Upon the Walls is a Powerful Rage: Part Two

      "Ginger, what is it?" she heard Mad's voice behind her.

      Mad placed a paw on her shoulder, and stared at Ginger's shocked expression. He then looked forward at the wall she was staring at. "Ginger?" he repeated.

      "I-" she gulped. "-I just saw a shadow! On the wall there!" she pointed ahead.

      Jay rolled his eyes. "Ginger, stop! You're acting really stupid!"

      "I'm serious!" Ginger shouted.

      Annoyed, Jay pushed Mad and Ginger out of the way and stomped up the creaky, dusty, wooden steps leading to the second floor. He reached the top of the staircase, and looked around. Jay bent down, and stood back up. In his hands, was a large stick.

      "Could you have possibly seen this tip over?" Jay snickered.

      He approached a dirty window and opened it. He tossed the stick out the window, shutting it behind him.

      "Now, go wash off that paintbrush," Jay crossed his arms. "Or whatever it is I heard Mad tell you to do. Look, the bathroom is right here."

      Jay pointed to a closed door to the right of him. Ginger laughed nervously, and traveled up the staircase. Jay went down to join Mad.

      The bathroom looked as if it were a public restroom at a cheap restaurant. The walls and the tiled floor seemed to be covered in mold and slime. The sink, which was on the left side of the bathroom, had gone from white to grey. There was a brown ring around the walls of the inside of the sink where water had once been. The faucet was rusty, and so was the pipe underneath the sink. A cracked mirror was nailed to the wall above the sink. The toilet had, too, gone from white to grey, and there was no water inside the toilet.

      "Yuck… just yuck," Ginger felt sick to her stomach.

      She approached the sink and placed the paintbrush on the edge of it. With her right hoof, Ginger turned the knob for cold water. Absolutely no water came out. Ginger stared at the faucet for a good minute or so, and then turned to face the open door.

      "Guys!" she cried. "There's no water!"

      Suddenly, fresh water began to pour from the faucet. Ginger jumped back, startled by the sudden flow of water.

      "Nevermind!" she yelled.

      Ginger grabbed the paintbrush off the side of the sink and held it under the running water. The water was cold, and felt good against her sweaty fur. Ginger hummed happily to herself as she watched the shiny, grey paint seep off of the paintbrush bristles and drop into the water, circling the sink drain and soon disappearing into it. She lifted her left hoof and pushed back a strand of her mane that had fallen in her eye. A bit of the grey paint that had washed off the paintbrush and onto her hoof was left in her mane.

      That's when the door to the bathroom slammed shut behind her. Ginger twirled around to face the door.

      "Jay left the window open," she told herself. "It's the movement of the wind through the house that's causing doors to shut on their own. That's all."

      Once the paintbrush was completely grey paint-free, Ginger turned the knob for cold water back. The water stopped running. She held the wet paintbrush carefully, and exited the bathroom. Down the stairs, she walked. Jay and Mad were waiting for her in the living room.

      "I washed the paintbrush," she told them. "And I'd like to get out of this house right now."

      "But… why?" Mad eyed Ginger.

      "I feel uneasy here. But I guess that's natural," Ginger shrugged. "Plus, it's gotta be around 8:00 PM, now. We have to get home."

      "O…kay," Mad was suspicious.

      "So, we paint tomorrow?" Jay asked.

      "Sure," Ginger said. "I'll get some cans of white paint."

      "Ditto," Mad replied. "And I've got two paintbrushes at my house. Jay and I can use those. Ginger, you can use that old grey paintbrush."

      Ginger nodded, and the three left behind Ginger's house. Not one of them looked back as they sped away on bicycles.

     ***

      "Oh no, I can't believe this mess!" Ginger heard a faint, raspy voice screaming in rage.

      She slowly opened her eyes and eyed her surroundings. She was in her sister's bedroom. The clock on the wall read exactly 9:00 AM. Ginger was in her sister, Gloria's, bed. She had went to sleep in her room the night before because she was too scared to sleep by herself. Her new house had scared so much out of her.

      Then, Ginger realized that she had promised to meet Jay and Mad today at 9:30 AM. She quickly sat up in bed and yelled, "I'm gonna be late!"

      Ginger hopped out of her sister's bed and raced out of her bedroom. She charged through the kitchen and into the garage, where she ripped two cans of white paint off the floor and hurried outside.

      "Ginger, get back here!" Gloria demanded. But it was too late. Ginger had mounted her bike and zoomed out of her neighborhood, already.

      Gloria sighed and examined her pillow and sheets. They were covered in grey paint.

      "I guess she had the paint in her mane, or something," Gloria moaned and peeled the sheets off of her mattress.

      It took 15 minutes for Ginger to ride from Gloria's house down to her house. She had placed the paint cans in a wicker basket attached to her handlebars. When she arrived at her home, Mad and Jay were sitting on the porch, discussing something random. Beside them, were five cans of white paint and a tall ladder.

      "Hey Ginger!" Mad greeted Ginger as she dismounted her bike.

      "Hi Mad, Jay," Ginger nodded at the two and selected the lifted the paint cans out of her basket. She carried them over to the five paint cans Jay and Mad had already collected and set them down. She plopped down on the porch beside her friends.

      "Mad, those cans are heavy," Ginger sighed.

      Jay shrugged. "Let's start painting!"

      "No," Ginger said, immediately. "I must rest, first. That bike ride here was long, tiring, and boring."

      Jay rolled his eyes. "Got the paintbrushes, Mad?"

      "Oh! Yeah, I put them beside the paint cans," Mad replied.

      "Where's yours, Ginger?" Jay leaned forward so he could see past Mad and look at Ginger.

      "I left it here," Ginger said, "on the floor in the living room."

      "Er… why?" Mad questioned Ginger.

      "I might have lost it if I took it home," Ginger lied. "Or Gloria might have hid it."

      She actually didn't take the paintbrush home because it sort of gave her the creeps. Whenever something odd happened, the paintbrush would show up: Ginger falling down the stairs, the crying noises, the water in the bathroom working all of a sudden, the bathroom door slamming shut on its own. The paint brush was always there.

      "Smart," Mad tapped his forehead with his finger and grinned.

      "Okay, I think you've had enough resting!" Jay hopped up and picked up two paint cans. "Let's start painting!"

      "Sure thing," Ginger replied, obviously out of breath.

      The three pets popped open three paint cans. Mad and Jay selected one paintbrush, and dipped it into the can. They placed the bristles of the brush, wet with white paint, against the exterior walls of Ginger's home and began making vertical strokes.

      Ginger stood up from her sitting position on the front porch and approached the front door. She pushed it open, and entered the living room of the house. The sound of creaky floorboards happily greeted her. Ginger looked around at the room and shuddered. She quickly bent down, picked the once-grey paintbrush up off the floor, and slammed the door shut.

      Ginger dipped the paintbrush into the can of paint she had opened. She tried to pull the brush out… but it just wouldn't budge.

      "What in the…?" Furrows appeared in Ginger's forehead.

      She tugged hard on the handle of the paintbrush. After she figured the paintbrush was caught on something, Ginger reached her hoof into the can of white paint. She felt something small and apparently furry. Ginger gasped and attempted to jerk her hoof out of the paint. She managed to get it halfway out of the can, and on the other end of Ginger's hoof… was a small paw consisting of three fingers.

      Ginger screamed and jerked her arm back with tons of force, causing the paw to let go of her hoof and disappear back into the can of paint. The paintbrush and Ginger flew backwards after she was set free, knocking over Jay's can of paint and sending white paint all over the dead grass and Jay's feet.

      "Ginger, what the?!" Jay spun around to face the terrified Uni, his mouth wide open.

      Mad stopped painting the wall and turned his head to look at Jay. He burst out laughing when he spotted Ginger lying in a puddle of white paint and Jay with his feet coloured white.

      Jay turned to look at Mad. "So, you think this is funny?"

      He picked up his can of paint and thrust his arms forward, sending the remaining paint in the can flying towards Mad. The white paint splashed Jay in the face and chest, causing him to fall backwards.

      Ginger didn't pay attention to the boys' roughhousing. She slowly got on her knees and crawled towards the paint can. Carefully, she reached both hooves into the can, searching for the paw she had just seen. She found nothing. Thinking quickly, Ginger picked up the can of paint and turned it upside-down. All the paint toppled out of the can and onto the grass.

      "That's two cans of paint you just wasted!" Jay shouted at Ginger, infuriated at this point.

      "Hey, Ginger, are you all right?" Mad looked concerned, as he always did. He wiped some of the paint off his face with his paw.

      "Th-there was a-a paw in-in the paint!" Ginger managed to sputter.

      "What?" Mad said, standing up and walking towards Ginger.

      "It reached out and grabbed me! I saw it! I felt it! I'm not lying!" Ginger was extremely close to tears. But she would never cry in front of a boy. Even if that boy was her best friend.

      "She's crazy, crazy I tell you!" Jay flung his arms in the air, wildly.

      "Shut up, Jay," Mad sneered, eying the cans of paint Ginger had tipped over.

      "You shut up!" Jay always said that if you told him to shut up. It gets really annoying.

      "Now, Ginger… why don't we just do the painting?" Mad suggested.

      Ginger looked at Mad, and then at the mess she had made. "Yeah… yeah… you can paint the house… I'll go do… something else."

      "Clean the backyard," Jay said.

      "Yeah, you can do that," Mad agreed. "It's in awful shape, right now."

      Ginger simply nodded, and stood up.

      "Maybe I should wash this paint off first," she eyed herself. Her back and her legs were covered in white paint.

      Mad grinned. "Go ahead. I don't mind a bit of paint on my fur."

      And so, Ginger washed herself off with watering hose near the front porch. Afterwards, she plucked all the weeds out of her large backyard. She pushed all the trash into a pile to recycle the next day.

      When the backyard was done, Ginger stepped into the front yard and shrugged.

      "I'm done with the back," she said. "I'll help paint now. I promise not to freak out, again."

      She reached down and grabbed her paintbrush off of the ground. Carefully, Ginger dipped it into a fresh can of paint, and held it there. She was a little hesitant about pulling the paintbrush back out. But she did, and no paw attacked her.

      Ginger approached a part of the wall where it hadn't been painted. And she painted. Oh, what fun she had painting that ugly wall. Ginger spent hours making thin, even strokes of white paint along the stucco wall. When the sky had darkened and the moon shone down on Ginger's house, the trio ceased painting.

      "Ginger!" Jay walked up to her angrily. "What did you do?!"

      "What are you talking about?" said Ginger, confused.

      "Look!" Jay pointed at the wall Ginger had just painted.

      Ginger quickly turned her head to look at the wall. Along with the white paint on the walls, the occasional small spot of grey paint could be seen.

      "Wow!" Ginger stared at the wall. "I guess I didn't wash the paintbrush off very well."

      "Well, go do it!" Jay stomped his foot on the ground in rage.

      Through the front door, up the staircase, and into the bathroom Ginger went. Once again, she held the paintbrush under the cold water of the sink. As Ginger turned to leave the bathroom, seeing as how the paintbrush had been cleaned, something caught her eye.

      "What the…?" Ginger placed the paintbrush on the floor and kneeled down. The pipe under the sink had rather large, scratch marks on it, as if something was trying to slice it in half.

      "These weren't here yesterday… were they?" Ginger shrugged and picked up her paintbrush. She placed it on the edge of the sink and exited the bathroom and her house.

      In the front yard, Mad and Jay had closed all the cans of paints and washed off their paintbrushes with the hose. Oh, why didn't I think of that? Ginger had thought to herself.

      "We're going home, Ginger," Mad told her. "It's getting to be dark. We'll come back tomorrow and finish painting the house, okay?"

      "Sure!" Ginger smiled.

      And as the three had done the night before, they mounted their bikes and sped away from Ginger's home, leaving behind the cans and brushes.

     ***

      "I just don't understand," Mad said to himself, his paws on his hips.

      Ginger sighed, eying the wall she had painted last night. The paint had all chipped away. Flakes of white paint had dropped all over the ground. But what concerned her the most, was that there were large scratch marks all over the wall. The marks resembled the ones she had seen on the sink pipe.

      "I really don't feel like repainting this wall," she said.

      "And that's cause you're lazy," Jay sneered.

      Suddenly, the trio heard a loud crash from within the house. They all exchanged glances, and then darted inside. Inside, in the living room, they found a small, Red JubJub wearing a straw hat whose feet had fallen through the floorboards.

      "Children, help!" the JubJub yelled.

      "Don't help her, she's probably a burglar!" Jay exclaimed.

      Mad and Ginger ignored Jay's word, and rushes to the JubJub's side. They pulled her out of the floor, and brushed her fur off.

      "Thank you," she said, simply. She had a rather quiet and raspy voice.

      "You're welcome," Mad nodded.

      "Allow me to introduce myself," the JubJub smiled happily. "My name is Ms. Maggi."

      "Hello, Ms. Maggi," Ginger smiled back. "I'm Ginger, and these are my friends, Mad and Jay."

      "Hi," Jay refused to look at her.

      "Er, ma'am?" Ginger said to Ms. Maggi. "Why were you in my house?"

      "Oh, I heard news that someone had just moved into this house. I didn't believe it at first. But, this is now your house?"

      "Yes, ma'am," said Ginger. "Why is that so hard to believe?"

      Ms. Maggi eyed Ginger skeptically. "You mean… you don't know who lived in this house 50 years ago? Or what happened?"

      "What are you talking about?" the JubJub was beginning to creep Ginger out.

      Ms. Maggi snickered slightly to herself. "Dear Ginger, and her friends, you may all come to my house later on today, in an hour or so, to hear the story of those who used to live here. To get to my house, you must travel down the dirt path visible from the backyard. My home is at the end of that path. I still can't believe you haven't heard the story… well, I must go pick strawberries. Ta-ta!"

      Ms. Maggi smiled happily at Ginger and her friends, and then departed through the front door, circling the house and darting down the dirt path she mentioned.

      "That was one creepy JubJub," Mad suddenly said. "What story do you think she's talking about?"

      "Who gives a care?! Look what she did to the floor!" Jay yelled, pointing at the hole in the floor where Ms. Maggi had fallen.

      "Are you guys going to come with me to her house?" Ginger couldn't very much take her eyes off the hole in the floor, either.

      "No!" Jay cried.

      "Ginger, for all we know, that lady could be making up the whole story thing. As Jay had said earlier, she might as well be a burglar," Mad added.

      "Burglar? She's too nice to be a burglar!" Ginger defended the JubJub. "And if you two won't come, you can stay here and repaint the walls while I'm down there talking to her."

      "That's fine by me," Mad shrugged. "But be careful, Ginger."

      Ginger rolled her eyes. "I'll go get my paintbrush. You can use it."

      She turned and trotted up the staircase, entering the bathroom where she had left the paintbrush last night. The paintbrush was sitting on the edge of the sink. Ginger lifted it up, and turned to leave the bathroom. Right before she reached the bathroom door, it slammed shut in her face.

To be continued…