So, what could ‘the invitation’ possibly be?
I pulled a shirt over my head in my favorite color, black, and put on a pair of ripped jeans, all the while contemplating if the nightmare message was real or not, and if it was real, what it could possibly mean. I glanced at the mirror and quickly pulled my messy, waist-length blonde hair into a ponytail. There, at least I looked semi-presentable right now.
My phone beeped, and a text message from my best friend Cassie popped up. Happy Birthday, D.! You feeling old yet?? I already booked a spot for you in the nursing home. Hahaha, kidding! LOVE YOU SO MUCH. I’ll drop by at Joe’s around 3pm. Xoxo
I chuckled at Cassie’s joke—she was a year older than me, so in an ideal world, she’d be holding a spot for me in the nursing home months before I ever got there. Still, I was glad she’d be dropping by at work; Joe’s Diner was always quiet between 2 and 4pm.
I grabbed my leather jacket and shrugged it on. After glancing at my mirror image one last time, I rushed out of my bedroom, slamming the door shut behind me. Taking two stairs at a time, I raced downstairs into the kitchen, and nearly jumped out of my skin when I saw my mom standing in the kitchen. Wasn’t she supposed to be at work?
She stood with her back toward me, and she didn’t move when I came in. Had she decided to take a day off as a surprise for me? Was she feeling ill?
I frowned, distinctly remembering she told me yesterday how sorry she was that she had to work, but that she’d make it up to me with pizza.
“Mom?” My voice came out as a squeak. “Is everything okay?”
She flinched at hearing my voice, but she didn’t turn around.
I inched closer toward her, growing worried. Something about this, about her being here, about the jerky way she moved, didn’t feel right at all. Shivers ran down my spine. “Mom?” I tried again.
She straightened her shoulders, but she still didn’t turn toward me.
I was only a few feet away from her now, but all my senses screamed at me not to move closer, to just stay away. What the hell was going on?
“Mom, you’re scaring me.” I reached out for her, my hand almost touching her shoulder—
And then she spun around, lightning fast.
For a second, I feared I was back in the nightmare. Mom didn’t look like herself at all. Her eyes weren’t their normal brown color; the irises had all but disappeared, and white orbs gazed at me. Her face was ashen-pale, her lips almost blue.
I was too scared to scream.
Mom’s nails dug into the skin of my upper arms, and with formidable strength, she pulled me closer until my face was inches away from hers. Those eyes….
“You, Devina Ashworth,” Mom said in a high-pitched, screeching sound that didn’t sound like her own voice at all, “are hereby invited to the Academy for the Wicked. Your test will begin at 4pm sharp today. Don’t be late.”
My mouth dropped to the floor, and I could barely progress what the Mom-that-wasn’t-my-Mom was saying. Academy for the Wicked? What the hell was that? And why was I invited to it?
The invitation. The woman from the nightmare.
But what worried me the most was what was happening to Mom. Had someone or something taken control of her? Was she hallucinating? Had she been drugged?
And the most worrying question of all: was this person even my Mom?
Replica-Mom blinked slowly, and when she opened her eyes again, the white orbs had turned back into her regular, brown eyes.
“Devina?” Mom touched her head and wobbled a little.
I grabbed her arms to support her.
“Why am I… Why are you up?”
“Come on, sit down.” I was shaking too, but I tried to focus on Mom. Despite her eyes having returned to their normal state, she was still as pale as a ghost.
She sat down without protesting. “I don’t feel very well. Am I ill?” She put a hand on her forehead, feeling her temperature. “What time is it?”
“It’s seven am. That’s why I’m awake, I have to be at Joe’s in half an hour.” I kept holding on to her, rubbing her arms. I was afraid that if I let her go, even for just a moment, she would turn back into the horrible doppelganger I’d seen seconds ago.
“Seven?” Mom frowned. “But I’m supposed to be at work…”
“It’s okay. I’ll call Frank, don’t worry about it.” Frank was my Mom’s boss at the hairdresser’s she worked at and unlike Alfred, the owner of Joe’s Diner, he was actually an upstanding guy who had the best interests of his employees in mind.
“I don’t remember… Dev, I don’t even remember waking up.” Mom looked so fragile, so small in that moment, that I couldn’t help but wrap my arms around her, despite the lingering fear that she would turn back into whatever it was that had seemed to… possess… her seconds ago.
“It’s okay, Mom.” I hugged her and rubbed her back. “It’s okay.”
But was it? The nightmare woman’s message had turned out to be true; I had received an invitation that I probably wasn’t ready for at all, and delivered in a way that had scared me half to death.
If I didn’t know better, I would guess I was still dreaming, and that I hadn’t managed to wake up from the nightmare yet.
Besides,
