Chapter 2
Ashley Arroyo held Pixie so close that she smelled the tuna flavored dinner he had eaten an hour ago. Mews rolled off his tiny pink tongue. He was so cute and vulnerable. She wanted to keep him safe forever.
When she checked the clock on the nightstand, it read 9:17 p.m. Nine long hours stood in her way until sunrise.
She began to cry. It was hard to stop once she started.
The shadows in the corners of her bedroom frightened her the most. Something had escaped from them before. She had seen it, but couldn’t believe it.
She wanted to tell Jeff more about it earlier. He seemed nice enough, but he surely would have hospitalized her for being crazy.
She set Pixie under the lamp on the nightstand, basking him in the safe bubble of light, and briskly crossed the room to turn on the bathroom light, leaving the door open to spill warm glow into her bedroom. She also turned on the lamp in the corner of the bedroom beside the window, and then she lit a candle on the edge of her nightstand. The lights now chased away most the shady areas. She felt slightly better.
Picking up Pixie and the fizzling Dr. Pepper soda beside the candle, she took a long sip.
Mom would come in soon and tell her she was wasting electricity again. Mom would make her turn off all the lights, and then the creature from the dark would come. Ashley wouldn’t be able to stop it, no matter how hard she tried. The candlelight only held it at bay.
Pixie would start meowing fast, breathing hard, and trembling. She worried mostly about him. He knew about the shadow creature. This helped her understand she wasn’t crazy. If Pixie sensed it, then the shade was not just in her mind.
She set the soda back on the nightstand and kissed Pixie on the head. He purred so hard it massaged the air between them.
She kept watch around the room. Despite the lights, traces of gloom still lurked under the bed, under the dresser, behind the open bathroom door, and in the corner where the laundry basket sat.
Nine more hours till daylight. She really didn’t want another sleepless night. It would be hard to stay awake tomorrow in school. Her grades had already dropped, and Mom had put her on restriction because of that. For a month, Ashley was prohibited from going outside except for school.
As her eyelids grew heavy and closed, she snapped them wide open. She gulped more soda, tickling the back of her throat, trying to keep caffeinated. She prayed for daylight to return as fast as possible.