6 Follow the moon
Louisiana at last. The dry breeze was relieving since her nightmare in the plane. Though, what was that?
Lilith was perhaps traumatized by her ‘dream’, as soon as she stepped foot on the cement of Louisiana airport, she was calmed as ever. It is lively here. The atmosphere is far from what she had dreamt in her dream.
“At least if I’m on land, I can run away”, she sighed while dragging her case. Waving her hand for a taxi to Youngsville. The car looked groggy, worse than her husband’s Toyota.
As soon as the driver turned off the engine, his car coughed. Is this safe for Lilith to ride? The driver has lines of old age on his face, trace of his smile, wrinkled the side of his eyes and around his nose, old but welcoming, he took off his beret and revealed his almost bald head.
“Good day, Madam!” he went to chase Lilith’s luggage.
"Madam? I prefer Ma'am" she chuckled.
And he only smiled.
Her case was placed in the trunk and her bag stayed on her lap. She bent her body and got in.
“To Youngsville, are we?” his eyes talked to Lilith through the rear mirror.
The flight took about 23- hours, and she was not able to blink asleep after the nightmare, she was wary. As soon as she felt at ease, her eyes started to feel heavy.
“Yes--” she muttered “how did you know?” Lilith completely shuts her eyes. Her sleepiness could not battle a single moment to hear his response.
Though he said no word and just drove.
The movement of the car swayed her into the abyss of slumber. It was an hour or two long drive, perhaps because the car can only drive up to 60 mph, but he went for half of its speed. Long ride, enough for Lilith to catch her sleep.
When she awoke, it was dark out, nighttime?
The road was covered with blackness of the night, the moon was nowhere in the sky where her sight can reach. The car is not moving too, and the driver is gone.
Did he take a break? Or is this the location now?
Lilith waited for about fifteen minutes in the silent car, yet the driver did not come back. The emptiness was unsettling, and so she went out of the car to search for the old man.
The crunch of leaves under her footwear broke the eerie silence. Slamming the car door shut behind her.
“Hello?”
The fog was chilly, she crossed her arms in an attempt to warm herself. A few steps, crunching the leaves, then she realized she is in the middle of the forest. The wind rustled on the tall pine trees. Again, she was alone.
Just like in her previous dream.
Upon wandering, soon she got the sight of the moon, its light pathed her way. Since she was unfamiliar of the place, she decided to just follow the moon.
It was a thoughtless and illogical decision that might lead her to circles, which she knew, but she still did.
Although she began walking farther away, she remembered her luggage on the trunk of the car, but it was too late for her to go back, she had come a long way. At least her bag is still hanging on her shoulder.
She searched for her phone and it was nearing to the drained battery, she shuts it off.
Lilith was disheveled by the rustling of the trees and bushes. She rushed her walking pace until a house covered the sight of the moon. She came to a stop before the black twisted metal gate.
This situation felt like a Deja vú. The chains that wrapped the gates closed were rusty and old, which seems like it has been untouched for several years. She clanged the chain and a lock fell. She took the chains off.
The hinges were loose, causing the gates to open widely.
She entered upon the echoing, opening noise of the gate. As she entered and walked closely to the house, it was not just a house, it was big and spacious yet inhabited and silent. A manor, A mansion.
A lonely mansion it was.
Its Victorian-style gives off a chilling sense, Dead but it seems like the house was breathing.
No, not because it moves, but something about it, something in it makes her hairs about to stand up to its ends when she knocked on the metal knocker and creaked open.
A woman and a man, both stood straight before her.
“Welcome, Madam Arlott” both said in unison, bowing their heads as a respect.
Upon hearing her husband’s surname addressed to her, Lilith was dumbfounded. She was unable to utter a single word.
Is this the mansion?
The woman walked closer to her, taking her bag casually, and brushed Lilith past the pillars that stood strong on the side of the mansion. And up to a hundred steps of stairs, for the prepared warm bath in the room that lies at the end of the corridor.
While the man closed the door behind Lilith. She was not able to do anything but to be swayed by their actions.
She undressed Lilith as if she was taking off a glove, her actions were disturbing for Lilith, but it looked as if she is used to this.
“Excuse me? What are you doing?”
“A bath, Madam” she continued to undress Lilith.
Lilith clasped her arms across her chest “I have no clothes”
“They are prepared in your room, madam”
Astonished by their advance preparation for her coming, her jaw fell open.
The woman sat on the edge of the tub and lowered her hands on the water. “The temperature is best suited for your skin, madam” Her dress straightens as she rose.
The woman wore a ruffled white apron on top of the rough plain black dress, which concluded Lilith’s assumption.
“Sorry to be asking you despite your kind actions towards me, but, are you a maid here?”
“A servant till death, I am”, she smiled and left Lilith in the bathroom.
Lilith emerged herself in the tub, the warmth sure was relaxing. After her horrible nightmares for coming all the way to Louisiana was paid off after arriving to the mansion in an unexpected way.
She wonders where the taxi driver went before she open her eyes awake. And her clothes too.
