hillary smiled. Her eyes were feral. She picked up the knife and slit Caleigh’s throat from left to right. Caleigh gasped and choked on her garbled words. Hillary put her mouth to Caleigh’s throat and drank. Her sister made a noisy gurgling sound. She could feel Caleigh’s pulse throbbing, strong at first then weakening. She could feel Caleigh dying. She pulled away and looked at her little sister. Nope, she was not so pretty anymore.
Kathy sobbed heavily. The pillow was damp with her tears. Hillary looked coldly at her.
“Why is there blood on your lip?” she joked, “Did you drink from Caleigh too?”
Kathy hadn’t even realized that she had bit her lip badly. She didn’t even feel it.
“Come on,” Hillary summoned her, “show’s over. Let’s go downstairs.”
Kathy couldn’t move. She cringed in place on Caleigh’s bed, unable to comply with Hillary’s command.
“Let’s go,” Hillary repeated loudly. She held up the knife for Kathy to see.
Kathy tried to stand. Her legs were too shaky.
“I...I can’t,” she cried, “I can’t.”
Hillary approached her mother angrily and slashed the right side of her face.
“How ‘bout now?” she yelled, “you think you can get up now?”
Kathy grabbed at her face as she shrieked in pain. She cowered but could do no more to avoid Hillary’s wrath. It was as if she were paralyzed with fear.
“Let’s go!” Hillary shouted, growing incensed by her mother’s disobedience.
Kathy cringed in fear, awaiting the next strike.
“You never listen to me!” Hillary roared, her big, red, blood-stained mouth making her look even more terrifying.
“CAN YOU HEAR ME?” Hillary’s threatening voice resonated loudly throughout the room.
She lunged forward and used the knife to slice the back of Kathy’s right ear. She did the same to her left ear, only making a deeper incision. Blood dripped down Kathy’s neck as she screamed loudly.
“CAN YOU HEEAAARRR MEEE? YOU’RE NOT LISTENING TO ME!” Hillary shouted into her mother’s right ear.
Letting the knife drop to the floor, Hillary stepped in front of her mother and grabbed a hold of her ears—one in each hand. She dug her fingernails deeply into the bleeding lacerations, squeezed her hands to grasp each ear firmly then yanked them forward savagely.
“You’re gonna hear me,” Hillary hissed, “you’re gonna hear me….”<
br />
What Kathy mostly heard was the ripping sound of her ears being torn from her head. It seemed surreal to her. It couldn’t be happening. She was in the middle of a long, horrifying nightmare. She would wake up and find everyone in her family happy and healthy and alive....
Kathy could feel the pain; it was excruciating. Yet she couldn’t move. She was on the verge of going into shock. She was half-screaming, half-moaning and one hundred percent afraid of what Hillary would do to her next. She didn’t dare put up a fight, didn’t dare resist. She had seen for herself how brutally savage Hillary had become.
When her mother’s ears didn’t fully dislodge from her head, Hillary picked up the knife and used it to pry them off, puncturing one of her eardrums in the process. This time, not only did Kathy howl in pain, but she tried her best to protect her ears from further damage, to no avail. Hillary stabbed at her hands when they got in her way. Less than a minute later, Hillary had Kathy’s left ear in her hand.
“Now can you hear me, Mom?” Hillary shouted, launching the ear across the room and repositioning herself to remove the other one. Kathy was beside herself with pain, fear and grief. She was sweating profusely. She felt hot, then cold, then hot again. She took rapid, short breaths. She thought she was going to pass out. She was hoping, anyway.
Hillary was saying something, but Kathy couldn’t make out what it was. There was a sharp ringing sound in her ear. The next thing she knew, Hillary was holding her other ear in her hand. Kathy swayed, feeling woozy. She didn’t know if it was the blood loss, the diminished oxygen or her overwhelming fear, but before she could ponder it any further, she fell on her side upon Caleigh’s bed as everything faded to black.
~16~
It was just a dream, just as she had hoped...until she saw the blood all over her hands, all over the pillow, all over her shirt, all over the floor, all over Caleigh’s grotesque corpse. The ringing in her ear persisted. Her head felt heavy. She wanted to go back to sleep and never wake up again. She scanned the room for Hillary. There was no sign of her daughter. Slowly she climbed off Caleigh’s bed.
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