It had been happening the same way every night since she’d moved in. Usually, nothing happened until 2 or 3am, so she was able to get a little sleep. Until the crying woke her up, like it always did. She’d always think she’d imagined it, at first. But as the seconds ticked by, it seemed to sound more and more distressed. She always had a sinking feeling in her stomach at the decision to go out there and see what was going on, but it never stopped her.

She’d stumble to the kitchen and stare at the little girl for a few minutes, trying to get her eyes to adjust and wondering if she was in a dream. But that idea never stayed with her very long, because the kitchen was too real and the colors were too sharp for it to have been a dream. And the bloodstains on the floor always made their way to her feet. Funnily enough, the blood would turn from such a dark dried maroon that it was almost brown into vibrant, shimmering red. It soaked into her socks, although she could never remember putting any on before she left the bedroom.

The girl would always stop crying when this happened, as if she had sort of extrasensory perception pertaining only to the soaking of blood through white cotton. The girl was always facing away, toward the door, at first. But as soon as the blood started to soak through the socks and touch skin, she’d start to turn. Slowly, but you could tell she was doing it if you watched her closely enough.

She never wanted to watch, because somehow it felt like she’d seen it all before. When the memory of the previous night and what she’d seen would come back to her, she’d try to turn away and go back to her bedroom, where she could shut the door against the broken skull and the mud caking the girl’s dress. Because somewhere deep inside herself, she could feel where the blood soaking her socks was coming from. And although she didn’t want to wait, didn’t want to see, she stayed. There was no sense in leaving; she’d see it anyway.

The girl would always smile at her, when she’d turned enough to make it matter. It would have been a beautiful smile for a little kid if half her face hadn’t been stripped of skin. She could see the flaps where it had been ripped from the bone, see the girl’s jaw moving with nothing to block the view of gums and teeth.