The Middle Realm

by Alessia Mattei

  “You're not fine, okay? You need help.”

  “No, I don’t” she said defensively. “You have no clue what my life is like. You don’t know what I go through on a daily basis.”

  “Yes, you do need help. And no, I don’t know what you go through on a daily basis. If you told me, maybe I could help,” I said.

  “You would never understand. Not in a million years,” she said.

  “Just tell me. Maybe I will,” I said.

  “No, you won’t,” she said as she threw a vase at me. I didn’t even see her pick it up. That’s how fast she moved. I tried to walk over to her, but she picked up a clock and was ready to throw it if I got too close. I stepped back a few feet.

  “Will you at least tell me why you are even here?”

  “I’m here because I want all that you have,” she said.

  Really? This is what she has made a big deal about?

  Fine, whatever she wants. I can let her have some things. I know I have some bags and jewelry that I can give her. I’ll even let her go through my closet and take what she wants. This should be an easy fix.

  “If you can wait until I come back home, you can go through my stuff and take what you like. Within reason,” I said.

  “That’s not what I meant. I don’t just want the material things. I want everything. I want your perfect life,” Emma said.

  Not this again. She knows I don’t have a perfect life. I tried to walk up to her, but she pushed me away. Not hard, just enough for me to get the hint to keep my distance.

  “Oh, here we go again with the ‘Savannah has the perfect life and I want it’ crap. My life isn’t perfect. It’s far from it. Will you just give it up already? No one’s life is perfect. ”

  “No,” she said, “You have the perfect body, the perfect hair, the perfect family, the perfect boyfriend. Everything you have is perfect. I wish I had even one of those things”

  I had to think of something that would appease her. What was something that I have that she has as well? It’s certainly not personality. It’s definitely not a sense of style. We are both really smart, but that won’t make her happy. There had to be something else we share. I looked at her and it hit me. There was one thing we shared. It had better be enough for her.

  “You know how people tell me I’m beautiful all the time. Well, if you look almost identical to me, then I’m sure they consider you beautiful as well,” I said to her, throwing my hands up in the air and smiling as wide as I could. “See? We do have something in common: We’re both beautiful.”

  Yeah, she wasn’t buying it. I could tell by the look on her face. What else could I say? I tried. I can’t help it that we’re so different. We’re like night and day. What does she want from me? I can’t make her popular. I can’t make guys fall in love with her. I’m not a genie or her fairy godmother. It’s like Emma is possessed. I’m scared.

  “Okay, if I’m as beautiful as you are, how come I don’t attract guys the way you do? Everywhere you go you turn heads. I go somewhere and no one notices me,” she said.

  I hate to admit it, but she’s right. I’m not trying to sound vain, but guys notice me more because of how I act and how I dress. I walk around confidently. Emma is more insecure. Confidence is beautiful. Emma needs to up the self esteem a bit.

  “Emma, it’s probably because of your low self esteem or something. It’s not because you’re ugly. ” She used to tell me when she’d look in the mirror, she’d see an ugly person staring back at her. It bothered me so much to hear her say stuff like that. In high school, I always heard the girls at school talking about how jealous they were of Emma and me in the looks department. If Emma were just more confident in herself and less insecure, things would be different.

  “Fine. I look like you and that makes me beautiful?” she asked.

  “Yeah, I guess. Emma, I’m tired and don’t feel like dealing with this tonight,” I told her.

  “Looking like you is not enough,” she said.

  “Well, I’m sorry if that’s not enough,” I said. “What do you want me to do? Kill myself and let you take over my life? Is that what you want? Will that make you happy?”

  “As a matter of fact, it would,” Emma, said, smiling.

  She knew I was being sarcastic, right? She didn’t honestly think I was serious? Like I would just give up my life and hand it over to her just like that. She didn’t think I would say, “Emma, hand me that knife over there. Let me just get this over with so you can get on with the fabulous new life that’s waiting for you. Will you be a dear and grab some extra towels? I don’t want to ruin this beautiful carpet. While you’re at it, check to make sure the door and windows are locked.”

  I hope she caught the sarcasm. I’m not sure. I’m not even sure this is the Emma I knew. I no longer knew who this person was. She looked and sounded like Emma. If she was joking, I really wish she would stop. She’s gone a little too far.

  “Now you’re really scaring me. Why did you come here?” I asked her.

  “Are you deaf? Did you not hear me before?” she shouted at me.

  Okay, I really didn’t like where this was heading. I think it’s safe to say that Emma had lost it. She had gone off the deep end, all right. I think that was an extension of the fight we had before I left. There was definitely some pent up anger that was erupting right now and clouding her better judgment. I’d never seen Emma like this. Could she be drunk or on some sort of drug?

  Whatever it was, I needed some backup. She could have a gun or knife. I’d hate to call the police, but my life could be in danger. I’m sorry, but I wasn’t taking any chances.

  “Emma, let me get you a flight back home. You’re clearly not stable right now.” I walked over to the table to pick up my cell phone to call the police.

  As I was dialing, Emma knocked me down and pinned me to the floor. She had somehow grabbed my purse from the dresser and poured all of its contents out onto the floor.

  “Get the hell off me! What are you doing?” I yelled at her as I tried to push her off of me.

  “Savannah, you know why I’m here,” she said. “You’ve seen firsthand what my life is like. You once said that you would give me the moon if you could, that you wished you could make things better for me.”

  While this is true, I never expected that she took it as, “Here, feel free to take what you want.” Why is she doing this to me? I’ve always been there for her -- well, almost always.

  “Emma, let me go, please,” I yelled as I reached for my phone. I struggled with everything I had to get away from her, but she was too strong. She looked as fragile as a porcelain figurine, but she was as strong as a quarterback.

  “No. Your perfect little world can’t last forever,” she said with a voice like venom.

  What the hell is that supposed to mean, “My perfect world can’t last forever”? What perfect world? If my world was perfect, I certainly was never made aware of it. “Emma just let me go and I’ll help you. We’ll work things out. Let me go and we’ll put this incident behind us. No one will ever find out what happened tonight. I promise.”

  “That’s right, no one will find out. I came here tonight for a reason. I’m not leaving until I accomplish what I came here to do,” she said.

  “Please, Emma, just think this through,” I said, desperately.

  “I did. You were a good friend to me. We had some good times together. Too bad they have to end,” she said.

  “They don’t have to end. Let me go and we can still have good times,” I said as calmly as possible.

  “Yes, they do, Savannah. I’m sorry. With you out of the picture, I can be happy. You want me to be happy, right?” Emma said.

  “Yes, but not at my expense.” I was crying now.

  “Savannah, I will never forget you. I’ll miss you a lot. I won’t forget all that you’ve done for me. Just remember that what you’re giving me now is the best gift you could give. Goodbye, Savannah. I’ll make this as quick and painless as possible,”
she said, before knocking me out with a bottle of Perrier she found on top of the fridge.

  Stupid overpriced mineral water I originally asked not to be sent to my room. It knocked me out cold. After seeing that I was not waking up anytime soon, she took my purse and held it tightly over my head, just to make sure I would not wake up.

  Ch. 9

  I think you can probably figure out what happened next. Everything went black. After a delivering a nasty blow to my head with a bottle of overpriced mineral water, she used my favorite purse to suffocate me to death.

  I had never thought about how I would die. Who does? Who actually sits down and thinks to them self, I wonder how I will die. Will it be fast and painless or slow and painful? If anyone had asked me how I thought I would one day die, I would never have guessed death by mineral water and asphyxiation with designer handbag.

  Emma probably thought she was rid of me. Boy, was she wrong! So very, very wrong!

  I still can’t believe she went through with it. I’m still in a state of shock. I didn’t think she actually had the guts to do it, to be honest. Boy, was I wrong or what? It just goes to show that you never actually know a person.

  The fact that I was no longer living hadn’t really sunk in, not that it had anywhere to actually sink in to, seeing as I had no physical body anymore -- again, thank you, Emma.

  I thought, “Shouldn’t I be in heaven by now? Maybe I am,” but I look around, and all I could see was my hotel room. Yeah, this was most definitely not heaven.

  What I couldn’t get over was how strangely calm I felt right then. I thought I would be an emotional wreck, but I wasn’t. I was very mellowed out. It’s like that time I went to that MGMT show downtown and people were passing around that pi-- -- you know what, that story is too boring to tell. No one wants to hear about that, okay? Moving along. Nothing to see here.

  I decided to leave the hotel and wander around for a bit. It was weird. This whole being a ghost thing was going to take a lot of getting used to. It felt strange walking around without being noticed. Where were all the other ghosts, anyway? I couldn’t possibly be the only one.

  This city is really old. You would think with Paris’ long history there would be ghosts everywhere. I couldn’t go back to the hotel. I didn’t want to see her. So I continued to walk around.

  There were a lot of people out that night. They would walk straight through me. After maybe three or fours hours, I’m guessing, I went back to my room.

  When I got there, my jaw dropped. I couldn’t believe it. There she was sleeping in my hotel room. Wearing my favorite pair of pajamas, and holding the Steiff teddy bear Alexander bought me when he went to Germany two years ago.

  Well, she had one hell of a nerve! She killed her best friend. Well, I shouldn’t say “best friend.” At the time she killed me, we were more frenemies than friends. That’s not the point, though. The point is how the hell could she sleep?! How can anyone with a conscience sleep knowing they’d killed another person? I wondered if she even had a conscience. Surely, she didn’t. I wondered what she did with my body. Did I even want to know? I wondered if I could communicate with her at all.

  In the movies they show the deceased communicating with the living. There had to be some truth behind it. I decided to try it out. I walked over to the bed. I bent down and yelled as loudly as I could into Emma’s ear, “Emma!”

  That startled her pretty good. She sat up and looked straight ahead.

  “Over here,” I said. She turned to face me with a stunned expression on her face.

  “Savannah?” She said out loud. “I can see right through you. That can’t be good. It would mean that mean you’re a ghost or something? How could you be a ghost?” she asked, afraid.

  How could I be a ghost? I don’t know, Emma. Maybe because you freaking killed me? What’s going on? How could she have forgotten? It only happened a few hours ago. Either she really forgot or she’s trying to make it look like it was an accident.

  “Oh, it’s me all right,” I told her, quite angrily. “You’re the one who caused me to become a ghost in the first place.”

  “I did? Are you sure?” she asked. “This isn’t a dream, is it? Or am I being punked? Or maybe I’m on Scare Tactics ” she said, staring at me.

  “No, Emma. You are not being punked, you’re not on the show Scare Tactics and you are not having a nightmare. This is real,” I said to her.

  “Am I drunk?” she asked.

  “Nope, you’re not drunk.” She was going to wish she were drunk.

  “So, you really are a ghost? I’m the one who caused you to become a ghost?” she asked, afraid and on verge of tears.

  “Yes,” I said. What is going on here? Why wasn’t she remembering what she’d done? This is strange. Maybe she is in denial? I didn’t get it. How could you not remember killing someone? Isn’t that something that would be hard to forget?

  “Shit. I don’t even remember coming here,” she said, looking around the room. It was as if she were taking it all in for the first time. As she looked around, I raked my brain as to why Emma could remember nothing.

  A concussion? Unlikely.

  Denial? A possibility.

  Drugs? That’s must have been it. It had to have been drugs or something. I’m sure she was drugged. The fact that she couldn’t even remember coming here said it all.

  “What did I do?” she said out loud. She began to cry.

  That’s all she could say? All right, now I’m mad. That girl had some nerve following me all the way to Paris and murdering me, even if she was under the influence of drugs. She could apologize. She is lucky I couldn’t grab hold of her, because if I could I would have broken her skinny little neck.

  Ch. 10

  “That’s all you have to say? An apology would be nice,” I yelled at her.

  “You don’t have to yell at me. Isn’t what I did punishment enough, waking up in a different country not knowing how the hell I got here? Then I come to find out I killed my best friend. I would think that’s punishment enough,” she said. “I’m so sorry for everything that happened.”

  I didn’t know whether or not to believe her. I wanted to think that Emma is not the vengeful type. I hoped this is all because of drugs and not actual jealousy. If it is drugs that she took herself, she needs to be reprimanded. If she was slipped drugs, I don’t know. Just to be sure, I sent Emma on guilt trip.

  “Are you sorry, Emma? Do you feel horrible about what you did? How does it feel to be a murderer? What would my family say to you right now if they knew you killed me? Do you regret it more than anything?” I made sure to lay the guilt on nice and thick. Was I was harsh? Nah. After what she did, she needed to hear that, she needed to feel remorse.

  “Savannah, I’m sorry. I wish I could go back in time to fix this. I wish I could bring you back. I don’t know what came over me. Like I said, I don’t remember killing you,” she said. She was now in full crying mode.

  I was the one who had been brutally murdered, but she’s the one who is crying? There is definitely something wrong with this picture. See, you would think I would be the one crying, not Emma. I was the one who was hit in the head and then suffocated. I deserved to be crying. I think I’d earned the right to cry if I wanted to.

  But, hey, someone needed to be the sane one. It had always been me, and it would continue to be me. Even in death I remained the sane one of our little duo.

  “It’s a little late to do anything now, the damage has been done. There’s no going back in time to change things. You made your bed, and now you have to lie in it,” I said to her.

  “Savannah, I don’t even know what happened,” she said in between sobs.” I’m so sorry.”

  “Well, you should be. My life was going so well. My dreams of becoming a fashion designer were beginning to happen. I was well on my way. You knew how I happy I was,” I told her. “There’s a box of tissues in the drawer of the nightstand.” She pulled the box out and began blowing her nose.


  “Do you forgive me? Will you ever be able to forgive me?” she asked.

  Do I forgive her? Ha! Let me see, she murdered me out of jealousy, or for whatever reason, and she planned to steal my identity. Could I forgive her? Probably not. If she had, say, put a hole in my favorite cardigan I lent her, sure I could forgive her; murdering me, though, not so much.

  As I was yelling at Emma, I happened to see the beautiful Tiffany charm bracelet my parents had given me for my 18th birthday sitting on the nightstand. I had taken it off to put my new airplane charm on and polish it. Each charm represented a different family memory. At that moment, I would have given anything to be able to hug my parents and sister again. Maybe there was something Emma could do.

  Ch. 11

  “Maybe I can forgive you on one condition. You still have to take over my identity. So you’ll get my life, whether you want it or not. I don’t want my family to go through all the pain of losing me. You can pass for me. I will help you. You’re the only one who can see and hear me.”

  “Oh, my God! That’s why I killed you? I wanted your life? Granted I have said that I would love to have your life, but I would never kill you. Not knowingly, anyway,” she said, crying again.

  Has she not heard anything I’ve been saying? Have I been talking to myself?

  “Haven’t you been listening to a word I’ve said?” I asked.

  “No,” she said. At least she was being honest.

  This night kept getting better. The least she could do was listen to me. “Want me to tell you what happened?” I asked.

  “No,” she said again.

  Maybe she was telling the truth? I didn’t know what to believe. Either she was saying she didn’t remember anything because she felt bad, or she really didn’t remember. I’m glad she didn’t want me to describe what had happened. That relieved me. I don’t think I could stand having to relive what happened.

  “Will you do it? Will you take over my identity?” I asked her again.

  “Savannah, I can’t do that. I could go to jail for stealing your identity,” she said.