“Well, time for another day of disrespect and neglect from my fellow classmates,” Mumbled the young girl as she sluggishly switched off her alarm and eventually dragged herself out of bed.
The girl was 14-years-old and called Rachel. She brown had hair that went just below her chin, which came with a fringe and was almost always getting in the way of her face and her bubbly blue eyes. Her head was round and fairly small, while her eyes were somewhat large. Her mother and other family members said she had big eyes anyway. She didn’t mind that because it was the only part of her face that she actually liked. The feature on her face she hated most were her pinkish lips and fairly small nose. She thought that her lips were too large while her own father made a comment on her nose being too big for her face.
As the girl forced herself to get out of bed her mother popped her head around the door and greeted her by saying “Good morning,” with a warm smile. The happy woman soon left the room without another word and let Rachel get ready for school.
The girl has pretty much always hated school, and for the same reason every time. That one reason was simply because almost no one liked her. She’s been called obese when she’s never been that kind of weight, she’s been called ugly, she’s been called a bitch on so many occasions that she’s lost count of how many times she’s heard the word itself, she’s been called oversensitive because of how she reacts to the insults that are thrown her way on a daily basis, and so many more things that have just simply unsettled her and made her feel insecure and not at all confident with herself. She still managed to smile through the awful days of school with the help of her friends, however. They always seemed to make her happy.
Rachel soon started getting dressed and packing her bag. It’s not too long before she was 100% ready for school. She never ate breakfast, so as soon as she had brushed her teeth, put her shoes on, and finally pulled the bag onto her back she left for school.
It was the last day of school before the Summer holidays, so Rachel was somewhat happy about that. She still had to deal with the others that lowered her faith in humanity day by day, bit by bit, however. Since it was the final day of school, everyone left at 12pm, so all of her lessons were shortened too and, again, because it was the last day of school, it was also a non-school uniform day, so Rachel decided that she’d wear a pitch black tank top, a maroon leather jacket that she got for her birthday the year before, baggy dark blue trousers and black baseball shoes that day.
School soon came to an end. Everyone was happy and cheerful, rushing out of school to go home and relax or to simply spend time with their friends. All students were glad; all but Rachel, that is. The poor girl’s friends weren’t there at all so it ended up being a whole day of disappointment, depression and rude and insulting comments from her peers. Luckily, she had found some money in her front trouser pocket, so she decided to buy herself something from the nearest shop to cheer her up.
Upon entering the nearest shop, Rachel felt bad vibes from the place. She couldn’t put her finger on it to begin with, but after not too long of searching for something that could potentially cheer her up, she found what was unsettling her a little. It was an eerie looking voodoo doll. She liked the look of it, but did seem out of place to be in a corner shop. The dool was all a very dark gray, with red stitches in it that kept it from falling apart. The stitches were on the arms, legs, body and face. The stitches on the face were different from those on the body. The stitches made a face. There were “X”s for eyes and a smile was also there, but it was somewhat distorted. Instead of a normal smile that we would except to see on any other doll or person, this one was all crooked and wonky. To Rachel it almost seemed like it would be the sort of smile you would see on a serial killer. But, since she loved to collect voodoo doll mini-statues, or ones made of yarn, or even soft toys such as this one, she picked it up and went to purchase it. The cashier didn’t ask for any money, however. He simply said “I’ve never seen that before. Just take it,” With that, Rachel left the shop and headed for home.
As soon as Rachel had reached the far edge of field that she had to cross to get to her house, she had unfortunately met some girls from school that practically loved to upset her. There were two of them. One had dirty blonde hair, was a little on the obese side and caked her face in makeup, leaving no visible unaltered features of her face. Meanwhile, the other was naturally blonde, so much slimmer, short, and wore just about the same amount of makeup as the other. The first was called Taylor with the second was called Daisy.
“What’s that?” questioned Taylor, almost instantly noticing her voodoo doll.
“It’s none of your business. Can I just get home?” replied Rachel, trying to push past the Taylor and Daisy.
While trying to get past the two of them, Rachel felt the voodoo doll that was in her jacket’s pocket being removed. She turned to find Daisy with it in her hand, looking at it and laughing.
“You have a doll with you? Oh my fucking God, you’re such a baby! And look at it’s mouth, it’s crooked. Just like your face,” chuckled Daisy, who then tried to throw the voodoo doll to Taylor, but Rachel intercepted it.
“Thanks for that, now I’ll be going back home now,”
“Aw, really? But we were just starting to have some fun,” said Taylor, stopping Rachel from getting past her.
“We’re not done with you, bisexual scum,” Daisy threw Rachel to the ground, stood over her with Taylor, and they both started kicking her, punching her and eventually pulled out knives on her and made cuts on her arms.
This didn’t go on for too long, as Jamie - one of Rachel’s friends - saw what was going on and rushed over to put a halt to this. The girls instantly ran away as soon as they noticed Jamie, as she is much taller than the two of them. Rachel was curled up on the ground, tears falling from her eyes and blood escaping from her nose, mouth and cuts on her arms. Jamie helped the poor, beaten up, defenseless girl up and helped her the rest of the way home, then called an ambulance as soon as they both got in, with Rachel’s mother calling the police.
After Rachel had explained what had happened to the police she was taken to the hospital, just so that they could check for any broken bones or to stitch up and deep cuts that were made on her.
The day after the incident, Rachel stayed at home, not moving from her bed so that she could try and at least attempt to relax after everything that had happened. She doesn’t know if the police have even been to either Daisy’s or Taylor’s house yet, so she planned on staying inside all day to avoid seeing them again. Her mother was out of the house all day because she just had so many things to do. She wish that she could stay at home just so she could take care of her daughter, but shopping obviously comes before taking care of a beaten up child that was also rushed to hospital.
While she was at home, Rachel stared out of her bedroom window and into the sky, wondering many different things, such as “why does no one like me?”, “how come Jamie wasn’t at school but was able to save me?”. Soon, a knock on the front door interrupted Rachel’s thoughts. She dreaded opening the door, so she looked out of her’s bedroom window, which was at the front of the house. It was Jamie, so Rachel slowly went to open the door.
“Hi, Rachel!” said Jamie, looking happy to see her friend, while her friend seemed very unimpressed.
“I bet you’re wondering about why I wasn’t at school?”
“Why wouldn’t I be? You weren’t at school yet you were there to stop Taylor and Daisy,”
“Look, the simple answer is that my mum let me take the day off school just because it was the last day. I’m sorry I wasn’t there and I feel bad about it. Maybe, if I was at school and I walked home with you like we normally do, none of this would have happened,”
Rachel’s forgiveness was empty, but she played it off as a meaningful one. Jamie left her friend to her own devices without another word.
While being lost in her own little world, Rachel suddenly felt a felling that she had never really felt before. In fact, it wasn’t really a feeling, but more of an urge to do something. She shook off the feeling and tried to get some rest, holding her voodoo doll close to her as she slept, just for comfort. That didn’t really help her to sleep, though. Instead, she lay awake for about half an hour before actually getting to sleep and witnessing an awful nightmare... To begin with, at least.
She was being beaten up in this nightmare, by the same people that had done this to her the day before, feeling the same pain and emotions that were going through her head at that time. Soon into the nightmare, however, Rachel shot up to her feet, blowing Taylor and Daisy away and knocking them off of their feet and on to their backs. While they were lying there, Rachel felt powerful. She had knocked the two that hurt her the most - both physically and emotionally - down just simply by standing up. In the dream, Rachel noticed that Daisy’s knife had flown out of her pocket and on to the ground, giving her the opportunity to get her revenge on Daisy. She picked up the knife, but didn’t stab her. Instead, she pulled out her voodoo doll that now looked like Daisy, but with the same X-shaped eyes and crooked smile from her pocket, waited for the girl to sit up, and slowly pushed the knife into the doll’s chest just a little bit, before dragging the knife down and pulling out a lot of the stuffing from the doll.
While all of this was happening, Daisy was lying there, screaming in absolute pain as she saw her chest open up and her organs spill out. Rachel was thoroughly enjoying this. The same sort of crooked smile that was on the doll appeared on her face too, but the only difference was that her mouth wasn’t stitched up, so she was able to let out the psychopathic laughter that allowed the girls on the ground to know how much she was enjoying all of this.
Taylor soon awoke with a jolt to the screaming of her friend, watching all of her organs coming out of her chest. She felt sorrow and despair as she sat there, watching her friend slowly dying, she also felt like throwing up at the grotesque sight, but the feelings that overpowered her most of all were hatred and rage as she saw the one who was responsible for this. With those feelings stuck in her head, she stumbled to her feet and swung a punch at Rachel, hitting her hard and making her fall on to her front.
Taylor went to kick Rachel square in the head, but before she did that, she noticed her voodoo doll, and how it had changed to it’s original state. She picked it up and saw that its features had changed to match Rachel’s, keeping the crooked smile and X-shaped eyes there again. Pulling out her knife, she plunged it into one of the eyes of the doll, pulling it back out and leaving a trail of material, thread and stuffing on the knife and back to the doll. Rachel screamed in pain as her eye was pulled out of her socket, while bleeding from both the socket and the eye itself, with the cord that connected the eye to the brain snapping as Taylor ripped the stuffing, material and thread away from the knife and the doll’s head, before repeating the same thing with the other eye.
Since this was all in a dream - all in Rachel’s dream - her pain and suffering didn’t last much longer before she went for Taylor and pulled the doll and knife from her grasp and repeated what she had done to Daisy to Taylor, with the same reaction: noting but tears, blood and screams of agony, which all continued for a good while or so before Rachel jolted awake.
When Rachel finally woke up from her nightmare, she was panting and sweating. She was startled, but she didn’t feel too bother about the nightmare itself. After a moment of thinking about it, she didn’t even class the whole experience as a nightmare, but just more of a pleasant dream. The urge returned after she had woken up and thought for a moment, but this time it was stronger; much stronger. Instead of shaking it off this time, she let it stay there for a while before getting out of bed, getting dressed into the same tank top, the same trousers, the same baseball boots and the same leather jacket that she wore the day before.
Then, just before leaving, Rachel looked in the mirror to find that her eye sockets were empty, yet she still somehow had the sense of sight. While querying this, she walked off, forgetting her voodoo doll, but then soon stopped at the top of the stairs, where all she saw... was absolutely noting. She turned back to the way where she believe her room was, and saw that at least the doorway into the room and the room itself was visible. Returning to her room, she picked up her voodoo doll and cautiously walked back out, realising that the hallway and the stairs were visible. “Hm, so this little guy acts like some sort of torch for me, but only works for a limited space? I guess that’s kinda cool,” Rachel mumbled to herself as she looked at her new friend while walking down the stairs and exiting the house.
The young, eyeless girls with never ending blood pouring from her eye sockets closed the door behind her and went to search for someone to help with her first try at this. Luckily enough, she came across the two that beat her up before and that were also in her dream. They didn’t notice her at all as she was behind them, so she snook up behind them, trying not to make a sound, and as soon as she was right behind them she whispered into their ears “Don’t... turn... back...”
The two girls jumped out of their skin as they heard that. “Jesus, you fucking bitch! What was tha--” Daisy was interrupted as she turned to see Rachel’s new eyeless, blood covered face.
Both Taylor and Daisy looked confused and terrified for some reason. Rachel wasn’t bothered though, nor did she take much notice.
“Aw, I was hoping to have a little fun before you turned around,” said Rachel, smiling and sounding ashamed that both of them had turned to face her.
From her left pocket she pulled out her voodoo doll, while from her right pocket she withdrew a knife she had picked up before leaving the house. She went to plunge the knife straight into the doll’s chest, but stopped herself and made sure to check that it had certainly changed its appearance to suit one of the two girls before her. The voodoo doll’s change in appearance slowly took place, but before this change could take place, however, one fo the girls leapt up and punched Rachel square in the face. This knocked her back, but it appeared to do no damage. While stumbling to get up, Rachel realized that her voodoo doll had fallen from her grasp. She wanted to start looking for it but noticed it’s disappearance too late, because by the time she got up she was pushed to the ground again by the same one who first punched her.
Taylor took note of where the doll had landed and headed straight for it while Daisy was trying her best to keep Rachel on the ground. Leaping for the doll, Taylor quickly got to her feet when the doll was in her hands and plunged her knife into the head of the doll... And screamed in agony for a few seconds before falling on the ground, completely silent. Daisy looked towards the direction of the scream to find that Taylor wasn’t there any more and panicked when she couldn’t find her in the tall grass.
“Taylor? Where are you?” yelled Daisy, letting her guard down long enough to let Rachel push her off and giving her time to find the doll.
The eyeless girl quickly found the doll, that now looked like Daisy, and slowly pushed the tip of her knife into the doll’s chest, pulled it down even slower that when she pushed it into the chest, and then started pulling the stuffing out of the doll. Just like in Rachel’s dream, the girl she had hated for almost a year now was getting what she deserved.
It wasn’t long until there was complete silence in the field again. Rachel felt suspicious that Taylor would leap out from somewhere any time soon, so she went to leave. As she was turning round to walk away from Daisy’s body she tripped over something and looked up to see what it was; it was Taylor’s body. "Oh, turns out she’s already dead.” thought the girl, out loud.
Dusting herself off, Rachel left for her house to pack a few things. Food, a few drinks, and anything else she needed to survive alone.
Returning to her bedroom to look for a suitable bag to carry her supplies in, the girl noticed something. Something that shook her so much to the point where she collapsed on the floor and just lay there, letting the blood pouring from her eyes form a pool around her head.
A while after checking up on Rachel, Jamie flicked on the TV and it just so happened to be the news channel. “Today, police investigation has started looking for the murderers of the young girls Daisy Lynchwood, Taylor Brookes and...”
Her heart stopped. No, it couldn’t have been. Had she heard correctly? That’s a lie. Jamie rewinded her TV to the point where the names were mentioned. “Daisy Lynchwood,” It wasn’t her. “Taylor Brookes,” It can’t be her. “and...” The TV switched off before Jamie could rehear what was said. Someone else filled in that little bit of information for her, though.
“Rachel Timesly,”
Jamie spun her head towards the direction of the voice, only to find nothing there. Cautiously, she got up and walked towards the area where she believed the voice was coming from. “Rachel?” softly and nervously spoke the scared girl.
“You know, you’re right. None of this would have happened if you had protected me by simply being at school and walking home with me, but no, you wanted to bloody risk it. You know that Daisy and Taylor live near us and always try to patronize me even when you’re there. Hell, you didn’t even want to stay for a while to protect me while I was seriously injured, stuck at home and with no one to take care of me!”
“Rach, I’m...” Rachel interrupted her.
“No. Don’t call me that. I’m no longer your friend; maybe I never even was, by the looks of things.” ”Please, listen to yourself, Rachel. You’re going insane,”
“Insane? I’m perfectly sane, thank you very much! I just have a different point of view on everything now because of what happened!” Rachel started raising her voice, showing no attempt to keep in her anger.
“Rachel...” Yet again, Jamie was interrupted.
“Oh, Jamie. I wonder, oh how I wonder what it could be like if all of your beautiful features were just taken right from you. Your dirty blonde hair, your pink lips, your green eyes... Every part of you that I thought was beautiful would be gone,” This time, Rachel had lowered her voice back to something softer, quieter, more relaxed... But also something that sounded very, very unsettling. Jamie started backing away from where she was originally walking towards, knowing where this was going, only to bump into what felt like a standing body. “In fact, I’ll she how you look with all of that gone right now,”