CH 4.2

She switched on all the lights in the room and lay down on the bed while hugging her blanket to her chest for comfort. It was one thing to see a ghost in your dreams, and another to see such a creepy scene in reality. Feeling overwhelmed, she laid there all ajitter, terrified of anything that might happen next. For a moment, she felt that all her past beliefs about reality had been shattered to pieces.

“It’s okay, don’t be scared, it must’ve just been Chen Xu… I’m going to die anyway, what’s there to be afraid of?”

After comforting herself, she tried to stay awake, but the fatigue from her journey was too much to bear, and she fell into a deep sleep.

The mattress was thick and comfortable, while the cotton blanket was relatively thin. Tang Tian had expected that it might get rather hot if she slept with a blanket on in the peak of summer without any fan or air conditioning, but it was surprisingly cool at night, maybe because the room was well-ventilated. 

Being as weak and ill as she was, she was more sensitive to the cold than most. But the soft blanket covering her body had just the right thickness to it.

As the young woman laid still, her small, pale face contrasted against the bright red satin bedding, making her seem even more beautiful. 

The incandescent lamp above her suddenly flickered twice, before it abruptly died. 

Tang Tian awoke, with a start, to complete darkness. 

Her body was tense and rigid while her eyes were opened as wide as they could go. Meanwhile, the air in the room felt frigid, as if she had fallen into a freezer. Piercing cold air came in gusts, swirling around and creating a blurry fog in her room that kept her from seeing even the furniture clearly. 

She wanted to move, but she couldn’t control her body. It was the same feeling she had had on the train. Suddenly, her body jerked like a puppet on strings. She saw herself sitting up stiffly, then awkwardly getting off the bed. With her heart thundering in her chest, Tang Tian struggled to move her eyes, and she saw how the tip of her toes were barely touching the ground as her body somehow floated out of the room.

As her toes brushed against the ground, a soft swooshing sound could be heard. When she reached the raised threshold by the door, her legs weren’t even lifted, and her body passed through the wooden panel as if she was just an empty shell. 

This was more terrifying than what she had experienced on the train, and she tried to scream for help, but no voice came out. It felt as if someone had a vice-like grip on her throat, stopping her from making any sounds. 

She was tugged along by invisible strings to the study she had visited earlier. Upon entering, she saw, out of the corner of her eye, that there was a dark, ghostly shadow sitting on the redwood chair, the same chair she had sat on earlier. The shadow had one arm on the armrest and seemed to be gazing right at her. 

The cold air that never stopped swirling around her clouded her vision, so she couldn’t see the shadow clearly. Then, her body was then turned to the direction of the bookshelves, and soon, she floated to a stop right before one. Tang Tian clenched her teeth tightly to contain her trembling, all her attention focused on the person, or thing, behind her.

The shadow’s gaze was cold, sharp, and eerily familiar. 

The next second, she witnessed her hand lifting on its own, as if being guided by something. It was raised slowly but stiffly, until it pointed towards the second last book on the fifth row.

Someone had pulled the book out a little, so its jutting spine stood out against the perfect line formed by the other books. 

It couldn’t have been me, Tang Tian thought as she recalled that she had neatly placed the poetry book she had read back to its original position, in accordance with the owner’s preference.

This book didn’t seem to be about poetry, either. There was no indication of the book’s publisher, title, or author anywhere on the plain black cover. 

She did not recognize the book, but then again, when she was picking out something to read earlier, she hadn’t noticed it at all as there were simply too many books on the multiple bookshelves.

“What book is this?”

While Tang Tian was distracted, the energy that controlled her abruptly dispersed. Her feet were lowered to the ground and she regained control of her body, but her arm remained in the same position. Without thinking, she leaned forward and touched the book. As she was pulling it out…

She felt something cold and hard press against her back all of a sudden, sending a shiver down her spine. A hand appeared from over her shoulder, brushed against a few strands of her hair and rested on her raised hand. 

Tang Tian could feel her heart in her throat. The hand that hovered over hers was larger than hers, with slender fingers, and a freezing cold sensation seeped into her hands as it touched her. She noticed that the hand had visible veins and its awfully pale skin had abnormal blotches of greenish-black colour. 

Tang Tian realised immediately that this was a dead man’s hand!

When she was still at the hospital, she had accidentally peeked at a patient who unfortunately passed away. That patient’s hands were of the same colour. 

Shit! 

The colour instantly drained from her face. She struggled instinctively, trying to free her hand, but the hand closed on hers, gripping tightly with interlocking fingers. He had stopped her from pulling the book out, but at the same time, blocked her escape from behind, so she was unable to flee.

Does he want me to take the book or not? thought Tang Tian in exasperation.

As she stood still for the next few seconds, she recalled all the things that she had been put through during her journey earlier until finally, she couldn’t hold in her annoyance any longer. 

“Dude, what are you trying to get me to do? Can you at least be clear with it?”