ONE

Kyliena.

Of course.

I had the luck to catch the laziest taxi driver ever. The slightly grumpy old man who hadn’t said a word through the whole drive, intently listening to a song that came on the radio.

I flinched when a raindrop hit my head as soon as I got out of the taxi. Looking up and blinking a few times.

Sure, as soon as I got here I just needed to start raining.

It didn’t feel like a good sign for someone who had just moved to another town; glancing up at the clouded dark gray sky once more, I turned around and walked to the rear of the parked taxi.

The grumpy old man was oblivious to my struggle of trying to heave the two big heavy suitcases out of the trunk.

“Best to get inside darling, nights like these are not something you’d want to get caught up in.” A stranger spoke right behind me as felt a hand latch onto my suitcase handle and pulled my heavy suitcase out like it was weightless—I quickly retracted my hand as the stranger set my large suitcase on the concrete road right beside me then quickly did the same with my second suitcase.

I could feel the hot burning sensation pumping through my cheeks, I was hardcore blushing.

“Thank you for helping me—” I heard the taxi’s engine start up and the grumpy taxi driver took off. I had paid him before I had even stepped out of the taxi. I stupidly had also tipped generously him thinking he’d be nice enough to help me with pulling my luggage out of the trunk, clearly, I was wrong.

I looked over to see who had helped me with my luggage, and I saw nobody around except this one tall guy with piercing green eyes that glanced over at me as he opened the door to a tattoo parlor stepping inside.

I was left on the sidewalk with two heavy suitcases, standing in the rain—which was only getting heavier and heavier. I wasn’t sure how I’d get my luggage to my grandparent’s house that just so happened to be a townhouse stuck to the side of this odd indie tattoo parlor.

I hadn’t ever actually been to my grandparent’s house before—and this was definitely not what I was picturing it to look like. My father was too paranoid of the town they resided in to ever let us visit them. —The only reason why I’m here now was because my dad got time behind bars because he beat up my boyfriend Blake over something he thought he saw. To this day, I don’t know what he “saw”.

Anyway, he kept saying that there are horrible creatures that lurk in the darkness here…

While growing up he told me the story of the time when he was ten years old, his dog ran out of his family home—this townhome, the home I’m just about my home until my dad gets out of jail and the social worker says I can go back.

He goes on and says that he watched his dog die that night being eaten alive by a wolf-like humanoid that he himself barely made it back home to safety.

Then there were these stories of the locals being blood-sucking vampires and all the BS surrounding that subject. Oh and the witches of the forest and the great lake—supposedly they lure pregnant women to their deaths and drown them in the lake as a sacrifice to make their power grow stronger.

I didn’t believe these stories he told, neither did my mother and that’s why she left us. She left me with him because she didn’t want to be reminded every day of how crazy her husband became and how her ‘perfect’ family died because of it.

I didn’t quite expect my grandparent’s house to be a beautiful white wood-washed well kept townhome as my father always mentioned how hauntingly dark the house was along with this quaint seaside town.

I did not get this hauntingly dark vibe he mentioned when I looked up at my grandparent’s house. I had always liked the look of this style of townhome—even though it was a slight eyesore because it was connected to this tattoo shop but I was determined to look beyond that small shop.

I struggled to lug up my two large suitcases towards the townhouse and I really didn’t know what I was going to do to get them both up the winding stairs that lead up to my grandparent’s front door.

I sigh heavily.

“Rosie is that you?!”

My head shot up in the direction of the voice, my eyes were met with a pair of kind brown eyes that matched my father’s eyes. I’m assuming this man was my grandfather.

“Kyliena Rose Yuri?” He spoke out to me again and that prompted me to nod my head yes and give out a slight wave of a hi up towards him.

“Finally! We were starting to get worried,” he says as he opens his front door more and steps onto his front porch. “We were expecting you hours ago,” he added after a while of silence and of me struggling to lift one of my suitcases onto the first step of their long windy steps. It was a good long two flights of stairs before you even met the front porch.

I had a feeling this was going to take a while.

Just as a large forced gust of wind pushed against me, making me lose my balance ever so slightly. I went to grab onto the suitcase that was in front of me to try to get it on the first step, and my hand didn’t grip onto the handle—all that was there was cold weather and emptiness. I furrowed my eyebrows and looked around me to see if the gust of wind caused my luggage to fly away from me from the force of the wind.

I didn’t see them anywhere near me, I looked up at my grandfather with a puzzled look, but there he was again that guy with the intense green eyes carrying my luggage so effortlessly up the long steps to the front door.

I heard my grandfather and this guy chatting before he stepped aside for the guy to walk in with both of my bags and up another staircase that I’m assuming led to the room in which I’d be staying in.

As I made my way up to where my grandfather was waiting for me, I couldn’t help but be curious about what I would find in their house. My father was always too scared to tell me anything about his parents…mainly his mom, he refused to even stay in contact with them.

My father made it sound like their home was an absolute dump-hole and a sinkhole for everything good, but I hoped that this would not be the case for me.

I needed a fresh start after all that had happened in the past year, I needed to make this work.

I looked up at the dark sky above me one last time before I stepped into the house.

“It’s so wonderful to finally meet you, Rosie!” My grandfather said cheerfully as he pulled me into a bear hug.

“It’s so surreal to be meeting you, grandpa.”

“Your grandma had to take her evening medication a bit early today, she’s been feeling a little under the weather lately and they make her very tired. So she had already turned in for the night…” He explains to me.

“Oh, I totally understand…sorry for taking so long. I had a hard time finding a taxi driver to take me here for some reason—all of them thought I was messing with them, playing a joke on them, or thought I was crazy.” I lightly chuckled out nervously as my eyes trail around the rectangle foyer.

The foyer was the landing in-between the stairs leading down to the basement or bottom floor, and the stairs leading up to what I figured was the living room, kitchen, and possibly other rooms.

I followed my grandfather up the stairs and I was met with the livingroom and kitchen area. My attention turned to the figure in the hallway to my left, it was that guy again walking over to me, but looked like he had no intentions of acknowledging me.

And I was right, he just walked on past me, down the stairs that led to the front door.

“Oh, Papa Yuri…you had gotten a couple of packages earlier today while you were at the market with your lovely wife—they’re in my office—”

“Packages? I wasn’t expecting any—...I wonder if it was Gloria with the television shopping again.” My grandfather chuckles, as he scratched the top of his head lightly.

I raise an eyebrow in amusement and curiosity. 

“I’ll bring them up to you tomorrow morning when I bring up your mail and newspaper,” the strange green-eyed man says as he cracks open the front door and turns to leave.

“Oh, have you met my beautiful granddaughter?”

He stopped and turned his lowered head towards my direction.

“Briefly, I almost dropped dead in my tracks when I saw her get out of the taxi,” he says as he quickly exits the house, closing the door behind him.

He almost dropped dead in his tracks when he saw me?

What was that supposed to mean?