Ann's POV

"Ann wake up! Come on it's already 7:25 a.m."

I heard my sister calling from downstairs. "Yeah coming" I replied, groaning as I sat up on my soft cozy bed, rubbing my eyes to adjust to the morning sunlight coming right in from the huge french window of my room. My waist-long black hair was all messed up as I searched for a clutcher clip to tie them in a bun.

Yesterday my sister and I shifted to Tezpur in Assam. She is going to start her own clinic here and Assam is a good place for dentistry, which is her profession. Moreover, Assam is also well known for its coaching institutions and schools which will train you to crack any competitive examination and I am a medical aspirant.

Our parents have to travel a lot due to our business and it has always affected our studies. So, they decided to send us somewhere, where we could stay and concentrate on our career. Moreover, a few of my mom's friends are from here and hence they could help us anytime we need them and, here we are starting a new adventure.

I prefer to call my sister just 'Sis' while she prefers calling me Ann, as Anwesha is a big name to be called every time. We are living in a huge Victorian-style villa, amazingly beautiful but a bit away from the locality. Our father is in the real estate business and hence he got this magnificent house at a much cheaper price. It is around 10 to 15 minutes drive up the hill through the woods from the locality. The place is extremely beautiful and mesmerizing with the tall pine forest all around, and the snow-covered mountain peaks are a sight to behold. Our house is a bit cut off from the locality and hence there is an eerie quietness that surrounds us. If we take a walk through the rocky path up the hill for about 30 minutes, we will reach a small village of mountain people with their beautiful wooden houses.

Just like our new house, there is a beautiful old church standing all alone at the east edge of the mountain which is just a 10 minutes drive from our place. Although the church mostly stays quiet but during Sundays, it would get crowded with the people around this place attending their Sunday mass.

I love this kind of quiet place, away from the locality, so peaceful. Silence was never really uncomfortable for me; I always find some melody in the quietness.

As I got up from my bed lazily, I realized it was already 7:25 a.m and my classes start at 8:00 a.m and it was a 25 minutes drive from my house. I don't want to be late on the first day of my new school.

I took a quick shower, wore my school uniform, packed my bag, and went downstairs fixing my hair into a ponytail. Sis has already made our breakfast table ready with fruits and milk and cereal. I gulped down three spoonfuls of cornflakes with milk, left the dishes in the sink, grabbed an apple, and hurried out of my house. Locking the front door properly, I slid into our car. Sis was already ready and was waiting for me in the car.

"I don't want to be late on the first day of my clinic," she said, her voice was a bit stressed. "Sorry sis" I apologized, "Hey you will do great!" I said trying to reassure her, I know she was way too stressed. She smiled and let out a sigh and we started our journey. "Make new friends in your new school and study hard!" she said with a smile while waving at me, "Yeah I will try" I replied getting out of the car rolling my eyes, as I didn't want to catch much attention of the students around. I was not really good at making new friends so easily.

As she drove away I turned around and in front of me stood the high rising school building called APS. I looked around to find students in clusters walking around, laughing, talking, and smiling. Taking a deep breath, I walked inside while adjusting my full-rimmed black spectacles over my nose, hoping to have a great first day.

I took my diary, i-card and my routine from the office. I was in 11 science and I had no idea where my classroom was. As I was going through the school map all puzzled, I saw a group of student's looking at me. I was a bit nervous yet gathering up my courage I walked up to them. "Hi...I am Anwesha. Can you help me find my new...c..class ...I am n..new to this school and I am so puzzled!" I stuttered, feeling quite nervously as I asked a girl standing in the corner with the group of 5 students.

She looked up with a smile and assured me that there was nothing to be scared about. "Hi am Anushka" she introduced herself.

"This is Siddharth, Anirudh, Clair, Sam, and Anita" she introduced her friends. I shook hands with all of them. "Which class are you in?" Anita asked me. "I am in 11 science" I replied. "Great!" said Siddharth. "You are with us then".

We all together headed for our class. The students here were really friendly and helped me a lot. School was quite fun on the first day. I never expected that. But I missed my old friends too.

After school, I had to go for my coaching classes at Career Hub Institute. Fortunately, my new friends were also taking their coaching from the same institute. We took a bus from school as it was just a few miles from here.

Career Hub is a very reputed coaching institute with branches spread all over India to train medical aspirants to crack any medical entrance examination in India.

Our classes got over by 8:30 p.m. "See you guys tomorrow!" Clair spoke with a wave as she hopped in her car, her mother at the driver's seat. We waved her goodbye as she left. Soon after she left, the others left too one by one. In the end, I was the only one left, waiting for my sister outside the premises of the institute. It was really cold and foggy everywhere. Not a single person was around except for the night guard of the institute.

My house could be seen up in the mountains from there, enveloped in fog, giving it an uncanny look. Suddenly a very cold breeze blew past me making me shiver and I heard a very faint whisper of a woman and it felt like she was uttering my name. I was startled. I looked everywhere but couldn't find anyone anywhere. A shiver ran down my spine. I turned my gaze towards my house and I froze in my place. It looked like candlelight coming from the attic and somebody was standing there!

Although it was quite far away, yet amongst the sinister darkness up in the hills, I could spot the faint candlelight and the shadow that moved past it. 

I looked at it again adjusting my spectacles as I was not sure of what I saw, but yes, there was a faint tinge of candlelight coming from the attic. I was pretty much sure a few moments before now there was nothing rather there should not be anybody now at home. Then who was there in our house other than us? Who lit the candle?

I was a bit scared, or rather much confused. Everywhere was dark. I looked at my watch and saw it was 9:00 p.m. Where is sis? I thought.

All of a sudden, I heard sis calling me. As I tried to look in-between the fog, I spotted our car.

"I am really sorry Ann" she apologized. "Hey, you don't have to tell me sorry. It's all right" I replied, my voice still recovering from the sudden revelation. She smiled and I got into our car. I looked up from the window of the car to see our house; to my surprise, the faint tinge of the candlelight was gone. It felt a bit creepy. Am I seeing things? I asked myself. Shrugging off the thought I put on my seatbelts and we drove off.

We continued our drive, taking a turn from the market area we ascended through the stilled woods. It was so dark and foggy everywhere. Our car headlights were the only lights present.

This place was beautiful but a bit creepy. I had a long day and was feeling so tired, so I plugged my earplugs in and was about to doze off when suddenly sis pulled the brakes. "What happened?" I shouted.

Hi everyone. This is my first attempt to write a story. Hope you will enjoy it.
Please excuse my mistakes and feel free to mention them in the comments. Please do vote and comment.

-Anusree