The Girl with the Yellow Eyes

I’m now in China for 3 weeks, and here lies the first of any dreams that might come my way. Last night I awoke at 2am from a disturbing nightmare featuring my daughter Lucinda. The house we were staying in was a combination of Heartbreak Hotel and the Newcastle house from my childhood. We (my family) were all sleeping in the downstairs bedroom, which was my younger sisters’ shared bedroom from that latter property.

I awoke in a panic, realising my daughter was missing, nothing but crumpled sheets in her bed remaining. I tried to turn the lights on, but the electricity had been cut, and I fumbled blindly along the walls. I had a horrible feeling in my chest that something awful had occurred. Without waking Li, I groped my way out of the room, trying other lights in the house as I went without success.

I eventually made it upstairs and along the extension to my old bedroom, where Dana was sleeping. Next to my old room was a low crawlspace, extending back quite some distance. It could only be reached by getting down and sliding in on one’s belly. Inside, a duvet had been laid out, and on this bed was Lulu, asleep.

I whispered her name loudly and woke her, asking what she was doing up there. She told me the girl with the yellow eyes had taken her here. My heart went cold and I asked who she was. “My friend” was her reply. I assumed she had been dreaming and sleepwalking, but my skin prickled all over and I asked whether she was with us now. The question was ignored.

I crawled inside to retrieve Lulu but became wedged by my shoulders in the process. I had a claustrophobic panic attack and thrashed around like a trapped animal. After freeing myself, I took to drastic measures and grabbed my daughter by the ankles. I dragged her out this way, only for her to lunge for my throat and begin throttling me with an inhuman strength. I managed to pull her off, and saw that he face had taken on a ghastly aspect. All her features were puckered together, as though a vacuum cleaner had sucked them forward.

I tried to scream to wake someone and predictably, no sound came out of my throat. Being next to Dana’s room, I woke her. Being another sufferer of sleepwalking, I hoped she might have some explanation as to what was happening to Lulu. Eventually, Lulu’s features returned to normal and I carried her back downstairs. However, the nightmare was not over.

Upon reaching the room, Lulu attacked me again, and we were forced to wake the rest of the household and enlist outside help. Skip forward, and a team of clergy and scientists had taken over matters, assuring us they would get to the bottom of it. A priest told me she had been possessed by the spirit of a dead man, some John something or other, I’ve already forgotten his surname.

I went to check on her, and found her lying on her back under a big sheet of clear plastic, a female scientist injecting a yellow liquid into her eyes with a huge syringe. When asked what the meaning of this was, the scientist said it was necessary to purge the evil. Lulu began to moan, then complain that she was blind and couldn’t see. I rushed over and saw a yellow wormlike parasite burrowing around under her eyeballs, occasionally poking out its head. The scientist held a pair of tweezers and tried to extract it, but wasn’t quick enough.

Then Lulu sat bolt upright and grabbed me by the throat again, choking me more violently than before. Her face had returned to the same awful, puckered features, now and again flashing into that of the man who possessed her. I punched him in the face in an effort to ward him off, all the while conscious that I was probably hurting my own daughter. I awoke before the exorcism was completed.

I tried to piece together the narrative in my head, if it even had one, remembering the ‘girl with the yellow eyes.’ I wondered if she was the ghost of a previous possession victim whose eyes had also been injected with that yellow liquid.