CURSED CHRISTMAS DINNER
by Alexandre Henrique Ferreira Campos de Souza
The cold wind howls through the city, the snow slowly falling and gathering on the roofs of houses. A normal Christmas Eve, families gathering, and presents being given and received. And that was how Gabrielle, and her family’s night went until the nightmare began. Now she is running desperately down the hall on the first floor of her house trying to meet her family while portraits fly over her head. Her heart beating at the same pace as the portraits hit the walls, a devilish symphony on Christmas Eve.
“Oh God! Why did he have to buy that damn necklace?!” she yells. “I told him it was cursed. I felt the spirit presence in it.”
Gabrielle is a 12 years old girl that, besides no one believe her, is a medium capable to see and talk with spirits.
Finally, she reaches the Master Room and finds her mother, Megan, sitting in the corner embracing her legs, and facing the door, her eyes glazed with fear. As he gets closer, he notices the marks of the night on her body: various bruises on her arms, legs and face; a cut in the head, the blood still dripping, impairing the vision of the right eye. He grits his teeth in anger and thinks worriedly about how his children are.
“Are you ok, mommy? Let’s get out of here and find daddy and Michael,” she says, trying to sound as gentle as possible.
“Stay away from me!” her mother yells.
“It’s me, mommy. Please, calm down,” she answers, even more gentle.
“Behind you!”
As Gabrielle turns, she sees a raid of flying objects of all kinds coming in their direction. She freezes, not capable to react. Her mother grabs her and her body in front of Gabrielle’s. Then suddenly her father, Frank, and her brother, Michael, break the door and storm into the room, hitting the flying objects with their baseball bats.
“Stop it!” Gabrielle suddenly screams, and then all objects falls down, giving them time to take a breath. They stare each other, trying to find a way out of this situation.
“I have a plan, but you won’t like,” Gabriele finally says.
***
They are standing before the dining room; the smell of turkey still impregnates the air mixing with the smell of wine coming from a broken bottle laying next to the table. And the table is the only thing that still untouched in the house, with plates, glasses, forks and knives staying right where they’re supposed to be; an island of peace among a sea of chaos and destruction destroyed furniture and all kind of objects all over the place, as if a tornado had passed leaving only the walls and ceiling in place .
“I’m going,” Gabrielle finally says, staring with conviction to dining room.
As she gets closer, the air gets heavier and moving becomes more difficult like she was walking against a strong wind. The objects on the table starts to tremble and she feels the spirit’s angry intention.
“I know you can hear me. Please, I just want to talk with you, help you.” She says to the spirit, that still not visible to her. “I know you’ve been suffering for a long time, and I know you want to be free. But you won’t be able to do so if you don’t let us help you.”
However, the spirit got angrier and started throwing objects in her direction. And so, a knife hits her thigh, sticking there firmly; she groans in pain, falling on her knee, tears falling over her face.
“Gabrielle!! I will destroy you, spirit!! No one hurts my little girl!!” Frank screams, going to where her daughter is. But Michael stops him, holding him and taking him to the ground.
“Stop it, dad! We need to trust her! She’s the only one who can do this!” he says.
“I’m okay, daddy. I can do this,” Gabrielle says, standing up again. Her father still not accepting this, trying to free himself from Michael. She looks to her mother that, with a sad smile, nods her head.
“I trust you, honey,” she says, “even hurting me so much.”
Gabrielle takes a deep breath, nods and turn back to the spirit that is now visible to her.
“I won’t give up. I will help you and save my family. Tell me why you’re doing this,” she says looking directly to the spirit. The rain of objects got heavy again.
“I understand you’re angry. You were a little girl just like me, but your father did horrible things to you in the middle of Christmas Eve. He broke you in every aspect possible, and then threw your body in the river. And your soul got trapped inside the necklace you were wearing,” Gabrielle says.
“But this is not an excuse to hurt other people, innocent people. They’re not at fault.” She continues. The spirit seems to calm down a little.
“Is there anything we could do for you? Anything you wish?” she asks gently.
“We can do this,” she suddenly says, then turns to her family and affirms “We will have a Christmas dinner with her, the one she couldn’t enjoy in life. This will free her soul.”
At this moment, nothing shocks them anymore and they accept without questioning.
***
A normal Christmas dinner except for the one empty chair where supposedly the spirit girl was sitting. Everyone except Gabrielle was nervous about having a dinner with a spirit that almost killed them and destroyed their house, but they tried to act as normal as possible to not upset the spirit again. After a while, the spirit got satisfied, and after thanking them through Gabrielle transcended to the other side, finally achieving the peace she longed for.
“You know, little girl,” Frank says with a tired smile, “you were right from the very beginning. Next time, I will throw the gift as far as I can before opening it.”
About the Author:
Alexandre Souza was born and grew up in Recife, Brazil. He likes to watch animations and reads books. He loves dark and supernatural stories. Follow him on Twitter @AlexandreH98.
