A scratching noise downstairs slithered into her deep, dreamless sleep.

The first thing Lynn noticed upon regaining consciousness was that she was in bed, lying still beneath layers of thin bedsheets. Her muscles screamed to be stretched, her legs tingled as her body remained frozen over the soft mattress. As her eyes snapped open to receive the punishing glare of the sun, she glanced around the simple room in confusion.

She didn't remember having gone to bed.

Lifting a hand to bring comfort to her pained eyes, Lynn tried to glimpse at her memories of the previous night. But her mind was against the idea, and it showed its irritation by sending piercing needles to her temples. She vaguely recalled walking upstairs in search of an available room, but everything was fuzzy.

Did she see anyone up there?

No, replied a voice in her head.

The room was locked from inside, leaving her no choice but to claim the bed she was lying on now. Relief flooded within her as she pushed through her headache and found the answers she sought. She had turned around upon realizing the third floor was off limits, walked into that room and told Dana she was too tired to party.

Closing her eyes again, she forced her body to respond and bent her knees beneath the bedsheets. Her exhaustion was but a ghost of the past, her excitement a long-forgotten hero that resurfaced to take down the monsters lurking in her mind.

She yawned and stretched her swollen muscles, reaching behind her head to touch the sage-green, stuccoed wall. A blow of cold air licked her bare arms, sending an unpleasant shiver along her spine that forced her to seek shelter under the blankets. Five more minutes, she thought while pulling her knees to her chest.

The scraping noise which had woken her from her slumber kept ringing from a room downstairs.

Focusing on it, Lynn's first thought was almost disturbing. It sounded like nails grazing the wooden floor, drawing shapeless forms on its surface.

Her second thought was more of a realization; one that made her freeze. Because the noise didn't come from downstairs.

It came from under her bed.

A familiar sense of alarm pierced her heart, causing Lynn to grip the sheets between her fists. So tight was she holding on to them that her knuckles turned white like chalk, and her nails dug into her palms painfully.

Whatever was making the scraping seemed to notice her uneasiness and basked into it, for those nails travelled to caress the slatted base underneath the mattress.

Her heart danced to the rhythm of a clock in the distance, hard enough to echo in her head. But she tried to soothe her galloping anxiety, to take the wheel and park apprehension somewhere in the back of her mind so her usual confidence stopped straining and was finally allowed to drive.

Forcing her body to sit up, Lynn swallowed the lump in her throat and paused.

The scraping stopped, as if her reaction was unexpected.

It's probably Mark pulling a prank on you, she told herself. And it made sense, because the man was the biggest prankster she had ever met.

"Congratulations, you've won Idiot of the Year. And that's five years in a row," Lynn spoke in a clear voice, indirectly admitting he had managed to scare her. "Now, can you pick up what's left of your dignity and stop crawling under my bed like a cockroach?"

Irritation dripped from her voice as she cursed him under her breath; she should have expected it. Normally, Lynn was difficult to catch off guard, so most of his attempts at making her jump had been fruitless in the past. But for some reason, it had worked that morning.

Lynn was on edge, alert. Although there was no reason for her to be like that, she could feel her muscles tightening beneath her skin. Her legs were ready to run; her fingers tingled, itching to curl around anything she could use to defend herself. But from what?

From the idiot who keeps hiding under your bed, for starters.

With a loud huff and a roll of eyes, Lynn sat on her knees. She would drag him out if she had to; she would have no problem sweeping the floor with his grinning face. Dangling her upper body over the mattress to look under her bed, her breath caught in her throat.

A pair of glowing, bright-yellow eyes stared at her from within the darkness.

Frozen in place, Lynn dared not to blink or move a finger. A strange sensation sprouted from her insides as she received the calculating stare of the monster under her bed. The air in her lungs turned into stabbing ice as cold sweat trailed along the side of her face to find shelter between locks of caramel hair.

Its breath hit her stunned expression, fanning over her gelid features. Lynn swallowed the urge to grimace as the stench of raw fish and rotten wood slid past her nostrils.

And then, the monster sneezed.

Taken aback for the umpteenth time that morning, Lynn lost her balance and hit the floor head-first. As her body followed her one level down, she groaned and glanced at the culprit of her sudden pain. But the black cat -- the damn monster -- didn't look perturbed and blinked at her stupidly, as if trying to comprehend why she was sprawled on the floor.

The hinges creaked as the door opened, before a red-faced Mark burst in. Upon seeing her on the floor, amusement was quick to take over in his forest-green eyes. "What are you doing, Lynn?"

Sending him an annoyed glare, she pursed her lips. "Giving a morning hug to the floor. What does it look like I'm doing? I slipped."

Mark snickered. "Serves you right for stealing my bed."

"Sorry, I guess Dana forgot to mention it was yours."

He crossed his arms over his bare chest. "That's a good one, but I'm not falling for it. Dana was worried because you don't usually skip dinner, so she went to look for you and found you soundly asleep. So if you ever asked her about it, it must have been in your dreams."

Confusion crept like a salamander towards her numb mind, shattering her reality. His words triggered something inside her, snapping her from a deception she had been forced to believe. Yet no matter how long she poked around her clouded memories, all paths reached a dead-end and she was left standing in the midst of what-ifs.

She thought she had talked to Dana before going to bed.

She remembered walking downstairs; she remembered being told the room on the third floor was off limits, that it belonged to someone else.

For a fleeting whisper, clarity shone upon her mixed-up memories. And she saw herself, standing in the darkness of an empty room. Facing a monster with no face.

"Lynn?"

Blinking, Lynn put her thoughts aside and met his worried gaze. "I'm fine," she said with a forced smile. "I guess I was that tired."

Tired enough to either hallucinate or have the strangest nightmare I've ever had, she added mentally.

Mark didn't look convinced, but something caught his eye and his lips curled into a smirk. "I see you've made a friend."

Lowering her gaze to follow his, she clicked her tongue in exasperation just as the cat reminded her of its spooky presence by rubbing up against her leg. "It almost gave me a heart attack. Do you think it got in through an open window or something?"

"Must have." Mark shrugged in a nonchalant way, before his face lit. With a mischievous grin that showed his dimples, he pulled out his phone. "I can't let this opportunity pass, though. Smile at the camera, buddy; show Dana you're more interesting than any book."

All he received was a hiss. And then, the cat fled, slipping between his long legs to disappear down the hallway.

"Apparently, you're as good with animals as you are with women."

His cheeks turned pink, and he put the phone away grumpily. "Shut up, Lynn."

----

They were in the lake.

All except for Nick, who kept staring at her as she ate her cereal. Trying her best to avoid his furious eyes, Lynn drifted her attention outside the kitchen window.

"You did it on purpose," the man accused again. "Just admit it."

Placing the bowl in the sink and wiping her mouth clean with the back of her hand, she turned to face him with an exasperated expression. "You're kidding me, right?"

He wasn't.

"Why did you do it, Lynn?" He puffed his cheeks. "Was the third floor too small for your big bum?"

"The room was locked. Did you expect me to sleep on the floor?"

Nick had the guts to nod fervently. "Yes!"

Rolling her eyes, the woman shook her head and abandoned the kitchen. She picked her purple towel and stopped before the front door, knowing Nick would follow her until the gnomes in his head pestered him enough to avert his irritation somewhere else.

"C'mon, Lynn! You knew Mark would take someone else's bed the moment you took his," he whined. "And Oliver is too nice to let anyone sleep on the sofa, so you knew he would end up taking it. Are you trying to sabotage my plan to make him realize he actually plays in my league?"

Lynn was torn; she wanted to laugh because the situation was simply surreal, but she didn't want to aggravate it.

"So instead of waking up to his lovely face, I spent the night trying not to smash Mark's in. I haven't heard anyone snore so loudly in my life," he carried on. "If I didn't love you so much, you both would be deep buried underground."

"I know, Nick." Breathing in the scent of fresh grass as she opened the door, Lynn decided to ease his mind and turned around to smile at him. "I'll take the sofa tonight."

It seemed to work, because Nick pursed his lips in thought and crossed his arms over his chest. "You promise?"

She nodded.

Nick beamed and threw his lanky arms around her to give her a quick hug. "I knew I hadn't killed you for a reason." Stepping away, he was quick to take his shirt off and start running towards the lake, where the rest of the group waited.

Lynn paused just as she was about to follow his steps, and her gaze got lost into the waving waters. By that point, she was certain there was nothing wrong about that place - not about the house, not about the lake. Her exhaustion had played with her mind, but she was ready to forget about the previous night and enjoy her holidays.

It's just a lake.

She welcomed the warm touch of the sun with a hum and took a step forward, abandoning the creaking hallway. Somewhere in the house, the cat was scratching the floor again.

But the scraping was muffled by Nick's distant voice.

"I'm a ballerina!" he claimed as he graciously jumped from the wooden platform and into the lake.

With a short laugh, Lynn shook her head and walked over.

As the shadow of the house grew and stretched to meet the inviting waters, she dived in.

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Word count: 1.906

Total: 7.699