The house was small and dark, nestled between blue-green trees, branches like feathered fans. It smelled of dampness and earth. The wooden walls were certainly rotting. The windows were so stained with dust, grime and raindrop streaks, inside must have been as dark as night.

She did not mind. It was the first human structure she had seen in what felt like ages of wandering through the forest. She was far away from anybody and anything, which was what she wanted.

She saw one for the first time when she was 5 years old. It looked like a child, walking on all fours with its back painfully arched like a hissing cat. It moved faster than expected, skittering past her on the street. She could hear its long nails against the gravel and its face looked demented.

She looked up to her grandma, as if to confirm what she saw actually happened. The old woman, with wispy white hair and infinitely kind eyes, squeezed her hand tight and motioned her to stay quiet. That only made her worry more. When she looked towards the end of the street, the thing had vanished.

The door opened without resistance. She could see the dust dance in the air in the newfound light from outside. Musty carpets and cracked wooden furniture were all in the places she expected them to be when thinking of a house. For all the world it seemed someone used to live there and suddenly left, leaving everything behind as it was, and everybody else who passed by since then also left it untouched.

She stepped over the threshold, breathing in the stale air and hearing the floor whine under her boots. There was a living room, a small kitchen that smelled like pond water, a dining room with a big table and a sort of drawing room with sofas set up in a triangle formation.

As she walked through the ground floor, already having made up her mind to rest there for the night, and perhaps every night, she could hear an echo to her footsteps. Soft steps just a little too late to be covered by the sound of hers. They were faint rustles, like fingers brushing against wood.

She looked over her shoulder and saw nothing on the floor. But then she heard a crystalline clink and looked up to see the old chandelier above the dining room table. It lightly swayed as something scuttled past it on the ceiling.

The village she grew up in was made of white walls, blue roofs, veggie gardens and clean stone roads. It was surrounded by the forest all around like a crown, the dark firs stretching up to the sky in sharp points only birds could reach. The forest was endless and dangerous, so nobody left it except for traders who would pack guns and sage and crucifixes in their carts.

Her grandma shared her theories as she sat on her knees, about all the bizarre and shambling creatures that wandered through the woods and sometimes into the village. When she was her own age she heard a legend that this is what happens when a human stays in the forest for too long - they turn into a monster. Hence why nobody must leave the village. But not everybody could see those creatures. No, only very few.

As if on cue, her father entered the room. He was frowning.

"What did she tell you?" He demanded as they went away. His hand was rough and kept pulling at her to walk faster.

"Nothing!" She replied. "She was telling me stories."

He groaned. "Don't believe everything that senile witch says."

"W-What's senile mean?"

He shushed her.

She checked the tap in the kitchen and, to her surprise, it worked. A jet of murky brown water crawled up the old pipes and shot out into the dusty sink. She waited for a minute for the dirt to be mostly cleaned out the pipe and, while still a shade closer to tea than water, she drank directly from the tap. Good enough. She didn't need a lot and didn't need it fancy.

As she drank her hair fell against her face and the water stuck it to her chin. She didn't care to push it off, but it did block her view of the rest of the room. As she was thinking about the fact she was lapping like a dog, she saw something from the corner of her eye. She raised her head, tongue still out. There was nobody there.

She sighed in disappointment, then roughly wiped her mouth with her hand, shoving her lips.

Her grandma died of old age while she was 11. She had seen countless things until it happened. Hairless and sometimes skinless people that walked like dogs, with coal-black tiny eyes and stained mouths. Disembodied girl heads the size of tractors, floating without aim between the trees. Young men with skin dyed from head to toe in red, wearing only pants if at all, running madly with teeth bared.

Whenever one crawled through her window or under the closed door, she pulled her blanket over her head and prayed to God to keep her safe. In the morning she would go to her grandma, who would always pet her head and tell her kind words. They were the only people who could see those creatures, and the only ones who knew she could do it. Grandma said it was best that nobody knew. People were cruel, she said.

Nobody in her family, or in the village as a whole, was very good at hiding their disdain of her grandma. She was never told why, but she supposed it was because she could see those things. So she stayed quiet even before her grandma told her to be careful, to not react, to stay calm. She was a smart girl, grandma praised her, who learned quickly. She knew when to stay quiet around her family, how not to speak, what not to do, ever since she was quite small.

Her grandma was the only person she could be around freely, without careful consideration of every move and word. She could just be. She cried throughout grandma's funeral.

The Priest invited everyone forth to say goodbye one last time. She looked up at the podium where the casket was placed and her heart froze. One of the things was next to grandma's body. A horrible, blackened, spindly thing, long claws like needles and bulbous eyes.

"Come, sweetie..." Her mother said, her face wet with tears as well.

"N-No...!" She said, too scared to breathe. It was running its awful fingers over grandma's face, pushing at her wrinkles, messing with her hair.

"Come on, for grandma." Her mother frowned, brows furrowed above red eyes.

"Mama...!"

"Oh, mother..." Her mother put her hand on the edge of the open casket, fighting to keep her posture straight. The thing stretched its hand towards her face and touched her hair too.

There was a fraction of a second where her mother looked up in confusion, before she started screaming "Leave her alone!!", all parishioners turning their heads to look.

The fridge was empty. Whoever lived there last had taken all the food away and cleaned the compartments with a wipe. She had the urge to touch the white metallic inside to check if it was cold, but in the end she closed the door back. Of course it wasn't, she could see the black plug on the ground.

The light coming through the window was golden, making the old and sparse room more beautiful than it was. She stared at it for a while, allowing melancholy to take over for a moment. In many ways she found darkness beautiful. It was gentle on the eyes. As scared as she was, she kind of liked traversing the forest at night.

She gasped when she heard a scratch coming from the floor. When she looked down, there was nothing there. The plug had shifted position.

She sat in her room, on the floor next to her bed. She could hear her parents arguing in the living room, mostly her father shouting and her mother trying to calm him down.

"She's mad, just like that hag!"

"Don't talk about my mother like that! And she's not mad!"

"What do you call this then, huh?!"

"She's your child!"

"Everyone thinks she's a lunatic!"

"She was upset! M-Maybe she was imagining things! It was only one time!"

"One time is already too much!"

She looked up and out the window by her bed. The spindly thing was there, tall enough to potentially reach it, but only its forehead and eyes were visible.

There used to be a garden in the back of the house. Weeds of all shapes and sizes took over, covering a dilapidated fence like a dark green hill, dotted with small white and purple flowers. The plants grew on top of each-other, overlapping leaves and vines choking each-other.

She regarded the miniature jungle and half-expected something to come out, other than flies that is. Looking at the ground, she picked up a stick and unceremoniously threw it at the greenery. Nope, nothing. The woods were quiet and sleepy.

She looked at the endless forest beyond it, then back at the house. She felt like she was in a pivotal scene in a cheap movie, deciding her own fate. There was not that much to choose from. Wander endlessly until she went properly mad, like some of the wanderers she had encountered, filthier and wilder-looking even than her, or stay in this house she discovered. Stay and rest. She shuddered and went back inside.

The Father the priest welcomed them with a soft smile on his fat face and a gesture almost like a showman for them to enter the chapel. Their church was sparse, clean and very white, white walls free of garish golden ornaments, encouraging an atmosphere of quiet contemplation free of distractions. If she made too much noise during service she was smacked over the head, or given a scolding as soon as they arrived back home.

The Father and her father shared a few words while her mother searched the purse for the wallet. She waited in a chair in front of his desk, trying to stay as still as possible, to look as invisible as possible. Then she was left alone with the priest. She had known him her entire life, the man who married her parents, christened her and buried her grandma. He had always looked old.

"How are you feeling, child?" He asked, making his voice pleasant and friendly. "A little better?"

"N-No... Not really... I'm sorry..."

"No need to apologize! Please!" He gestured with his large and bony hands. Spindly, she thought and shivered. "Oh, I remember when my own grandparents died, both of them within a few months when I was only 8 years old. I was beside myself. Grief is a powerful emotion that can really skew with your mind."

She nodded.

"It is important to remember that when a loved one dies, you don't die along with them. Life goes on, as painful as it may be at first, and it would hurt your grandma to see you like this. She would want you to live a long and happy life, your best life!"

"I-I know..."

"Oh, I'm aware it's easier said than done, but, thankfully, that's what God is here for. Since the beginning of time people have lost their loved ones and mourned them. Even if you feel completely alone, remember that you never are." Her face twitched. "Even if you are going through something that, say, you can't tell your parents about, have trust that God is there for you and He listens to your prayers, spoken aloud or not."

"Father..." She tried to gather the courage to speak.

"Yes?" He smiled encouragingly.

"I've... I've seen them again..."

The smile remained on his face, but she caught his features darkening. "When did it happen, child?"

"This morning, before I came here."

He hummed as he thought it over. "Are you sleeping properly?"

"N-Not really."

"It could be that." He said. "The grief and the exhaustion and everything... The mind loves playing tricks on itself when it's weakened. Seeing things that are not there, blowing things out of proportion... Don't fret, it happens to me too! Oh ho ho, I lost count how many times I saw my chair in the corner of the room at night and thought there's an intruder. All these tall-tales about 'monsters' and 'creatures' in our forest doesn't help either. They just scare people. You should really avoid those topics, in general. Notice how when you try to sleep at night, your mind suddenly remembers every story you ever heard?"

She nodded and glanced up, then lost all colour in her face. There was one of those things in the window behind the priest.

"We don't always have control of our bodies or our minds." He went on, unaware of it squeezing and sliding in the space between the frame and the windowsill. "If there is an illness going around, you may catch it whether you want to or not. It is... trickier with diseases of the mind, though, I agree."

"I'm sick...?" She asked, forcing her eyes to remain on him and now follow the thing writhing and slinking around the walls.

"No! No! Of course not!" He scrunched his wrinkles. "There is nothing wrong with you, dear! It's just that you are in a weaker state of mind. It could happen to anybody. It's not your fault, but there are things you can do about it. And, as I've said, Our Lord is there for you. You are a good girl from a good, faithful family. There is no reason for Him to afflict you with such visions. How old are you now? 12? Goodness, you used to be so tiny! Look... when you think you see those things again, remind yourself that they are not real, and pray. Have trust that God will give you the strength to push through this state."

The thing flopped over the desk and dragged its snakelike body over it. Her chest ached to the point of suffocation and a gross, cold sweat rolled along her spine. It turned its eyes towards her. It's not real, it's not real, it's not real, it's not real, it's not real, it's not real, it's not real

"Well, then!" The Father smiled. "I am going to pray for you as well, dear. It is going to be alright. Do you remember the story of Elijah?"

"T-The what?" She flinched. It slinked to the back of his chair.

"The story of Elijah in the Old Testament. He was, to sum it up, having an extremely bad time and he begged God to end his suffering. God sent him an angel, with instructions to eat something, go to sleep, then think about it again in the morning. Indeed, after having some rest, Elijah was able to think clearly again and 'retracted', so to speak, the desire to die. This can be applied to many situations, don't you think? Sometimes, the best thing you can do is... rest."

The thing stuck its finger in the corner of the Father's mouth. It dragged a sharp nail over the skin. The priest slapped his own cheek, thinking there was a bug on it. When he looked at his palm, there was blood. With an alarmed expression, he felt his mouth and there was suddenly a cut there. He looked at her, who was staring at him with eyes as big as saucers.

The sun was going down. She sat on the floor of the kitchen as she watched the light filter between the leaves, like a lightshow in slow motion. She could peek shades of red and pink and blue-purple. She thought about days where she would stay by herself in the house, usually in her bedroom. Rare times where she was truly alone. She would not turn on any lights, letting the house become dark and her eyes adjust. Her toys and trinkets and books would be contoured in new shades of blue and grey, she would test how well she could still read, play pretend with her dolls that they were having a camping trip in a safe forest. Those were her favourite kinds of evenings.

Her father arranged for the Father to conduct an exorcism. Nothing was working, no amount of prayer or sleep or distracting extracurriculars. The monsters were there, they were always there, everywhere. In the church pews, in the marketplace, at school. Everyday they would see her pale and trembling, and when they demanded why she would reluctantly tell them. It was freaking everybody out, fellow classmates refused to enter certain rooms anymore, life-long neighbours avoided them on the street. She wouldn't leave the house anymore, but "they" were there too, apparently. It was ridiculous!

She watched with much trepidation as a makeshift altar was set up in their living room, choking smoke filling the air and blurring her vision. Her father and the Father passed through it like ghosts.

"This is much worse than I thought." The priest sighed. "It seems more than just mental illness. It may be a spiritual attack."

"My daughter is not possessed!!" Her mother said. She stayed for the most part in the corner, biting her nails up to the flesh. Her voice's sudden loudness startled her.

"What other explanation do you have for this, then?!" Her father replied. "It's either demons or she's crazy!"

"There is nothing wrong with her!"

"She sees things that are not there! God, woman, we can't go on like this!"

She wished she could shrink out of existence. The priest stayed quiet and solemn, not looking at her either, waiting for them to be done.

"This is all your fucking fault!" He went on.

"My fault?!"

"She takes after your insane mother!"

"This again?!"

"Yeah, again! That stupid cunt tormented us for years, then we finally got rid of her and now she started doing it too!"

"Stop talking like that about my mother, you piece of shit!"

Her father suddenly slapped her mother over the face. She gasped in shock, tears bubbling in her eyes. "I knew I shouldn't have married your lunatic ass!" He spat on the ground.

Her mother glared at her as she held her cheek. You fault, she didn't say out loud.

Her father grabbed her arm and dragged her to kneel down in the middle of the carpet. The Father cleared his throat and held up the aspergillum, a towel between the bowl and his hand. The smell of the concentrated incense made her gag, cloying like wax down her throat. The holy water with basil and myrrh was boiling hot, its steam mixing with the smoke. It was sprinkled intermittently over her, making her flinch every time. Dizzy and aching and confused, as the Father chanted in a language she couldn't understand, she realised too late that he tilted the bowl to pour it over her.

The house groaned as she walked around it. There was a narrow staircase leading up to a second floor, which she suspected used to be an attic. If she got any taller or fatter, it would have been hard to make her way up there. It was already a hassle with the bulky backpack against her tired spine. The air smelled of dust and she could feel it go up her nose. She will have to clean the fuck out of this house in the coming days. Yes, she was sure she would stay here, at least for a while.

In her solo travel, she had found the remnants of old houses, abandoned villages, villages still in use, old campfires, fresh campfires still emanating smoke, mansions and industrial buildings in the distance she didn't dare approach, ancient churches she ran away from, dirt paths penciled in by cattle, carts and cars. If anything came up or if she didn't want to stay in this house anymore, she could just leave and wander again. There was a convenient freedom to being homeless. Theoretically, if she found this house, she would surely find another somewhere else. She wasn't sure if the forest popped them into existence or if it was just people like her leaving marks wherever they could in this weird, evergreen world.

It was for the best she be alone. She wouldn't be scared of anyone or anything, and they wouldn't be scared because of her. She tried to stay in another village after making sure she was far away enough that they wouldn't find her, but sooner or later she would be startled again and she would have to leave before people started to stare at her questioningly or worriedly or with contempt.

It was very dark in the narrow staircase. For 12 steps she would be engulfed in pitch dark, using her hands on the walls to keep balance. She heard a noise behind her, a creak in the wood. She turned around. Evening light illuminated the bottom of the stairs, the honey-brown floor and the first rickety steps. "Please..." She whispered, so quiet she couldn't hear herself either, temples feeling like they were about to burst as she focused with all her might, every sense, every fiber of her being, nails digging into the old wooden walls.

Nobody answered. There was nobody there. There was no further creak.

They were gone.

They were gone!

She couldn't see them anymore!

After her mother made her chamomile tea to wash her sore face with, she trotted throughout the entire village, peeking at every corner and house and garden. Nothing! Nothing! They were gone! All she saw was people and trees and regular animals!

The Father was in the yard of the church, carrying a water sprinkler. He smiled back when he saw her happily waving and waved back as well.

She made her merry way back home before too many neighbours saw her reddened skin. She could smell the duck her mother had placed in the oven, the gentle wind blowing cool fingers through her hair. She felt the large body and coarse fur of an animal rubbing past her leg and she glanced down expecting a doggy or a really fat cat.

There was nothing there.

She looked around, thinking it ducked into a bush or past a fence, but no, she couldn't see it. She shrugged to herself and continued on her way home. She passed her neighbours yard, where their elderly grandma was sitting on a chair on the terrace. She couldn't see or hear anymore, but she greeted her nonetheless. The old woman sat hunched over, heavy wrinkles closing her eyes. One eyebrow started moving up, then her cheek, then the side of her mouth, unseen fingers playing with her skin. The old woman swatted them away with a frown, confused. It happened again, her face moving on its own, and she cried out for her grandson, a squeal like a baby.

She ran the rest of the way back home, slamming the door shut behind herself. No, no, no no this can't be happening, please no no no

"Lunch is ready!" Her mother called out.

She sat down at the table. Her mother pulled the duck out of the oven and her father poured everyone juice he got from the store. The curtains by the small window moved far more than they should in the light breeze and she heard tiny nails tapping on the linoleum floor.

Her father took the first bite of the duck breast and hummed in approval, moving the fork around like a wand. "Best one you've made."

"I tried some new spices from the market." Her mother smiled, flattered. The edges of the table cloth moved and swayed, multiple sides. She looked down, pretending to fix her shirt, but there was nothing there. She couldn't see them.

"Keep using them!" Her father chuckled.

Her mother tasted the juice and licked her lips, also approving. "We should make our own juice one of these days." It was against her leg, then another, and another, like hairless weasels.

"Uncle told me the apples from his tree should be ripe next week." Her father said. "We should go visit him, have a little picnic too!"

"Oh, that would be so cute!" She said, beaming, then turned to look at her. "Are you, alright, dear?"

"Yes, I'm fine!" She strained out a smile, feeling it chew on her ankle.

She tried to sleep. The bed was full of dust and she had to use her backpack for a pillow. The small room had a bed, a wooden closet, a low ceiling and a window the size of two palms. Her face and her hands and her entire body itched, but she knew for a fact there was nothing there. She needed a shower. Her old clothes clung after the sweat dried up and twisted around her limbs, stealing away any comfort.

She kept looking at the window on the left and at the closet at the foot of her bed. Nothing, nothing, not even a groan as the wood expanded or contracted with the drop of temperature at night. That should be good. She should finally catch a wink of stupid sleep. But no, it was too quiet. Too peaceful. Too easy.

Did she miss being scared? What was wrong with her?

She could feel it on the bed. She laid on it, curled up and silent, watching as needlelike puncture marks appeared along her foot. She could vaguely hear her parents in the living room, chatting carefree or watching TV or eating or going outside. She didn't dare move.

She could hear them everywhere, everywhere. She couldn't tell them apart from a grasshopper or a squealing pig or a crow or a coughing old man or the wind blowing through the leaves. She'd hear them laugh right behind her and turn to see nothing. It was torture.

She didn't tell her parents or anybody this time. She was telling the truth when she was saying she couldn't see the monsters anymore, so people left her alone on that front. They complained and grumbled about her huddling in her room all day like some angsty teenager but she didn't care. She couldn't care. She was so tired. She could barely think most days. She could barely sleep and when she thought was going to, there it was, one of them again, crawling in her room on all six or picking at her skin like ticks. Praying did nothing, she might as well have talked to a rock. Going to church filled her with so much dread, it was too quiet and she could hear everything and praying only made her feel worse when nothing happened and they climbed over her nonetheless.

Why was this happening? Why her? She never did anything wrong, she was pretty sure. Nobody else could see them or hear them. She could never comprehend, why?? How?? Even if they couldn't perceive them, what they did was real. Scratches, bruises, moved furniture, dead animals. When she was home alone one time she threw a book in the direction of the noise and heard a goatlike yelp, then the table behind it skidded on the floor as the projectile made it lose balance. Why did nobody believe her back when she could see them? It was terrifying, yes, she knew it more than anybody, but what was she supposed to do? Praying did nothing, He ignored her completely or was not real, she didn't know which was worse.

It wasn't her fault, it wasn't fair. It was her grandma's fault. She inherited this from her, this curse. She didn't want to see the monsters either, she hated them. She wished she never knew. She wanted to scream and cry and break things and run vanish never be seen again but then she may become a monster too why did her grandma have to tell her that?! She wished she could wipe her memory clean and be stupid like everyone else. It was her fault, her fault, she did this to her, to everyone, why couldn't she shut up why wh

The prick marks advanced to her ankle, stinging and itchy. She reached down and scratched as hard as she could, catching the thing under her nails, or maybe that was her sick imagination again. She scratched and scratched until the needle dots became long streaks.

They were so loud. The heartbeat in her ears, in her chest, the growl in her stomach, the wind outside, the murmur of the leaves dancing and feeling each-other. Her eyes refused to stay closed. The light of the moon coming in was enough to still see the outline of the closet. She knew there had to be something, she could feel it, she knew it well by then. Of what good was it if she could do nothing to stop it?

Quietly, as if hiding, she brought her hands together. "Our Lord, our Father in Heaven, have mercy on my soul..." She whispered against her knuckles.

There was a thump. She couldn't tell if it came from downstairs on next to her.

"O-Our Father in Heaven, please grant strength onto my weak soul..."

Another heavy thump. The closet wobbled from left to right, scratching the wood beneath.

"P-Please grant calm onto my weary soul, and please, please, forgive me for my sins..."

The sink turned on downstairs, the jet splash ringing out like a gunshot. The fridge got shoved to the side.

"Forgive me, Father, for all the sins I've committed, for I am deeply sorr-"

The closet door slowly creaked open, a sliver of even darker dark growing wider and wider.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry...!" She murmured, tears pooling on the pillow by her head. "Forgive me, grandma, I'm so sorry, please help me...!

A hand emerged from the closet, bony tendons and spindly fingers with too many knuckles. It was followed by an awful gaunt body, with frayed, charcoal-burnt skin and huge staring eyes, reaching for the bed and for her.

She cried out, jumping out of the bed and throwing herself against the creature, wrapping her arms around its crooked neck.

It froze at the foot of the bed, too surprised to react. She held him close as if her arms became a vice, laughing and weeping and shaking like a leaf. "I can see you! I can see you! You're back! Thank God!" It tried to shove her away, then claw at her, becoming frantic, but she stayed put, giggling and hiccuping and squeezing tighter.

Just as suddenly she let go and ran out the room. Sprites like tiny skeletons with piranha teeth ran around the ceiling like cockroaches. She hopped up and smacked them, shrieking in delight. She almost tumbled down the stairs in her joyous dash.

In the kitchen there was a creature with the body of a boy and the head of a goat, standing on top of the table, while a centipede the size of a dog crawled under it. A girl with her back arched like a hissing cat was fruitlessly searching through the empty fridge. When she looked over the door, her lips were stretched to reveal all her teeth and her eyes were open wide.

She gasped. "It's you!!" She said, dragging her into a hug. The girl wiggled and kicked to free herself. She just laughed and laughed and laughed, weary eyes drinking in every thing around her, laughing even as the centipede started to gnaw at her with humanlike teeth.