Page 6 of Misery Manor

“Misery Manor closes at midnight, so you have one hour to escape. Please place your phones here,” he says, pointing to the table. One by one, we hand over our phones.

“What happens if we don’t escape by then?” Anya asks, still gripping Ronnie’s arm tightly.

Devil Man looks at all of our faces slowly and doesn’t say anything for a long moment. “Then you’re not making it out of here alive,” he says gravely.

Our nervous laughter fills the empty foyer, but Devil Man remains eerily silent.

“Enjoy your stay at Misery Manor. And please—don’t go into the basement.”

Bells chime from somewhere in the house, scaring the shit out of us. We look around to see where the noise is coming from, but it’s so dark in here that we can’t see much of anything. When I turn back around, Devil Man is gone.

“This is creepy as fuck,” Cherise says quietly, whipping her hair over her shoulder.

Tyler wraps an arm around her and pulls her close to him. “Don’t worry, baby, I'll keep you safe.”

Cherise rolls her eyes, but in the warm glow of the candlelight, I can see her skin flush from his attention.

“So, how are we going to do this?” I ask quietly, looking back at that hallway where the white face is still watching me. My stomach churns with nerves; I think I'm going to throw up.

“How about we break off into small groups?” Anya suggests. “That way, if we can’t explore all of the mansion before midnight, we can meet back at the van and talk about what we saw.”

Everyone nods their agreement, and without consulting each other, they break away. Anya and Ronnie go down the hall where Devil Man came from, and Tyler leads Cherise into a shadowy wing off to the right. That leaves me, Megan, and Jamal standing together by the front door.

“You’ll be okay by yourself, right Aliyah?” Jamal asks, although it’s not so much a question as it is a demand.

I flinch like he’s just raised his hand to me, hurt that he would even suggest that in a place like this. What happened to him protecting and providing for me?

“You really expect me to roam around here alone? At eleven o’clock at night? On Halloween?”

His eyes darken with anger, so I take a step back in case he decides to swing at me.

“You’re the one who decided to follow me out of the house like a lost little bitch,” he snarls, face twisting with fury.

“I don’t want to do this alone, Jamal⁠—”

“Then fucking don’t! Go find the others and latch onto them, but you’re not coming with us.”

Megan, the bitch, puts her hands on her hips and grins at me nastily.

I hate her so much.

For the second or third time tonight, my eyes are burning with unshed tears. I try to place a hand on his arm, but he smacks it away.

“Baby—” I plead, but he cuts me off.

“Shut up,” he snaps through gritted teeth. “And stop with all the crying. If you’re going to act like that you can go wait in the van, but you’re not coming with us,” he says again. His tone is edged with finality, so I nod and watch him and Megan ascend the sweeping staircase to the second floor.

Why did I come tonight? He and the others clearly don’t want me here; I don’t know why I keep trying to make things work with them.

“Get it together, Aliyah,” I say to myself, wiping my face and flinching when I graze the bruise on my cheek. “You’re here to have fun.”

After composing myself for a few minutes, I decide to do exactly what Jamal told me not to do and follow him and Megan up the creaking stairs. I’ll deal with the punishment later.

On the way up, I look down from the top and see that white face still staring at me. It looks up at me, but I can’t see the body and eyes.

I shiver and practically run to the first room I find. A set of ornately carved double doors sit right at the top of the steps, so I slowly open one of them and enter.

Just like the foyer, the room is lit only by candlelight, so it’s super dark inside. Candles hang from the ceiling, I assume with clear string to give the effect that they’re floating.