"You're Melissa, right?" A short, bald boy asks me during break time.

"Yes. Who are you?" I ask, trying to be friendly.

I've hardly slept in the past three days. When I do sleep, I dream of her. I dream of worms crawling out of her eye sockets. I dream of blood pouring out of her neck. I see her sometimes even when I'm awake. She likes to spend some time standing in the corner of my room, watching me.

Sometimes, she goes over to Alissa's bed and whispers to her. I can never make out what she's saying.

"I'm Kagiso." He says, shattering my thoughts.
Kagiso sits gown next to me on the bench in the playground.
His chocolate colored skin glistens in the sunshine as he unwraps his sandwich.

"You're not from here, are you?" Kagiso asks before biting into his peanut butter sandwich.
I shake my head no and close my lunch box.
I could just about manage to eat my orange, never mind the sandwich and the juice box in there.

"I'm from Joburg." I admit.

"I can tell that you're not from here." He nods his head.

"Do you want my juice box?" I offer.

Kagiso nods his head eagerly as I hand him the box of Frozen themed mango and orange juice.

"Ngiyabonga." He says gladly. I think it's Zulu for thank you.

"How do I say 'you're welcome' in Zulu?" I ask.

"Wamukelekile." He answers, finishing the last of his sandwich and starting on my juice box.

"Wamukelekile." I nod.

Kagiso looks me up and down slowly.

"Do you know about the haunting of Sierra?" He asks quietly. He probably doesn't want anyone to hear us talking about this.

"Tell me about it." I whisper.

"A few years ago," Kagiso begins, "this girl was kidnapped here, in Sierra. The guy who kidnapped her tortured her and painted paintings of the torture and of her dying in many different ways. No one knows what happened to the paintings, but legend has it that every once in a while, the paintings turn up in odd places. Another legend suggests that people keep making new paintings of her. Either way, when the paintings are discovered, the person who touches the new found paintings gets haunted. So does their family. Every once in a while, she possesses someone."

I get the creeps listening to him talk about this.
Does he know?
Can he tell?
Is she behind me?

"What's her name?" I ask, looking down at my shoes.

"No one ever says it. She was kidnapped a long time ago. Even though they think they found her remains, no one can really tell at this point. It's been over thirty years. Mostly they just refer to her as 'the missing girl'. She has a name, but people in this town are afraid that if they say it, they'll summon her." Kagiso is calm as he speaks.

I am anxious and just about ready to throw up.

"Have you ever seen her?" I ask.

"Yes." Kagiso answers slowly. Before I can ask him anything else, the bell rings.

My final class of the day is art. Alissa takes art too. Alissa and I are in all of the same classes. Our teachers can't tell us apart. No one can. Our art teacher, Miss Rosario, is a nice woman. She encourages us to use art as a form of self expression. She encourages us to paint and design whatever we want. "Let your creativity flow." Miss Rosario says as she paces up and down between our desks or easels.

I choose to paint and so does Ali. We sit on wooden stools at our easels. I paint a field of sunflowers.  I'm not much of an artist, but it was either art or drama. I chose art, because I'm too shy for drama.

I get lost in my yellow sunflowers. My arms get paint on them. I even manage to get a little bit of paint on my neck.

I glance over at Alissa. She is painting a portrait of a girl with dark hair and blood pouring from her eyes.

"What are you doing?" I whisper. She doesn't hear me. Her eyes are closed.

"Ali!" I hiss, slapping her arm.

Her eyes open, but it's not Alissa looking it me.

"You're going to get into trouble." I tell her.

She just smiles a sinister smile at me.

After Miss Rosario has seen Ali's painting, our parents get called in and Ali is sent straight to the principal's office.

I have no choice but to wait in the empty playground. I sit on one of the swings and swing slowly.

Kagiso is still here, and when he sees me he comes over.

"What are you still doing here?" I ask.

"My lift club driver is running late." He says simply, seating himself in one of the swings next to me.

Lots of kids at school join a lift club if their parents are too busy to pick them up or if their parents work late.

"Ali painted a picture of the missing girl in art class today." I say quietly.

Kagiso is silent for a long time. He doesn't need to say it, I know what he's thinking.

"You think she's possessed, don't you?" I ask him, breathing slowly.

"I've seen a lot of strange things in this town." He says simply, swinging a little faster.

"What's her name?" I ask him again.

"I already told you. We don't say it out loud in this town." Kagiso says nervously.

"Can you write it down for me?" I ask.
Kagiso shakes his head no.

"Writing is worse." He whispers.

"What if I tried to guess the name?" I ask.

Kagiso shakes his head no.

"Somethings are better left alone." He swings even faster and jumps off of the swing in midair.

When we get home, mom and dad sit us down on the couch and give us a massive lecture.

"I told you two not to go into that room!" Mom yells.

"It was Millie's idea." Alissa lies.

"It was not!" I yell, sitting up from the couch abruptly. Alissa has taken leave of her senses.

"Don't make a liar out of me, Melissa!" Ali jumps off of the couch and screams at me. She shoves me a little.

"Stop it!" Dad bellows. His voice echos throughout the house.

"This isn't about who decided to go into the room!" Dad is angry.

"This is about you," he points at Ali "painting gruesome pictures!"

"She made me." Alissa whispers weakly.

"I don't care!" Dad screams

"Go to your room." Mom says calmly to Alissa.

I stay put on our couch, looking down at my fingers.

I fall asleep easily. The kind of sleep that doesn't wait for you to fall, it just pulls you in. I sleep all the way through the night until mom comes to wake me in the morning.

Mom shrieks when I turn towards her.
"What?" I ask.
My vision is a little hazy.

She covers her mouth and points at my pillow.

It is covered in blood.

The skin underneath my eyes is damp. I swipe my fingers under them and my fingertips become coated in fresh blood.

Alissa watches from her bed in silence with a sinister smile on her face.

The bleeding stops.
My parents wanted to take me to the hospital, but it stopped after I ate my breakfast.
I insist on going to school. I feel fine.

"Melinda, what do you think?" Dad asks mom, frowning at me.

"Ek weet nie." Mom sighs slowly. Mom always talks in Afrikaans when she is stressed.

"Ek wil skool toe gaan." I say. I don't want my parents to worry about me.

At break time, I go straight to Kagiso.

"We need to talk." I say to him.

"We are talking." He says.

"We need to go talk in private." I say, tugging his arm and pulling him away from his friends.
I drag him off into a corridor in the school building, far away from anyone.

"My eyes were bleeding this morning!" I tell him urgently.

"I'm not a doctor." He frowns.

"I know what your dad does." I tell him, trying to seem tough.

"What does he do?" Kagiso crosses his arms over his chest.

"He's a sangoma." I say.

Kagiso is quiet.

"Who told you?" He asks, looking down at his shoes.

No one told me. I just took a lucky guess.

"You have to help me." I plead, ignoring his question.

"I don't have to do anything." He hisses.

"Surely there's some muthi you can get me or something?" I ask.

Kagiso laces his hands behind his head.
"It is a umoya omubi" He says quietly, but passionately.

"What does that mean?" I am confused. I don't know much about traditional healers.

"It is an evil spirit. Her Umuphefumulo has a isiqalekiso on it." He explains. I still don't understand.

"Her Spirit is cursed." He whispers.

I we'd thought we'd already established that?

"Her Spirit has entered your sister and her Spirit wants to enter you. That's why your eyes were bleeding. Your sister's painting wasn't of her, it was of you."
He is not Kagiso anymore and he is not here, he is someone else and he is drifting far off.

"What do I do?" I ask him.

"Protect yourself and brace yourself." He whispers, eyes wide.