“Marcel! I’m serious; you got to be home before six… no at least by five pm, otherwise you should stay in.”    “Not this again. Mom I already told you, the band is playing tonight, I won’t be home until ten… besides I’m twenty-one not eight. When are you going to stop trying to scare me with your stilly superstitions?”     “Young lady, this isn’t just some old wise tale; observing the rules of Peter Pak has always been very important to this family.”     “Yeah, whatever, can I go now?” The girl rolled her chestnut brown eyes, impatiently waiting for the conversation to end.      “Fine…” Sighing loudly, Ruby stared helplessly at

    “Snap out of it Marcel, it’s only for tonight and it will all be over.”    The girl patted her cheeks trying to regain a measure of normalcy, before tightly shutting her eyes taking loud deep breaths, puffing out a mouthful of air, repeating to herself… “Mike is gone; I’m doing this for mom so her mind will be at peace.”      After a few minutes she slowly opened her eyes ready to embrace the inevitable ritual, but at the said time her heart suddenly jolted in shock, rapidly drumming against her rib cage as a familiar figure seemed to have glitch in the background of her reflection in the mirror. However, staring intently… or rather, frozen in place afraid of blinking, the shadow seem to have disappeared.     “Holy shit! I think I’m losing my freaking mind.” The anxious girl hurriedl

     Marcel was completely stunned by her mother’s sudden outburst. Ruby had basically sprang to her feet and leaped forward in an aggressive manner, trying to shove her out of the front doors all in one swift motion causing the girl to stumble to the floors, panting heavily in pure fear.  Neither of the two young folks had anticipated her reaction to be this physical and bizarre.     “Aunty, please calm down. Everything’s going to be alright, it’s just the three of us here.” Nate hastily grabbed hold of the woman’s trembling arms in hopes of getting her to realize what she had done, since he could not tend to them both at once. At least he would be able to stop her from lashing out any further, right?      “No! Don’t let her poison you! My son is alive, but she’s trying to kill him. That witch wants to kill her own broth

     The very next day, Marcel groggily rolled out of bed with eyes barely opened, yawning several times as she managed to make it all the way to the lower flat of the house without stumbling down the stairs in the drowsy state she was in… searching for the guy she thought would still be asleep on the sofa in the room they shared the night before.       Apparently, that was the only room in the house he could sleep in… of course she didn’t believe his lousy explanation, but it felt nice knowing he was there, especially since the entire night her mind was battling this strange sensation of uneasiness, at one point she could even swear that Mike had appeared by her bedside just standing there, staring at her. So naturally it was safe to say, she had hardly gotten any rest.       “Nate?” Marcel called out in a slightly hoarse voice, walking over to the direction of the kitchen to grab a glass

     “Just take it easy, calm down. There’s no one there.” Nate hastily wrapped the girl in his embrace thinking it must be difficult for her to be standing in front of her brother’s room.      “No! I know what I saw! Mike… he… he’s in there!” Marcel shouted in grief, pointing into the room a few steps ahead, tears rolling down her face without fail as she desperately wanted to get as far away as possible from her own home.       “M, I need you to stay focus, Mike is gone… remember? We came up here to find aunty, she’s alive… you got to let go of the past, take care of your mom and dad… we need to take care of each other.” Her sudden unexplained behavior instantly made him worry that she too might be facing some sort of traumatic stress… was their family cursed to insanity after losing one of its beloved member?        “No! No! I’m not crazy; I saw his s