Chapter 6

Anabel watched as her twin brother leaned his arm against the back of the sofa, sighing deeply. His expression seemed rather distant and cold. She didn't need to read his mind to know that his mood matched hers. However, she decided to stay quiet for a bit. She didn't want to say anything that may have caused another argument to start between them, because Ben already seemed exhausted from earlier, especially after having gone to school with Anabel, as he usually did. For the past three years, Ben had been attending the same elementary school that Annabel went to - the one on the outskirts of town. He was supposed to go to middle school there, too, but unfortunately, he had failed his entrance exam, which meant that he would have to leave his beloved hometown. That's why Anabel was staying with him until they could figure out where they would live together in the future.

As she turned her attention back to the TV screen, she was startled when her phone rang, indicating that someone had called. Glancing at the caller ID, she smiled, relieved.

"Hi, baby," greeted Annie softly, holding up the phone with her hand while she continued to stare at her brother, who was looking away from her.

"Hey," replied a voice from the other line, sounding rather tired.

"How are you feeling?" asked Anabel, smiling.

"I'm fine," muttered her baby brother.

"You don't sound fine," replied Anabel frowning. "What's wrong?"

There was silence on the other side.

"Ben?" she asked hesitantly. "Is something wrong?"

"I'm fine. Stop worrying," he mumbled, closing his eyes for a short moment. "How are you doing?"

"Me?" replied Annie, surprised.

"Yeah," he replied, still keeping his eyes closed. "Are you alright? You don't seem alright."

"I am. Why wouldn't I be?" asked Annie.

"No reason," he sighed. "Just wanted to make sure. I haven't seen you in ages, so I wanted to check in with you..."

"Well... you don't have to, I'm pretty busy," responded Anabel.

She hesitated for a few moments, wondering if she should tell him what was bothering her. But deep inside, she wasn't entirely sure that she wanted to discuss something that was troubling her. Maybe she was being silly, but this was a topic that she had tried pushing aside for a long time, so she didn't want to bring it up again. She wasn't certain if her brother felt the same way.

"Why don't you get some sleep for now?" suggested her younger brother, interrupting her thoughts. "You look like you need it."

Annie smiled slightly, although her face remained serious.

"Alright, honey. See you tomorrow. Goodnight."

"Goodnight."

And with that, Annie hung up. Her brother's concern had made her smile, as he wasn't usually this thoughtful towards her. Although, she supposed that she shouldn't complain too much. After all, he'd been worried, and she couldn't exactly blame him for that. Besides, she was sure that he was right and that she needed to rest. After taking off her headphones and plugging her earphones into her phone's speaker, she switched her music volume up to maximum and laid back on her pillow before she closed her eyes and began to close them to relax. Just as she did so, her phone vibrated. Opening her eyes, she glanced at her phone, noticing that the screen showed that there was a message waiting for her. As she checked the sender ID of the message, she smiled softly, despite herself. It was an unknown number, with no information on the name that accompanied the text. Reaching over, she grabbed the phone and opened it.

Unknown: Hey, baby sister. Sorry for the sudden text message. I hope this doesn't annoy you too much...

Annie chuckled at the text. She knew that this type of text was quite common amongst the girls at college. They'd always mess around with her or just send random text messages, like 'hey', asking if she knew any cool movies. This sort of text message had never bothered her in the least, as most people tended to be very friendly and not interested in her private life.

But this person wasn't like that. He'd known that she lived in town. Furthermore, he'd sent a text message without using his name, which implied that he didn't want anyone to know who he was talking about. He seemed very confident and very confident in himself. He was definitely different from the others. The others had always been extremely shy and withdrawn. They'd rarely ever talked in general. She smiled slightly when she remembered the few times that she'd caught sight of him whenever she had attended an event and had bumped into him accidentally, and he'd always greeted her politely without even saying a single word. On those occasions, she'd always been quite shocked by his behaviour, as most teenagers didn't speak to girls so casually unless they were already dating them. This was probably why she had found this behaviour quite strange, although she hadn't really taken it seriously. Now she was beginning to realise that it may indeed mean something.

However, this mysterious boy had suddenly become even more interesting. He was certainly not like those other teenage boys. She didn't think he was particularly nice and sweet like the ones she had met before either. On top of that, he'd been very attentive toward her, and that somehow made her wonder if something had changed between them since the last time that she saw him.

She didn't hesitate to answer his message. 

Anabel: No worries, baby brother! How are you? Are you home safe?

When his response came, she was surprised to find that he was already lying down. He must be tired, she guessed. After all, it was quite a long ride for him to reach her place by car after school when he was always busy with classes or club activities. A short pause followed shortly thereafter. Then the reply appeared again:

Unknown: Yes, I'm here in my room.

Anabel: Okay. What are you watching?

Another brief pause passed.

Unknown: Nothing in particular. Just playing some video games.

Anabel: Oh, I see. Which ones?

Unknown: All sorts of stuff. I've never done this before, though.

Anabel: Never done what before?

Unknown: Playing video games. I'm not good at them yet, so I might fail, but I'll try anyway. :)

The last part of his sentence was written with such a cheerful tone that made Anabel chuckle lightly. If that was all he wanted to do, then perhaps he didn't intend to fail. There weren't many students who'd take up video games voluntarily in their first year. She assumed that he would have already gotten used to playing on his laptop by then and was enjoying every single second of gaming. However, this wasn't the only thing that he wanted to play. She had a feeling that he had another motive for calling her. Something else probably was going on with him; he sounded almost nervous as he asked if she had slept well. She couldn't help but laugh inwardly, knowing that Ben was most likely thinking about something. 

A part of her wondered whether her little brother was truly okay. She knew how much Ben hated disappointing anybody and everyone, especially himself. Even though her brother claimed that he didn't care about what others thought of him, he had always cared deeply about other people's opinions regarding him. She didn't understand it, because nobody could change anything about the way people viewed him, nevertheless, she hoped that he felt better now.

"Are you alright?" asked Ben a couple of seconds later, his words startling her out of her thoughts.

She nodded her head, smiling reassuringly.

"Yes. I'm fine."

Ben sighed as if he didn't believe her.

"Do you want me to stay with you tonight?" he asked.

"That's not necessary," said Anabel quickly. "You're busy. You shouldn't miss your friends."

"It's alright," argued Ben, rolling his eyes and grinning. "Seriously. I want to spend time with you, so can we talk about this later?"

Before Anabel could argue against it, her older brother continued speaking.

"Seriously, Anabel. Please let me stay here for one night. I promise that everything will be fine."

"You don't need to worry about me," replied Anabel.

"Oh, please," scoffed Ben. "Like you could protect yourself from everything that might happen when you're sleeping in here."

"I can take care of myself!"

Anabel didn't notice the slight blush creeping onto her cheeks at the implication of his words. Instead, she shook her head, trying her best to ignore the small voice inside her that was urging her to listen. 

"Okay," whispered Anabel. "If that's what you want."

"Of course it is."

Ben looked down at the floor for a moment, contemplating his next move. Finally, he spoke once again.

"What did you wanna talk about earlier?" asked Ben, hoping for a change of subject.

Anabel sighed heavily. After all, she really didn't want to bring up anything that had happened earlier in the evening again. She knew that she would end up telling him everything eventually, but maybe it wasn't such a good idea to keep talking about the incident that she had mentioned in the conversation. She had no idea if it was possible to erase the memory of something like that. Not until they managed to recover their memories from the accident, which was unlikely. Nevertheless, she decided to tell her brother the story again.

"I just... I can still hear him calling my name..." mumbled Anabel.

Ben frowned, wondering why she sounded so upset by this fact. It wasn't as if she had died, and surely someone would've come across her by now, wouldn't they? Perhaps the person who had called her name had tried to get help? And if so, why was she blaming it all on the man that the police hadn't found yet? But he knew he didn't have time to ponder about these things at that moment, as Anabel was about to continue.

"So I woke up, and I realized that you weren't beside me. And I thought that something bad must've happened because I can't believe that you would leave the house like that. I went downstairs, and you weren't there. That's when I heard footsteps coming from somewhere. That's when I saw him. He... he looked just like a ghost. He wasn't real, though, so... I screamed and I ran away as fast as I could. I thought that he would chase me or hurt me. I just don't know why he attacked us. Why was he chasing me? Did he kill them?"

Ben listened intently while biting his lip, trying not to give any reaction to her words. In truth, he couldn't blame Anabel for feeling scared and confused. Especially if she had witnessed the murder. However, Ben simply couldn't say anything. He felt horrible about it himself. It would've happened if he weren't paying attention, but if he hadn't been there, none of this would happen. 

He couldn't help but wish that he could've prevented it from happening at all. Although he had told his mother and sister about the events that had occurred after his sister had disappeared, he still hadn't told them everything about that night. As far as he knew, they had no idea what kind of monster had possessed her that day or why he had killed those people. He was determined to keep them in the dark for as long as possible.

"I... I hope that we catch the guy soon. He was wearing a blue hoodie and grey jeans. When they searched through his pockets they found that he had stolen a lot of money. But I don't think he's dead. Otherwise, they would've found his body too, right? Anyway, it seems pretty obvious to me that our attacker is not a human. They were probably possessed by spirits. And the police haven't caught them yet, because we're sure that he took their body with him."

"But... But why did he take our bodies away? He must have known that our father worked in that factory, so why didn't he just steal ours then? If the murderer is a spirit, shouldn't they want our bodies?" asked Anabel confusedly.

"Yeah, I'm wondering about that as well. Well, maybe he had some reason for taking away our corpses."

"Then how did he know where we lived?"

"Maybe it wasn't the same spirit," suggested Ben uncertainly. "Maybe... I mean, maybe we have some sort of psychic ability that makes ghosts able to track us down."

He had spoken more than enough already. Now it was time to go to sleep. It didn't matter what Anabel thought about the case, he was certain that the killer was going to try to finish what he'd started with her brother and that terrified him. He needed to calm down or he was afraid that he would lose control and harm somebody or something.

"Goodnight," said Ben, hanging up. 

He stared into space for several seconds before turning off his phone and placing it aside on the nightstand. He sighed quietly and closed his eyes for the last time that night, hoping that this nightmare would eventually end and that Anabel would wake up soon. For the moment, however, the nightmares seemed to be going to be relentless. No matter how hard he tried, the dreams kept coming and coming, and they left him shaken, exhausted and worried for both himself and his sister. His mind kept flashing back to the scene that had taken place during the day. At one point, he had even started imagining the worst scenarios that could've happened to Anabel. The most realistic scenario in his mind was that she had been hit by an SUV or trampled on by other vehicles. Of course, he had never expected this outcome to come true, but that didn't mean that the possibility of this didn't make him anxious. What if he wasn't there to save her when she was knocked unconscious and the paramedics hadn't been able to stop him from being late? Or worse, what if it was one of the workers that had done it? Or even worse - What if it had been Ben himself? 

Although Ben wished to wake up from the nightmare, his body refused to cooperate with him. His eyelids began to flutter and he tried his very best to push the images of bloodied, bruised skin and broken bones to the back of his mind. It took several minutes before he finally managed to force himself to close his eyes, even though he was already half asleep, and fell asleep almost immediately.