The trick is, not to give in to doubt. Really that's all that matters overall, in terms of being possessed. And frankly, Elizabeth was a girl who had always been full of doubt. She'd first come to the lake when she was 6 with her Father and brothers on a camping trip. She'd been so unsure of the lake itself, screaming and crying about monsters in the water, that she refused to go fishing. She sat on the shore while her family stood in the water casting lines. Causing such a ruckus that anything they could have caught was scared away. Her Father became so aggravated with her nonsense that he cut the trip short by a whole day. They didn't even have a chance to sleep in the woods.
Yes, Elizabeth was definitely a prime candidate for possession.
In High school, a boy asked her to the Junior formal and she worried herself sick thinking that it was all a trick.
"He's probably going to dump fish heads down my dress. Or try and get me drunk and take advantage"
Truth be told, poor Mark Maverson just liked the way she looked, and wanted to take her out. But when she stood in front of him silently, becoming more and more uncomfortable as the wheels in her head turned and turned, he knew he'd made a terrible mistake.
"Umm.... you know what Liz, I actually think I'm going to see my Grandma that weekend, so just forget it" He'd taken off in an almost sprint as soon as the words left his lips. He would never talk to Elizabeth again, not even during an exam Senior year when he desperately needed a no. 2 pencil.
Elizabeth lived a life of doubt and caution all the way up until her 18th birthday when she decided that she no longer wanted to be a mouse.
She was fed up with this life of utter sadness. Her hair was perpetually falling out, her heart was always pumping out of her chest, her eyes were sunken in so deeply one would think she was posing as a ghoulish specter.
Very bravely, as brave as you could expect from her, Elizabeth approached her Father. She told him, voice shaking, that she wanted to go to the lake for her birthday. That she wanted him to show her how to fish, and she wanted to sleep under the stars.
You'd think an Outdoors-man such as Matthew Pierson would be please that his daughter finally wanted to follow in his footsteps. Instead, he glared at her over the rim of his glasses, still holding his morning paper.
"Elizabeth, I don't know what it is you're playing at, but I want no part in it. If you're thinking for one minute, after what you put me through not too long ago that I would EVER take you back to the lake....." He trailed off. This usually meant that he was going to say something completely cruel, but then realized his daughter's delicate disposition couldn't take the blow. Elizabeth wanted to tell him he was wrong. That in fact that "not too long ago" was actually 12 years ago, and that she wouldn't cry on the shore for hours and hours. But unfortunately, she'd used all of her bravery to tell her Father that she wanted to go to the lake. She walked back up to her room with the speed of a geriatric tortoise.
Her speed granted her time to think, and by the time she reached the top of the stairs she'd decided that she was going to the lake on her own. She would show everyone that she wasn't a scaredy cat or a meek little mouse. She would be the kind of girl who said "Yes!" When a boy asked her to a dance. The kind of girl who went swimming without feel of serpents, and ate ice cream without fear of aneurysm.
At this point, an intelligent human being might have come to the conclusion that our dear Elizabeth Pierson is suffering from some sort of Mania, or Anxiety disorder. You may be screaming
"Good god! Someone take that girl to a Doctor! She needs medical attention!"
I regret to inform you that, apparently in Elizabeth's life, there were no intelligent humans. It is this, a lack of intelligence, that creatures of possession prey upon.
In another world, in another story, written by some other writer who is not so hell bent on warning you and telling you these truths, Elizabeth might have had a beautiful coming of age.
But instead
That night, when her brother's and Father went to sleep, Elizabeth took a knapsack, a sandwich, a flashlight, and her bicycle and went out into the woods.
She was not prepared. You would think a girl who had been raised by a man such as Matthew Pierson would have known everything there was to know about camping. But, like he said, Matthew had given up on her at the age of 6. After all, Matthew was a much better Outdoors-man then he was a Father.
That night, armed with a little red flashlight, Elizabeth walked on an unknown trail until she heard water. She followed the sound of the water until she came to a clearing, where the moon was as big as a Ferris wheel and just as close. It shown so brightly that Elizabeth forgot that she was afraid of the woods, and the water, and for that matter the moon. She started a little fire, and allowed herself to lie down in the moon's light, breathing in her surroundings. She almost fell asleep when...
"Hello" Elizabeth's eyes shot open, she sat up with a swift jolt. She suddenly remembered her deep seeded fear, and overwhelming doubt. But there was nothing. No person around, no animal, just...the Moon.
"Hello" Elizabeth replied surprisingly calm.
"What's your name?" The voice asked. It's sound was soft like music played on a stringed instrument.
"Elizabeth. What's yours?"
"Don't have one."
"You don't have one? Where are you?" Elizabeth looked all around, and when she once again saw no one, she rested her eyes on the Moon.
"Is that you?" She asked
"Yes, that's me. I have been watching you. And I like you very much. Would you like to swim in my water?"
Like I said before, Elizabeth was a human full of doubt. But something about the Moon's sweet voice left her feeling....nothing. Not fear, not doubt, not peace. Just....nothing.
She closes her eyes and breathed in the water, the sky, and the moon. She rose to her feet, and walked into the water.
The Moon, dear reader, cannot speak. The Moon is a giant gravity rounded astronomical body 238,900 miles away from the earth. But what CAN speak, are the things that possess. They have no faces, no outward appearances. They just sort of float through the earth looking for a vessel. And this thing that possesses, this one was completely entranced by Elizabeth's vessel.
Elizabeth stepped into the water, and allowed herself to become submerged. She was suddenly on the other side of the lake. How had this happened? She was sure she'd fallen asleep and dreamed it all, until she saw herself come walking out of the water. She watched herself gather her things, and leave the campground. Elizabeth shook her head, only, when she went to shake her head she couldn't move.
She tried to look down at her hands, her feet her torso, only to find there was nothing.
She was no longer.
She was just, a consciousness.
In the days and years that followed, Elizabeth Pierson would come to be known as the most fun, adventurous and brave woman that the town had ever seen. Her hair grew in thick, her skin perked in the sun, and her eyes glimmered like jewels.
Her Father was so pleased with her turn around that he would often take her to the Lake and go fishing. Sometimes, in the night though, he'd hear her laughing. Cackling even. But it didn't matter.
Elizabeth was finally the girl that would say "Yes!" when a boy would ask her to a party. She was never called a mouse, or told she looked like a ghoulish specter. Finally the daughter her Father had always wanted, the sister her brother's could adore.
And isn't that, after all, what she'd wanted all along?
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