• “Happy Sweet 16!” As my sleeping eyes adjust to the dime light in my room, I begin to recognize four figures standing at the end of my bed holding a rectangle object. On my left my short, little 7-yr-old brother, Todd, the two in the middle where my mom and dad, and then on my right was my best friend Beth. They were all still in their PJs and holding what look like my birthday cake. “Huh?” I moaned. “We said ‘Happy Sweet 16!’ are you deaf” My brother answered in my face. “Sweetie, get dressed and come downstairs. Your dad and I have a birthday surprise for you” I hear Mom’s sweet voice say. As they head down stairs, I grab some clothes and get dressed in jeans and my favorite tie-dye tank-top. I start to comb my long brown hair, when I here screams from downstairs.
    “Todd grab it!”
    “It’s going upstairs!”
    “I’ll get it!”
    I here someone running upstairs, then a faint pitter-patter noise coming towards my door. The door creeks and opens a smidge. I jump to my when as I see a flash of white run from the door to my stuffed closet. I’m frozen with fright for a few seconds but then I regain my courage and look around the door to my closet. I’m filled with relief when I see a small little white puppy, with a pink bow around its neck, sitting on a pile of dirty clothes in my closet. I pick the little pooch up and walk out of my room. I see my dad still looking for the pup and whispering “Here puppy, puppy. Here girl. Where are you?” “Found her!” I spook my dad making him almost fall over. “Uh…surprise?” my dad says when he gains his wits back. We laugh and go downstairs for breakfast. “Thanks for the puppy!” I say to everyone as I come into the kitchen with my new pup. We all laugh.

    “What are you going to call her?” my mom asks once I’m finished with my blueberry pancakes. “Hmm…I think I’ll call her Lily” I answer. The little, white puppy jumps on my lap and lick me, excited of her new name. I had thought it would fit her well and she’d seemed to think so also. I was glad to have gotten a puppy on my Birthday!

    After breakfast Beth went home. She had told me she would be back for my sweet 16 birthday party tonight. Lily and I went up to my room to play toggle-war with my brother’s old teddy bear. The room got dark as a huge, storm, cloud hovered over are house. The lights went out and the corners of my room were filled with shadows except for one that was just pitch-black. Boom! Crash! Bang! Lily yelped and jumped into my arms. “It’s just thunder” I reassured her. I looked outside my window to see rain showering down from the sky. I couldn’t she passed the rain. It was extremely dark outside. An eye bursting flash of lightning came across the sky. More booms and crashes of thunder came from the sky. For an unknown reason, Lily sprang from my hands and started barking at the pitch-black corner in my room. “Lily, what’s the matter?” I said calmly even though I was scared to death. She kept barking and didn’t even look at me. All her focus was on the dark corner. A flash of lightning came followed by thunder. Lily whimpered but kept on barking. Suddenly she was gone. I heard weird sounds from the corner and then a flash of a dark evil figure holding Lily. “Lily! Lily!” I screamed for my dog. Lily shot out of the corner to the other side of my room and then fell to the floor. I was horrified. Lily was covered in blood. Her own blood! I called for parents as I grabbed some clothes and wrapped them around her. There was no reply. I held my poor limp puppy in my arms, crying puddles of water around me, still screaming for my parents. No sound came from downstairs. I laid Lily down, giving up on my parents, and crept to the corner that had the dark figure in it the nearly ended my puppy’s life. Lightning was flashing wildly and the thunder got louder and louder. I got really close to the corner, too close. Lightning flashed, and I saw the figure starring at me. It grabbed my wrist and pulled me in. I found myself in total darkness…