Lady Undead

      Myra lived on a tilted, dead-end street. Deep woods at the bottom and the bustle of small-town life at the top. The neighbors were close-knit, nosy, and incredibly stingy about people staying off their lawn. It made games hard, but not impossible. Any game could be played if the rules changed to fit the circumstances. In a game of hide-and-seek, Myra knew that applied. The game changed with the environment.

           The moon had just risen in the sky, all the streetlights flickering on one by one. Myra walked in the middle of the street, down towards the woods. Pumpkins on doorsteps kept illuminated by a single candle, now stood out. As did the filled bowls of candy; no one ever bothered with the dead-end streets, putting out candy was a wasted effort.

           Wind skipped through Myra’s blue hair and pushed against the fairy wings on her back. A lazy costume, but still one, nonetheless. Myra’s eyes scanned the lonely woods. It was out of bounds; Myra knew that, but she couldn’t take her eyes off it anyway.

           A voice filled the empty street. “I’m bored! Why is it taking you forever to find us?” someone yelled. Myra knew the voice well: Thana.

           Myra laughed and turned around. “I know where you are, Thana, you hide in the same spot every year. I just thought I’d boost your ego a bit.” Proving her own words true, Myra walked across her neighbor’s grass and peered behind her trash can. Thana sat behind it, her brown eyes shimmering under the porch light, and her red cape pulled over her like a blanket. “Boo.”

           “I vote we give up this tradition,” Thana said. “We’re not kids anymore.”

           “I vote we don’t. At least not for a few more years. Now, let’s get off Ms. Everly’s grass before she kills us.”

           Thana smiled and moved to the street, giddiness in her steps. “She’s not the one we should be scared of. Not when Lady Undead lives on this street.”

           Despite Thana’s joy of the tales, a shiver ran up Myra’s spine. Lady Undead wasn’t someone to joke about. Without meaning to, Myra looked to the house. It was grey and regal-like, sitting almost in the woods itself far away from the moon and sun. “Just tell me where Daisy is, so we can go inside and watch a movie.”

           “She’s cheating. She went into your backyard.”

           “Are you kidding me?” asked Myra.

           “Nope. I watched her hop the fence myself.”

           Myra walked over to her fence, glanced to her house—where her parents were sound asleep—and rolled her eyes. “Daisy, get out of my backyard,” she whispered. “You’re going to wake up my parents.”

           Daisy popped out from behind a bush and met Myra at the white fence. She was wearing only orange, earlier insisting it counted as a pumpkin costume. “You take all the fun out of this game, Myra. You know that, right?” Her voice was whiny, mimicking annoyance.

           “You’ve caught me, Daisy. I’m the fun police for Halloween this year.”

           “I have an idea to spice up the game,” said Thana.

           Without even hearing it, Myra shook her head. “I thought you never wanted to play hide and seek again. That it was for children.”

           “The way you play is for children, but I have a fun way to play. It includes changing the boundaries of where we play.” Thana’s tilted her head to Lady Undead’s house. Tall, menacing, supposedly home to a serial killer let out of prison 10 years ago, who never quite recovered mentally—an awful idea.

           “No way,” Myra said quickly. “We’re not going into her house.”

           “Not her house, silly. Just her backyard. People say it’s huge, and that she has a greenhouse that’s always unlocked. Daisy, what do you think? You’re the deciding vote.” Thana’s words were out of her mouth before Myra could rebuttal, leaving all eyes on Daisy.

           The attention on the sweet girl made her squirm. But Myra knew that there was more under Daisy’s sweetness. Under it, was a girl who wanted nothing more than her friend’s approval. Daisy sighed and gave a short-lived smile. “Let’s do it. So long as I’m not ‘it.’”

           Myra nodded. “Thana can be ‘it’ as this was her brilliant idea.”

           Radiating with victory, Thana shrugged. “Fine with me. I’ll wait in front of the house for a minute, then start searching.”

           Getting closer to the house only made it more frightening. All of the lights were off, the curtains drawn closed, but an old car was sitting in the driveway. Leaves and frost covered the car, hiding its age and condition. On the broken wooden steps leading to the front door was a bowl of candy.

           “Do you think she’ll kill me for taking some?” Daisy asked.

           Thana grinned. “Only one way to find out.”

           Reluctantly, Myra followed them to the front door, past the untrimmed grass and bushes. Unlike Thana—who didn’t believe anything about Lady Undead—Myra believed. She believed the house was alive. Someone lived there. Legends and rumors always have some bit of truth to them, the question is just figuring out what that truth is.

           Daisy gasped, pulling Myra out of her thoughts. “What the hell?” Looking over Daisy’s shoulder, Myra found a nightmare of a candy bowl. What should have smelled sugary, smelled rotten like spoiled milk. The candy had ants crawling on it, and through the clear wrappers, mold was visible on the candy’s shell. “How long has this been out here?”

           “Ten years,” Thana answered laughing.

           “Not funny, Thana.”

           “Whatever. Now, get over that gate so I can start counting. The sooner we start, the sooner we can leave.”

           Hesitance and worry were written on Daisy’s freckled face. She frowned but looked to the gate anyway. “Right. Time to start.”

           Climbing over the gate was the easy part. It was about Myra’s height, made of brick, and relatively flat at the top. Perfect to lure people into false ease. Once they were both over, Daisy texted Thana, so she would know to start.

           Myra’s heart began to beat in her ears, as Daisy ran off without her. There was a clearly defined path of dirt in the yard with two forks in it, one to the backdoor, the other to the greenhouse. Birds chirped from high trees and crickets from the long grass. A broken fountain made of stone laid in pieces beside the path. Knowing she’d already taken too long, Myra started on the path. She wasn’t going to the house—never—so that only left the greenhouse. Big enough to fit a few plants and a small crowd.

           Picking up her pace, Myra dashed into the greenhouse. To her shock it was well-kept. Smelled of roses and sunflowers, all in peak health. Organized in a way Myra couldn’t understand were three rows of neat flowers.

           Unsure of what else to do and not wishing to back herself into a corner, Myra walked to the edge of the greenhouse and sat against the wall. The entrance was still visible, but Myra hoped someone walking by wouldn’t notice her.

           Beat, beat, beat. The longer she sat, the louder Myra’s heart got. Beat. She was sure Lady Undead could hear it from her house. She had must be able to.  

           A high-pitched noise sounded from somewhere in the yard. Though she couldn’t see anything, Myra looked around frantically. The noise settled and turned into running water. Maybe from a hose? But… that would mean someone was outside, in the backyard. Close enough for Myra to hear, and if Myra could hear them, maybe they could hear her.

           It must be Thana fucking with me, Myra thought. That logical part of her brain was quickly pushed aside, as anxiety took hold.

           Myra sucked in a breath, trying to settle and quiet her breathing as much as possible. The water stopped and walking began. Someone was maneuvering through the backyard, skipping across the stone path. Water could still be heard, but now it was contained and moving against something. It pushed to one side than another. Birds screamed and flew from the greenhouse’s roof, as the noises drew closer. Myra did the one thing she didn’t want to do and cornered herself, hoping the corner was dark enough to keep her hidden.

The person—most likely Lady Undead herself—began to whistle. It was melodic and light and deceiving, and if this was Thana, Myra was going to kill her. As the whistling grew louder, a shadow appeared on the floor. The person was a girl, seemingly a young one at that. She was simply bobbing her head from side to side and watering the flowers. Definitely not Thana.

Too young to be Lady Undead. Unless she was immortal as some said, already dead but still alive as her name implied.

Myra watched as the shadow disappeared and the girl appeared. She was blonde, well-dressed, nothing like the nightmare people said lived here. Her back was to Myra, and somehow that was more threatening than having her see Myra. At any moment, she could turn, and the atmosphere could change.

The girl began to hum, as she stroked the leaves of her flowers. “You’ve grown to be so pretty,” she whispered to the rose. “But not as tall as the sunflowers.”

Myra’s eyes widened, as a horrifying realization hit her. She was sitting next to the sunflowers. Tall, yes, but good for hiding, no. When the girl turned around and locked eyes with Myra, both of their hearts stopped, even though the world didn’t.

“Hello,” the girl said with a smile. “Not many people come around these parts.” She must have noticed Myra’s frozen expression and how Myra kept trying to scoot further into the wall because the girl gave a sad laugh.

A door, what Myra could only assume was the backdoor, opened. “Seph, how long does it take to water those plants? Get back in here!” yelled an older woman with a strained voice.

The girl—Seph, apparently—brought a finger to her mouth and shushed Myra. “If you’re quiet, the Lady won’t know you’re here.” Seph then turned to the house. “Sorry, mother! I’ll be done in a moment.” Without paying Myra so much as another glance, Seph finished watering her flowers, then left the greenhouse to go inside.

Myra had never jumped over a fence so quickly. She wasn’t sure where Daisy or Thana was, only that they needed to leave. Her head started to spin, as she called her friends. First, Daisy, then Thana, both insisting Myra was a liar but agreeing to leave anyway.

Who was Seph? Who is her mother, is it Lady Undead? Myra looked up to the daunting house, a light now shining through a second-floor window. Myra knew it was Seph, she just knew. Under Seph’s watchful eye, Myra’s skin itched. And Myra decided she didn’t want the answers to her questions; she would never be near this house again.

Daisy and Thana both hopped the fence, neither looking exactly pleased nor as if they believed Myra. Part of Myra wanted to tell them to look at the window, insist someone was there, but looking at the house again, it was completely darkened.

Thana put an arm over Myra’s shoulder and began pulling her up the street. “You’re such a scaredy-cat, you know that? If you were scared, you could have said so. No one needed to hear that you met Lady Undead’s child.”

“It’s not a story, it really happened. I don’t know how neither of you saw or heard her.”

“Because we’re not crazy,” said Daisy. “I honestly don’t think anyone has lived there for years.”

“Believe what you want, but I know what I saw,” Myra insisted.

Thana yawned. “Forget about it, both of you. Let’s go watch that movie finally.”

Myra shook her head. Even as she walked into Thana’s house and put on a movie, her mind kept replaying her meeting with Seph. The way the greenhouse smelled, Seph’s terrifying beauty, the birds which feared her. It wouldn’t stop playing.

Maybe one day, Myra would know the truth, but for now, she was content with her horrifying memories. She knew the truth; Lady Undead’s house was alive, not because of the old femme fatale, but because of Seph.

Seph was somehow living in a dying home and that made her more fascinating than any rumor about Lady Undead.