Mind Games (FIRST DRAFT)
Florence

"What did you do to them?" I yelled. Ray shrank back.

"I did nothing, Mother-"

"Enough about her, Ray." I interjected. "What did you do? What have you done since any of us have been here? You've been working with the enemy, Ray. We're all just trying to leave, and you're feeding us straight to her, satisfying her appetite. That's what you've been doing." I crossed my arms and stared them in the face.

"I-" They started, "I've done nothing of the sort." They straightened themselves in their wheelchair. "I've tried to help everyone here. Nobody listens."

"Because everyone thinks you're a double-crosser, Ray! What don't you get? You are a double crosser, sacrificing Mei and Mason and Mike and however many more people. When are you going to stop?"

"I haven't sacrificed anybody, and you know it!" They began to raise their voice. "You don't know shit about me Florence Ariana Everhart. I have people to see once I get out of here, and now I'm not going to try to help anyone out of here. I'm saving my own ass, and that's it." They turned and rolled down the hall.

"Fine then!" I yelled after him. "F-fuck you then!" I waved my fist after him and stormed back to my room. Just my room now, after Mother killed Mei, and did something with the boys. I flopped down in the cushions, inhaling the scent of worry and sweat. Why had Ray known things about me that I didn't? Are they a demon or angel or something? If they are, then I guess I'm in trouble, cursing them off the way I did. I grabbed my favorite pillow, the deep blue one with gold trims that used to be Mei's. I hugged it to my face, then relaxed the muscles in my back. I hadn't even known they were tense until I let them go. But a pillow isn't the same as a girl, and it wouldn't ever be.

...

...

...

"Mother, is there any way to contact the dead?"

I know it would sound strange to ask your enemy to help you talk to your dead maybe girlfriend, but it would also be weird to ask a friend or parent, and even stranger to ask a nonbinary person with bleach blond hair and glasses like Harry Potter. But enemies are better than Harry Potter kid.

"Why, of course there is, dear." Mother bent down to reach my eye level. I was the second tallest of the kids here, so it's strange to have someone to bend to my level. "Here," She turned and it seemed out of nowhere that a Ouija Board appeared. I looked at her, shocked.

"This looks kind of, how do you say... fake?" I said/asked. She looked at me with a stern look on her face.

"Darling girl, you asked to communicate with the dead, and I gave you something to do it. Listen," she leaned in closer. "I always liked you more than that brown nosed boy-"

"Person. Or kid. Ray's not a boy." I interjected. She paused.

"My mistake. Either way, I've liked you more than Ray for a good time now. Don't let this get in the way on our relationship." She walked off, leaving me partially stunned, partially confused.

Holding the wooden board in my hand, I walked in a daze back to the dorm. Mother hadn't tried any games since it was just me and Ray, and it was driving my nerves on end. Every minute I wondered when she would call us up, bring us out to 'play'. I barely slept, for fear that she would get me in my sleep. I didn't mean to not say 'kill'. What she does is not killing. Mother slaughters, disembodies, devours. She does not kill.

I plopped down on a pile of pillows, and buried my way deep, deep into them, basically becoming one with them. Sighing. I held the wooden triangular piece with its matching board high above my head, inspecting its curvy calligraphy and deep grooves. I sat up, grunting, then placed the Ouija Board on the floor. I laid stomach down, and traced my forefinger along the Yes in the top left corner. Sighing, I thought that I might as well give it a go.

...

...

...

After trying multiple times to summon a spirt, I grew irritated. Tossing, I threw the board across the room and grinned when I heard the sickening crack of breaking wood. Burrowing back into my den of pillows, I grew drowsy and began to fall asleep.

But not before hearing the whirring.

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