It was a Monday afternoon, three months after Helena's suicide. I had attended her funeral, at which she wore a stunning black dress lined with blood red satin. But it was a quiet time; a lonely time. Frank had a girlfriend now, so we couldn't hang out. My brother Mikey and I had grown slightly apart ever since he found out I let a girl commit suicide. Mom had to work all the time; I still didn't have a job. Who knew people didn't like to hire guys that wore eyeliner?
I plugged my ear buds in and started blasting Iron Maiden into my cerebrum It wasn't until I dozed off and jolted awake that I saw a figure in my doorway.
"Ah. Who's there?" I asked tiredly.
"It's your brother, idiot."
Mikey emerged from the 7:00 shadows to sit on the edge of the bed. He removed my ear buds and gave me an intent stare.
"We need to talk."
"Well, yeah, I can see that. What about?"
I sat up to re-position myself into the corner of my bedspread, and I hugged my knees.
"That girl you knew. What was her name?"
"Uh, Helena Fables?" I rubbed my eyes.
"Yeah, that's it. You know her room hasn't been dismantled yet. You know what that means? She's alive, Gerard. She didn't kill herself."
I was nowhere near tired now. I sat up straighter and furrowed my brow.
"That's impossible. I saw her hang herself. It was right in front of me."
"I know," Mikey nodded, "but they still have it cleaned and lit up. I can see it from my window."
"You're crazy, Mikes. I went to her funeral, remember?" I ruffled his light brown hair.
Fixing his hair he added, "Well I'm not crazy. Maybe someone else is living there. Nothing weird or creepy happened when you were there, right?"
Of course. Leave it to Mikey and his weird paranormal obsessions to try to figure out a possibility to something. The weirdest part was, he's terrified of ghosts. He always has been.
"Nothing supernatural happened when I was in her cell," I chuckled.
"Are you completely sure? What about this note you got from her?" he defended, holding up the small note Helena gave to me the night of her suicide.
"Gimme that," I mumbled, grabbing the note.
"It seems pretty paranormal to me."
"Mikey, she was a patient in a psychiatric hospital. This kind of stuff is expected from those people."
"'Those people'? Gee, they're as much as normal people as you and me. Honestly, I'm not sure why I haven't admitted you into the ward yet."
"Um, because I have the common sense to know not to kill myself," I grinned.
"Look, if you ever feel something is going on, you can tell me. My office is right down the hall," he smiled and stood up.
"Night, Gerard."
I watched him leave and I brought the note from Helena back out. I read it over and over again for what seemed like 20 minutes.
I tossed it onto my nightstand and clicked the power button on my television remote. The first image I see is of the daily news, flashing it's seemingly important but really stupid headlining stories. However, this story sparked my interest. It was a stilled, blurred image of a girl with a black dress laced with blood red satin.
"We have reason to believe that this girl is somehow connected with some kind of paranormal phenomena that we've been dealing with recently. It appears that she is the root of all the 'supernatural sightings' we've been getting so many calls for. She is extremely pale, her eyes have no irises, and her clothes are as seen in this roughly taken snapshot of the attack on downtown."
I turned my TV off and sat silently in the darkness of my room.
"Gerard, did you see the news?" Mikey hung in my doorway.
"Yeah," I nodded. "I saw it."