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Emily woke up in a daze. She didn’t exactly remember what had happened the previous night, only that it wasn't good. This had been her routine for quite a while now, ever since the persistent fog fully settled over her brain making her even more sluggish than she had been. Her body ached as she tried to roll over in her bed and sit up. She stared at the corner of her room. Behind the laundry that she never bothered to do, and the clutter she never bothered to clean, was a mirror. She still wasn’t sure exactly why she never threw a brick through it. She rolled over once more, hanging off over the side of her bed. She reached out to pry open a loose floorboard and pull out her journal, one of the few aspects of her routine that she bothered to keep. She opened it to the latest page and moved the pencil that she kept along with the journal down the page until she reached an empty line. She had long since forgotten what the exact date was. She didn’t go outside enough for it to actually matter anyways and she was always cold no matter what the season so the days became meaningless to her. On the next open line she wrote down ‘days clean:’ followed by a big, fat, ugly, zero. She tucked away her journal and once again curled up amongst her bedsheets. Considering the amount of light that came through her closed curtains it was probably around noon already, but no matter how bright it was, no light could illuminate anything in Emily’s life.
She spent most of the day like this, hiding away beneath her covers with just her daydreaming to entertain her. She thought about Rose. How many months had it been since she had seen her face, since she had held her, since Rose had pushed Emily’s hair out of her eyes and hugged her and told her that everything would be alright? She wondered what had come of her lost love. After Rose had been sent away to some far off facility to “fix” her, Emily was lonely, alone in a world that didn’t love her, full of people who didn’t love her, and she couldn’t even love herself. She hated this town. It was suffocating. That was the danger of a small town, everyone knows everyone, so everyone realizes when you suddenly stop showing up to school. Everyone notices the way that your parents act around you, the way your father’s face sinks, and his defined cheekbones convey just one message: “she is no longer welcome here”. She thought about her father a lot. The way that she remembered how he would tenderly hold her, guide her through the forest outside their town on days where they would go logging together. The pride and joy in eyes, that had vanished when he found out that Emily wasn’t who he thought she was. That his perfect little princess had broken the rules and that she was now less than human for doing so. He no longer talked to her, averted his gaze, fell silent at her mention. Emily liked it that way, at least she wouldn’t have to lie to him anymore.
By the time Emily snapped out of her haze. It was dark. It seemed like her mother didn’t bother to bring her food that day and since she couldn’t be bothered to leave her room, she didn’t eat. The cold ate away at her bones, pulverizing her flesh like an endless death, and in a way, Emily liked it. Maybe this was her punishment? Maybe this was simply her fate? Maybe she deserved this, and maybe, at the end of it, she would finally be beautiful? And if not, at least she wouldn’t be around to see it.
Suddenly, there came a knock at the door. It was slow and deliberate, not typical of her mother, but Emily was not in a state of mind to realize or process this. All she thought was that her Mother saw it fit to prolong her suffering by bringing her food, in some desperate hope that a false love was all that was needed to cure Emily. She ignored the knocking and curled deeper into her covers.
Again, the knocking came, but this time it was more insistent, like the only goal of the knocker was to get in. Emily ignored it once more, shutting her eyes tight as her hands curled around her blankets. The knock came a third time, this time a frantic pounding on the door.
It was at this point that Emily realized that it was most likely not her Mother, but her father. Maybe he had finally had enough of the shame of his family, and was going to finish the job that Emily had been slowly working towards. She relaxed a bit as the door was kicked down. However, it was not her Father, it was not her Mother either, it was… something. In her doorway stood a being clothed in her father’s clothes soaked with blood, its skin was rotting off of its hulking figure. Emily tried to process what she saw, but one could not blame her for taking a moment to realize that the figure in her doorway was her father who had somehow been transformed into what could only really be described as some sort of ghoul.
The ghoul slowly shambled towards her, arms outstretched in something that if Emily hadn’t known better would look almost like a hug, but no matter what form her father was in, he was incapable of doing such a thing. As it got closer, Emily didn’t run, she didn’t fight, she didn’t try to do any number of things that she could do, but instead clutched her black cat plushie to her chest. Rose had always liked black cats, in fact, the plushie was one of the last things that she had ever given Emily. As the ghoul's hands reached out to grab Emily, she somehow knew internally that the moment it touched her she would die. She felt the cold radiating off of its dead hands, the cold of death, a cold that she knew well, a cold that she was open and willing to embrace.
Just as the ghoulish hands were inches away from her face, there was a flash of blinding light as suddenly appeared out of seemingly nowhere a black cat, nearly identical to the plush in Emily’s hands. The light made the ghoul stumble backwards, being very clearly burned by the light emitted by the cat that now stood in front of Emily, guarding her. The cat turned around, and in a voice that Emily immediately recognized said, “RUN”.
The next few moments were a blur. One moment she was in her bed, the next she was out of her second story window and the next, she was on the ground behind her house and running into the forest. Her lungs were on fire as she ran, yet she was still cold, stumbling over roots and into the forest.
Suddenly, she stopped, out of breath, gripping her legs just above her knees and leaning over herself, taking deep breaths. She looked down and to the right of her and saw the black cat nuzzling her ankles and waltzing around her feet and between her legs. Emily’s mind was still running into the forest and had only just caught up with the world around her when she asked the only question that she could possibly think to ask in that moment, “What?”
She sat down on the fallen leaves, teeth chattering from the cold that ate at her from the outside and the inside. As she did, the cat jumped up onto her lap and purred contentedly, nuzzling its head into Emily’s stomach. “What do you mean, What?" the cat asked inquisitively, only furthering Emily’s confusion.
Strangely, what Emily found the most perplexing about the situation was not the fact that there were ghouls chasing her. It wasn’t even the fact that she was saved by a cat. It was the fact that the cat had her voice. “How the hell are you here? And why are you a cat?” Emily finally responded.
“Well you see”, the cat began, “When someone dies, their soul generally moves on to the place beyond the mortal plane. However, when someone has lingering attachments to the world, then they generally stay on this plane and inhabit a body that most fits who they are and the task that they want to accomplish”.
“So…” Emily began, but the cat cut her off.
“There isn’t much time”. The cat said as it jumped off her lap and began to walk further into the woods on the outskirts of the town. “The plague has already begun to stir. There are many creatures from realms beyond who attempt to get into this one. Usually they fail, but on occasion they manage to pass through the barrier between realms and influence this plane of existence. In this case, something on the other side is trying to exert its influence through a process of turning various creatures into ghouls and the only way to stop it is for someone on this side to perform a ritual halting its progress.”
As the cat spoke Emily looked behind her and in the distance saw ghouls lumbering towards them. She could almost make out some of the faces of them, now twisted almost beyond recognition. As she stared out at many of the people in her town that had succumbed to the ghouls, the cat nudged Emily to pick up the pace.
Emily tried to wrap her head around what this talking cat just said as they wandered further into the forest, making seemingly arbitrary turns at arbitrary points, until they came to a clearing. When she was younger, Emily had explored much of this forest, but in all of her years of exploration, she had never seen something quite like this. The clearing was littered with mushrooms of all shapes and sizes, and in the middle was a giant tree stump that must have been at least 15 feet in diameter. The tree stump was covered in tons of bizarre symbols that seemed to form various shapes that kept twisting and turning. “Sit here”, the cat commanded matter of factly while standing in the middle of the tree stump where there was a large red capped mushroom with white polka-dots all over its cap.
In a daze, Emily sat atop the bizarre fungus and felt a strange tingling sensation just below her skin, as if there was a mild electrical current running just under her epidermis. “Now, all you have to do is believe that the ghouls will go away, and the plague will be banished from this realm”, said the cat.
Not knowing what else to do, Emily concentrated deep within herself and believed. When she opened her eyes, the cat was still there. It tilted its head in a sort of confusion at Emily. “Emily, you can do this”, the cat stated, “you just have to believe.” The cat stared up at Emily, trying (but failing) not to rush her, as she knew that the plague that had befallen the town was closing in.
Emily tried once more, believing that maybe the cat was right and that she could be free of the ghouls and then… then what. What was even happening? Just moments ago, before all of this supernatural junk was sprung on her, Emily was ready to go, ready to be taken away into the arms of the afterlife and embrace her fate. What was the point of doing some ritual to save her and the world, if she didn’t care about saving anything. So she just opened her eyes and sat there.
The black cat looked up at her with concern. “Are you… okay?” she asked, knowing full well what the answer was. “Emily, you are strong, you can do this”, the cat insisted before Emily burst into tears.
“I CAN’T”! She screamed, tears streaming down her face. “I can’t do it anymore”, she sobbed.
The cat stared up at her with wide eyes before nuzzling into her chest. “Emily, I know you can do this.” the cat insisted, worry creeping up in its voice, as she began to spot some of the ghouls, now only a few hundred yards away.
“But I never have! I’ve failed at everything, I can’t do this anymore!” Emily yelled as she could sense that the incoming death brought by the ghouls got ever closer.
“Emily, for as long as I have known you, you have been the strongest girl in the whole world.You have done everything you possibly could and you deserve the world. You are beautiful and you are brave and you can do this. I know you can” said that cat as its wide yellow eyes stared up at Emily, full of hope and love.
“But then what! Even if I survive, what do I do? You were everything and now… now you’re gone, and I have nobody anymore, and if I die here then it will all be over and I can be with you and we can finally be happy and” Emily was cut off as she heard a shushing sound coming from the creature on her lap.
“It's okay. I will always be there for you, even once I am beyond the veil, I will guard you. That's why I'm here, my only regret in life was that I couldn’t protect you, so please, let me fulfil my goal, let me help, let me be there for you. It's okay if you don’t get it right away, once you die, you can’t change anything and that's why life is so beautiful, because you can keep going, even if it's just one step at a time, keep going, if not for you, then for me, because I love you Emily, and nothing will ever change that”. The cat curled up in Emily’s lap as the girl’s breathing calmed and she let out a shaky exhale before centering herself.
“I… I don’t know if I can?” Emily said once more, this time far calmer. She was filled with a new sense of determination and hope. As the ghouls stepped into the clearing, Emily found that an ember within her heart had sparked back to life.
“Don’t worry, you always had it in you” said the cat, as the shambling figure of what used to be her father (now without arms from the earlier strike) stood above the both of them. Emily looked at him, calmer than she had ever been when looking at him. “Dad.” Emily began, “I don’t know if you are still in there, but if you are, I have one thing to say to you. ”Emily said, a grin beginning to creep across her face. “Go die!” Emily shouted as loud as her lungs could manage. Emily clamped her eyes shut and believed. She believed more than she ever had in her entire life, and when she opened them, the cat was gone. Her father and all of the other ghouls had also vanished for that matter. The clearing had become empty, with the strange tree stump and the mycelium seemingly having disappeared. Emily knew in her heart that the plague, or whatever it was, was gone. Emily shakily stood up. The cold still devoured her whole, but it seemed almost like the burden of it had lessened. It felt like a weight that she had been carrying or what felt like forever was finally lifted. Life wasn’t perfect, it never would be, but she felt like she could keep going, that the fire in her heart had been rekindled at long last after being dormant for so long.
Emily walked through the forest and back home. It was still pitch black out, but in spite of that, she knew where to go. Although she could barely see anything, she felt like that path forward was illuminated.