Phases (2022)
Who would have thought that the best decision I could’ve ever made was to jump out of a bedroom window in the farthest corner of my great-aunt’s house and run as fast and as far as I could?
BY AMY KASSIM
IMAGE BY JASMINE COWAN
My alarm went off as the warm, golden sunshine peered through the blinds, bouncing off my lavender-purple walls and illuminating the entire room. I groaned as I struggled to open my eyes, the rays reflecting off my dresser mirror and onto my face. I turned off my alarm, and as I stretched my arms, Ginny darted into the room and jumped into the sheets. “Good morning, Gin.” Smiling, I picked her up and kissed her head before placing her back on the bed. “How is my sweet girl?”
It was the way her chocolate-brown eyes looked at me with such adoration at that moment, radiating an unconditional love I had never felt before, that made me realize for the first time that she was everything my life had been missing. I adopted Ginny shortly after I moved into my apartment, and we have been best friends ever since. She was a toasted shade of brown, with a patch of white on her back. I was unsure what breed of dog she was, but it didn’t matter—her love was pure.
I took a long sip of my coffee and, looking around at the living room and the kitchen and everything in them, smiled with satisfaction and pride. It wasn’t much, but I had come a long way.
The date was January 3, 2022, and it had been exactly two years since I’d left. Who would have thought that the best decision I could’ve ever made was to jump out of a bedroom window in the farthest corner of my great-aunt’s house and run as fast and as far as I could?
It was the first summer of the global COVID-19 pandemic, and since the borders were closed, I couldn’t return home to Trinidad and Tobago. I was an international student in Canada, and without any other option, I was forced to stay with my eccentric great-aunt: Aunt Shirley.
The house seemed normal at first. It was an average home with a white picket fence in a suburban area of Ontario, but something wasn’t quite right. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but the air felt heavier as I walked in. There was an uneasy feeling in my stomach that I couldn’t explain, and I was greeted by the smell of sulphur and incense wafting through my nostrils. Even the decor was questionable, with bright, nauseating colours that screamed from every angle and floral designs from floor to ceiling. I did everything I could to look on the positive side and not be so judgmental about such trivial things, but I couldn’t get rid of that ominous feeling that something was coming, that I was about to be in danger.
I stayed with Aunt Shirley for several months that summer, and I had so many unanswered questions about her. I had no idea what she did for a living or how she funded her lifestyle. Even though I saw her every single day, I had no idea what she actually looked like, as she would don extravagant wigs, wear unnaturally coloured eye contacts, hide under heavy makeup, and get routine facial fillers. Even when she was at home, she always ensured that her ensemble was properly fitted. She was never seen without her pink flask, but I never knew what was in it. She cooked lavish meals for me and always forced me to eat more, but I had never seen her eat anything. She’d just sit there and casually take a swig or two from her flask. I vividly recall asking her what she was always drinking, to which she’d merely smiled and said, “Want some, Amy? It’s good for your skin.”
“No, but what is it? Is it juice or alcohol?” My eyebrows had furrowed, and my head tilted to the side. “I won’t drink something if I don’t know what it is.”
“Try it,” she’d encouraged. “I’m on a new diet to lose 30 pounds, and this is also good for the skin. I don’t need food if I keep drinking it.” She’d squinted as she focused intensely on my appearance. “You would be so much prettier if you lost a couple more pounds. Have you heard of keto?” she had said, leaning in closer to poke my arms. “I’m telling you, carbs will never touch these lips or go to my hips.”
The mysterious drink she claimed would help her lose weight was not working so well, as Aunt Shirley was a stocky woman in the plus-size category. These discussions of her life mission, which seemed to be a constant weight-loss journey, made me uncomfortable and brought up horrible memories of being bullied in my youth and developing an eating disorder, but I did what I could to shrug it off and kept reminding myself that the pandemic would be over soon. Still, every chance I got to talk to my parents alone, I tried telling them that something wasn’t right with Aunt Shirley, but they wouldn’t listen, saying, “Amy, you aren’t giving her a fair chance” and “Can’t you be grateful for the huge favour that she is doing for us?”
Aunt Shirley also always seemed to find herself in sticky situations that only a teenager would find themself in, and somehow, she would drag me into them. Mind you, Teenage Amy would never have found herself in such a fiasco, but Young Adult Amy had to sit with Ol’ Shirley, stalking young men on dating sites, catfishing, and even being catfished. Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think that such an adult could exist in the real world, but there was Aunt Shirley. I tried to find a common factor, tried to understand if perhaps she had a type, but if they were young enough, she was into them, and when she was into them, she would dive in headfirst. There was always a new plot to lure them in with filtered photos and find out their financial status, and most times, they were all one-night stands. Then, once she had her fix, she’d get rid of them like a piece of garbage and start the hunt for her next victim.
My parents thought my aunt allowed me to stay with her out of the goodness of her heart, but it was quite the opposite. I paid for my stay with labour and, by extension, my sanity. Every morning, I would be awakened at the crack of dawn by Aunt Shirley pounding on the door. From the moment I opened my eyes until bedtime, the chores were endless: mopping and sweeping, dusting and vacuuming, rearranging furniture and carrying boxes and bags—the list went on and on. Every day felt the same, each one leaving me wearier than the day before.
However, the one room I had never entered was her bedroom. I never understood why she was so secretive and uptight about her bedroom, but the tall, white door had at least three latches. Every night, she promptly went up to her “chamber,” as I called it, at 8 o’clock, and if she didn’t, her anxiety would shoot through the roof. Her smile would fall at the glimpse of the clock striking eight, and the worried look on her face could only be interpreted as something evil about to take place. She would frantically start moving things around, kicking off her shoes and dropping all the dirty dishes in the sink.
“Amy, clean up. I have to go,” she would order as she stared at the time on her phone, rushing off to her room and slamming the door shut. In fact, all of her daily activities surrounded making it in time to head up at 8 o’clock at night. At first, I never minded the whispers and voices I had heard coming from her room, but it all changed the one night I heard awful groans and an ear-splitting scream.
It was a Thursday night, still as bright as midday outside at 8 o’clock, which was odd to me, and I was in the backyard, cleaning the pool. As I placed the skimmer back in the shed and headed to mop the kitchen, a deafening shriek stopped me in my tracks. I dropped everything and sprinted up the stairs.
“Aunt Shirley! Aunt Shirley! Are you all right?” I shouted, banging on the door.
“Just a minute, hon.”
The room went silent for a couple of seconds. As I whipped out my phone to call an ambulance, Aunt Shirley opened the door calmly as if nothing had happened.
“Yes?” she said, adjusting her robe.
“Are you okay? I heard you screaming,” I rambled out, panting, holding my chest as I caught my breath. Aunt Shirley just stared at me, confused. “Wait, didn’t you… Wasn’t it you who screamed?” I asked, contemplating my own sanity.
“No… Missy, are you getting sick?” She placed her hand on my forehead. “You’re fine. Are you done with the kitchen?”
I was speechless. I knew I had heard a scream, and there was no way I could’ve hallucinated a scream that loud. I was certain the neighbours heard it as well. I shook my head and slowly headed downstairs.
As I mopped the floor, I contemplated every possibility; I knew I wasn’t crazy. And it wasn’t just any scream. It had sent chills down my spine, and as it rang through my ears, I’d felt goosebumps on my arms. I had seen enough horror movies to know a scream like that could only mean staring death right in the face and clinging to life, knowing it was about to end.
I hadn’t slept a wink that night, waiting in case I heard the scream–or any noise–again, but for the rest of the night, there was nothing but footsteps to and from the bathroom. Sometimes, Aunt Shirley would go to pee, and other times, I would hear the sound of her choking as she threw up. So many thoughts raced through my head that night, wondering if she was sick and, if she was sick, why she didn’t tell me.
The next morning, I was awakened by Aunt Shirley pounding on my door at the crack of dawn. When I went downstairs to have a cup of coffee before starting my chores, Aunt Shirley was there, well-dressed as always, pouring her secret concoction into a flask.
“Oh, Amy, I have to run some errands today. The living room will be spotless when I’m back, right? And don’t forget to clean out the refrigerator today too. See ya!”
I stared, bewildered, as she burst out the door, her jewelry rattling, her heels clicking in the distance as she got into her car. She hadn’t mentioned a word about the night before, almost as if it hadn’t happened. I couldn’t describe it, but something was strange about Aunt Shirley that day–stranger than usual. But I couldn’t put my finger on it.
I was heading to my room to call Mom and tell her what I had witnessed the night before when I noticed Aunt Shirley’s chamber doors had been left open—just a crack. I froze for a brief minute, wondering what I should do. I knew better than to snoop around and invade another’s privacy, but I couldn’t help thinking that all the answers I wanted were behind that door. Curiosity got the better of me as I peeked through the opening. It seemed like an ordinary bedroom, a bit untidy but nothing to raise alarm. “There has got to be more,” I mused.
I pushed the door slightly, and step by step, I entered the forbidden room of Aunt Shirley’s house. I didn’t know what I was hoping to find, but my wandering eyes scanned for answers. A mahogany dresser was against the wall next to the entrance, ladened with old pictures of her in her prime. It was a bit vain, in my opinion, but not shady by any means. Aunt Shirley would only be gone for a few hours, and I didn’t have the time to search every nook and cranny, but I quickly perused the half-open drawers. There was nothing but unfolded clothes, enormous pieces of costume jewelry, and various makeup-stained items. As a matter of fact, I was on the brink of giving up and accepting that Aunt Shirley was simply weird when I noticed the closet.
Aunt Shirley’s closet was open, and there, sticking out of the door was a bloodied rabbit’s foot. I gasped and covered my mouth so I wouldn’t scream. Fear rooted me in that spot with my eyes fixated on the grey rabbit’s foot and blood smeared on the carpet. My stomach turned, and my knees went weak. It took a couple of seconds for me to decide what I should do next. With the tip of my finger, I pulled the door open scornfully and realized that the closet was actually somewhat of a chamber of its own. It was pitch black, with only a round table and a chair in the middle. I recited every prayer I had ever been taught as a child as I explored in complete awe. What the hell was I looking at?
There were semi-filled jars stacked everywhere with what looked like organs inside of them. Seeing animal organs submerged in liquids was frightening, but it was more worrying that some of the organs were labelled as human remains. On one side of the chamber was a display of hair samples. I wasn’t sure who most of the hair belonged to, but I was nauseated when I noticed that one of the hair samples was mine, labelled and in a Ziploc bag.
“My hair?” I muttered. “But how did she get this—” I stopped in my tracks when I noticed a calendar; each day on the calendar was crossed out with what looked like blood, and in two days, there was a circle around the date. As I was wondering, pondering why that date was important, I realized that my picture was sitting next to the calendar, surrounded by mysterious symbols in blood and that my eyes were crossed out. At that moment, I felt the room spinning, and I knew that if I hadn’t gotten to the bathroom, I would have vomited on her shrine. I sprinted out of there, leaving the door open as it was when I found it, and I stuck my head in the toilet, throwing up incessantly.
I hid in my room for the rest of the day in disbelief about what I had just seen. Was I going to die here? I wondered whether my aunt was in a cult; perhaps she was a witch. I had no idea what I was going to do since my parents hadn’t believed me the first time I tried telling them that something wasn’t right. I was all on my own, and it was up to me to save my life.
When Aunt Shirley came home, I told her I wasn’t feeling well to avoid her endless list of chores. Her paranoia about the pandemic forced her to lock me in my room. She forbade me from even leaving my room for food, and I was designated a particular restroom to use, far away from her.
Thankfully, she hadn’t asked any questions about her room, and I acted just as innocent. I spent all my time praying for divine intervention or guidance about what to do. Day became night, and Aunt Shirley had placed my food on a tray at my door and gone to bed. I refused to open the door; honestly, I didn’t trust her to make any meals for me. After what I had seen that day, the meal could be decayed remains or poison; frankly, I didn’t know what was worse. Aunt Shirley would be off the next day, and the “grand event” would be the day after. There was absolutely no time, but all I knew was that I needed to get out. Once I was out, I would decide my next move, but at that moment, I needed to be far away from Aunt Shirley and her evil.
I wasn’t allowed to leave my room, but my window was open. I couldn’t afford to take anything with me that might slow me down, so, into the darkness of the night, I jumped and ran as fast as my legs could take me. I refused to look back and kept going until my lungs gave out and the pavement had bruised my feet.
Once I got far enough, I caught my breath and slumped on the sidewalk. All the stars in the night sky were hidden behind heavy clouds, and the wind rustled through the trees. The chill left me with goosebumps, and I wondered whether I should even tell anyone about what I had seen that day. Would they have believed me? I had no idea what I was going to do at that point, with none of my important documents, no money, and no phone in a foreign country, but somehow, I made it.
I never heard from Aunt Shirley again, and when I asked my parents, neither did they. We have no idea if she died or if she went missing, or if she moved and now has another identity.
As for me, I know it’s not a lot, but I’m in my own space, and most importantly, I am alive, happy, and healthy. Everyone has near-death experiences, but how many people can say they were almost killed by their devil-worshipping aunt?
Amy Kassim is an aspiring forensic scientist based in Vaughan, Ontario. Originally from Trinidad and Tobago, she completed her post-graduate diplomas in Forensic Identification and Creative Writing from Humber College. At the moment, she is taking some time off from studying to work on a full-length book and a collection of short stories while working as a patient care coordinator.
Image: Phases (Jasmine Cowan, 2022)
Edited for publication by Denise Nicolaou, as part of the Creative Book Publishing program.
HLR Spotlight is a collaboration between the Faculty of Media & Creative Arts and the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Sciences and Innovative Learning at Humber College in Toronto, Ontario. This project is funded by Humber’s Office of Research & Innovation.