Kai

It had been twenty-four long years since she’d last seen it, but it looked exactly the same as it used to. The harrowing dull stone walls seemed to drain the sky of color as it loomed. Abandoned, that is what they told Kai. It sure looked like it.

 The grounds of the orphanage she used to live in were what appeared to be abandoned. All that lived here were the spirits of the past and the spreading ivy—like a parasite, spreading from the ground and up the walls. The tall grass reached to her upper thighs, tickling her as she crept past the creaking gate and onto the worn path that reached up to the house.

Most of the windows were boarded up for whatever reason. The doors, too, but that was why she came prepared with her satchel of supplies on one shoulder and a crowbar in hand. The place reeked of loneliness. The Quiet, as she used to call it.

Kai came up upon the doors and began stripping away the wooden boards that tied it down. She grunted at the effort, but she didn’t let their strength stop her. She was stronger—stronger than this place stronger than these damn boards.

When she was younger, living here had been. . . something. It was a mix between a fever dream and one of those pleasant nightmares. The ones that left you questioning whether what you had seen was real or not. The ones that kept you awake after night had already fallen and even the sounds of crickets stopped chirping. She hadn’t been that badly treated, which made her feel a little worse about what she was going to do.

After three of the boards were removed, she used what appeared to be a bobby pin to pick her way through the lock. It wasn’t a bobby pin. It had a thicker metal than one, and more refined, straighter, to achieve the goal she was aiming for. Then, she quickly and quietly slipped through the front door.

One would think orphanages to be small, low funded, maybe even a little office like. This was. . . not that. Kai came from London and after a series of unfortunate accidents with her parents and a few family members. Then she was placed at the orphanage, ready for adoption. It took a while. She bounced from house to house, never really settling, and whenever they didn’t want her anymore they took her back here. Always this same place.

The foyer was a wide open space, even though the spacious walls were blotched out with graffiti. There used to be paintings on these walls. Old ones of victorian women and swooning men at their heels. The tan walls were now a faded whitish yellow, although, it was almost hard to make out anymore.

Her staircase, the one that led up to what used to be her room, was barred off with caution tape. She was planning on visiting that place, but she would rather not fall through the floorboards. Kai was already dead enough as it was, and she didn’t need the police to come snooping when a loud noise erupted, courtesy of those uneasy floorboards. They made her wary even as a child. Although, she almost doubted they would come. There weren’t neighbors for miles, only a wide and swift river roughly a mile and a half from the house. 

Kai dug out a torch from her bag, clicking it on. 

The beam of light hit the floors at an odd angle, as if the floors were warped. Those rich brown boards, once polished, now covered and stained black. It smeared all the way to the living area.

Kai ignored it, and strode to the kitchen, just past the staircase and into a forgotten hallway. There, it seemed a little better, but only the barest fragments of light leaked from the boarded windows. There, she set down her torch to face the ceiling, and laid out her plan. 

The Quiet had once surrounded this place, surrounded her. Whenever she made friends as a child, they would always end up leaving her. Everyone always ends up leaving her in one way or another. Instead of making anymore friends, she decided to call upon some others. The Quiet always found a way of recruiting children. They were shadows of people, but not people themselves. The creak in the hall, the corner of a room, the shadow upon the ceiling. That was the Quiet. 

It crept to her one night in a dream when she was eight, and it never left her since. And this place. . . this was it’s hunting ground. 

The Quiet one time lured her to the river, following a trail of shadows and fleeting glimpses of happy memories, and to a place where no one heard her scream. It was under an old elm tree. It’s branches were dim though—stuck out at odd angles. Perhaps it was just the way her childhood memories stuck out, or maybe it was something more. It took her there, and she could have sworn it whispered to her.

In the blackest of night when all the children went to sleep, she would sneak off to the river side and visit that elm tree, leaving it little offerings of honey and bread that she snuck off the dining room table or the kitchens. 

Sometimes, when she didn’t leave enough, it would find her curled up in bed and awaken her, whispering to her awful things, things that made her want to simmer away into the shadow and never be found again. She almost did, until she was adopted and stayed that way.

Now, being in her late twenties, she discovered that the Quiet wasn’t just her imagination.

Out of Kai’s bag, she grabbed lighter fluid and a match box.

The Quiet, after she left, had slaughtered the entire orphanage. No one had been spared. Those drag marks down the floor weren’t just some black markings, they were old, stained blood. In the moonlight, Kai had discovered, it looked almost the same. Glimmering and black.

It was nostalgic being back here. In a way, she was finishing what she started. There would be no more darkness if the light dragged it out of the depths. 

Kai stuck the torch in her mouth, starting to dump the fluid on the floors and into the main hallway. She even went so far as to follow the decaying blood, in some spots pooling where there used to be bodies. She spared no spot, and was sure that when this place lit, there would be no way any of it would survive. 

This was one of the best days of her life. 

Nothing felt better than lighting that match and watching the world turn red. 

Kai dashed out the door, the ignition spreading quickly across the floors and the start of the stars. There wasn’t much time as she slid her way back through the crack she made in the door and out onto the empty lot outside. It would be awhile before anyone reported the smoke. Some say they still heard screaming here every night. Kai learned not to doubt them.

Kai watched as the house began to catch flame, and didn’t even consider leaving until she could see the smoke licking the outside of the windows, until the foundation began to reek with flames. An odd smile graced her lips. There was nothing worth smiling over other than the beginning of an end. An old friend meeting their match. Inside, she swore she could hear something roar, leaving a cold shiver down her back.

She walked around the house, trailing down to the riverside. It had never looked more beautiful in the dark skies. The clouds almost acted as a buffer, a way so no God could have ever seen her act of vengeance. 

Under that elm tree, she found her place, and laid her head back to rest on the aching roots. Kai took a deep breath, and said, “It’s done,” before closing her eyes and drifted off to sleep. 

The water near her feet was only a distant sound, even as the fire roared behind her, begging her to put it out. But there would be no such thing, and that was all that mattered to Kai.