The Ring.

She opens the door and throws her bag on the floor.  Her younger brother trails after her, whining.  
  "I'm hungry..."  
  "Mum?" she calls.  There is no answer.  Silence reigns.  
  "Where's Muuum..."  
  "How would I know?"  Stupid brat.
  "I want Mum!"  
  "Shut up, John!"  Why did whinging brothers have to be invented?  "Go get some food or something."  i.e. Get lost, brat!  
  She heads up the stairs to her bedroom.  Passing her mother's room, she suddenly realizes that a cold breeze is coming under the closed door.  Odd.  She pushes it open.  
  "Mum..."  She stops, stares, runs out and downstairs.  "John!"

The red was not blood.  Once they worked that out, many of the police left with more important things to do.  The rest are in the bedroom.  Or what's left of the bedroom.  She sits in her own bedroom, listening to them.  Finding out everything they can.  Swarming over the room like ants on a piece of cake that has been dropped during a party.  In her mind she sees it all again.  The huge gaping hole in the roof....the carpet soaked in red....the strange eye-shaped symbol burned like a brand into the carpet under the hole....and the ring....her mother's....  She had thought there were no more tears left, but now they start to fall again.

The officer in charge had been very kind.  He had arranged for her and John to stay with their aunt and uncle until their father (in Adelaide with his fiancee) could come for them.  He thrilled her brother with the offer of a ride in his police car.  When she had asked to stay behind, just while he had his ride, she had been given permission after only the slightest hesitation.  She wasn't allowed in her mother's bedroom, or out of the house, but that was fine.  She just needed some time to herself.  

Now the house is empty, like a huge, hollow shell when the creature which lived there has discarded it.  She sits on the bed, letting her thoughts wander, no longer crying.  A stray thought enters her mind.  
  Where's the ring?  She blinks and sits up.  That is silly, the ring is right there on her finger.  She smiles.  Nobody had noticed her take it.  She doesn't even know why she took it, she just did.  It's single stone is a dull red colour, reminding her of something...  She realises that she has never actually seen her mother without it.  She doesn't know where it came from, certainly not from her father.  Her thoughts wander again.  Then, 
  Where's the ring....where is it?  She shakes herself.  This is getting silly.

To distract herself, she gets up and starts walking around the room.  Suddenly she stops.  What was that?  Surely she heard a noise.  
  Now you're getting paranoid.  Her finger feels like it's going numb.  
  That ring must be tighter than you thought.  But the numbness is spreading, through her body, right down to her feet.
  Her feet.
  Her feet start moving.  She is walking.  For a few moment she feels as though something is wrong, but then she can't think what it could be.  After a few more moments, she has forgotten about it.  She just walks.  Out of the door, down the hall, into her mother's bedroom.
  The bedroom.
  In the bedroom she stops.  As if in a dream she looks around.  There is no hole, no red stain.  Her mother is standing in the middle of the floor, inside a pretty eye-shaped symbol, smiling at her.  
  They came back for me.  And they gave me this for you.  Do you like it?  She holds out her hand towards her daughter, who comes forward.  Her mother opens her hand.  In it is the ring.  Her daughter reaches for it and steps into the symbol.  The ring begins to bleed, its colour seeping out onto the ground.  When it is perfectly clear and the carpet is soaked and stained a dull red, it starts to glow.  A red light, engulfing mother and daughter.  And then they are gone.

(c) Copyright Hespa.
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