by Steven Arkell
Emily
was aware of the cliché appearances can be deceiving and she had
alsoheard the other don't judge a book by its cover. Both applied to her
street. There was nothing about the street that looked anything less than
ordinary. There was nothing about the street that was anything less than
ordinary. Well maybe just one thing. Just one house. Just one creature.
She could see the house
from her bedroom window. It was not surrounded by a spiked iron fence;
neither did it have any trees obscuring its bricked walls. The sky above
it and the air around it had no darker tint suggesting malevolence. The
films had lied, so had the books.
Although there was no objective
evidence that there was anything ominous about the building, Emily found
it terrifying. She passed it on her way to and from school. In the morning
she would walk quickly past it, in the evening she would run.
One thing her horror films
and books had been right about was that night time and darkness only amplified
the effect it had on her. She would not let herself consider the consequences
that would occur if she glimpsed the house in moonlight. In almost absolute
darkness she could only imagine what the building would look like, in the
eerie glow of the lifeless face staring at the Earth she would be able
to see the menacing façade that pale light would give it. She needed
no help from her imagination in scaring her when the bright shine of the
sun was forced out by the icy glare of the moon and the house was illuminated
by a stark, undulating wave of cold light. Of coarse the winter posed the
most problems in this area, as it would be near dark at best when she reached
her street after leaving school.
She was approaching that
house now. She tried to stop thinking about it but knew from experience
that she would find this task impossible. With each step closer panic increased
its grip on her body. Fear's merciless hands worked their way from her
mind to her legs. Her feet quickened their pace, she knew it would not
be long before fright forced her to run, knew it would not be long before
she could see the building she feared so much.
She crossed over the road
to put as much distance between her and that evil construction. She needed
to cross the road anyway as her house was on the opposite side; this was
as good an excuse for crossing early as any, she told herself on many occasions
when her actions seemed too cowardly.
The house came into view
as she reached the other side of the road. Her eyes led her head to a view
of the grey pavement just in front of her. This idiosyncrasy was so routine
for her she knew exactly where she was in relation to the house. As she
came to a position almost opposite the building a memory fired into her
conscious thoughts causing her to look up.
She stopped walking. Stopped
thinking. Stopped breathing. Its illuminated eyes taunted her. Its hard
orange skin radiated heat that chilled her to the point of shivering. Its
crooked mouth, set in an eternal, silent grin, told her the day. She saw
the pumpkin and remembered. She remembered a memory she had deliberately
forgotten.
After an eternity of staring
at the carved vegetable she finally managed to pull her eyes away but instantly
wished she had not. Her vision landed on the house. On a window. On a face.
The organs she used to see the beauty of the world had taken her mind into
the world of her nightmare. Her view became that of the occupant of the
house. Of its eyes. Eyes filled with insanity.
She could not see its face
clearly enough to tell if it was male or female (or even if it was either)
but she could see the derangement in its eyes, its eyes…she found herself
closer and saw it open its mouth, its mouth…closer still, she heard its
whistle, that awful sound…
At first she thought the
house was moving closer to her but when she tried to move backwards in
retreat and found her legs would not obey she realised it was her that
was no longer stationary.
Another memory jumped into
her mind but she was unable to decipher it until she saw other children,
other children ignoring their paths home, other children following similar
collision courses with the house as her.
Finally the secret of this
memory was unlocked when she heard the whistle grow louder. Loud enough
it began causing her slight, but real, physical pain. She had heard the
whistle once before- a few months after they had moved in to the street
last year. She had heard the whistle exactly one year ago. She remembered
why that pumpkin had terrified her.
She could remember the sound
but nothing else until her she had seemingly awoke from a trance to find
her father hugging her. He told her she must have been sleepwalking. All
that week she had been sick with the flu. Recovering in bed on Halloween
had not been a disappointment for her because her family had never done
anything about the tradition; her parents were always working. This year
her father had stayed off work to look after his daughter and had caught
her trying to walk out of the house clothed only in her pajamas. For fifteen
minutes she had struggled with him to let her go but he just held on, hugged
her until she woke up. She remembered looking out of her window after this
frightening episode and watching children walk out of the house she feared.
Children she knew. But there was more, she could not quite remember.
This year she could feel
the hypnosis wrap round her, like the coil of a noose as it is tightened
around the neck of a dead man. She focused on the events of last year that
she could remember trying to open those memories that refused to reveal
themselves. Her quest was successful. Repressed memories fired into her
mind in spasms like a machine gun throwing bullets rapidly in short bursts.
She remembered those children,
each of them she knew. She remembered how different they were at school
after leaving that house. She remembered her best friend Sara, how she
had become, how tired she had always seemed after that day. She remembered
those children last year and she remembered how each of them had died.
As she drew nearer the house
she tried to shout for help. Even if this simple task had been possible
none would be offered. The streets were deserted except for the other children
all more mesmerised than she was.
She reached the edge of
its lawn. The lawn; so beautiful even in the moonlight, so green in a world
that had lost its colours along with its light. This thought caught Emily
by surprise. If she had been able to utter a sound she would have laughed.
She was about to enter a house against her will that was owned by a strange
creature and all she could think about was how green its grass was.
Her temptation to laugh
vanished when she saw the door, saw children entering it. She could see
nothing inside; it was like a black hole, instead of reflecting rays from
the moon it was a vacuum that entrapped light and with it absorbed any
hope Emily had of escaping. She entered the house.
As she moved through the
black hole that had replaced the door fear broke her paralysis of action.
She span round but the lawn was not there. The door was closed. She must
have made the creature's quota for the year.
Frantically her hands roamed
the wood searching for a handle in the almost complete darkness. She found
nothing that could constitute a handle. As she slowly turned round and
looked into the room she had involuntarily stepped into she found her level
of fear had receded. Although she was still scared she was not as terrified
as her nightmares had suggested she would be.
She could see two doorways,
one on either side of her and a staircase directly ahead. There were no
doors just holes in the walls as if someone had tried to construct a door
using a sledgehammer. Tentatively she walked toward the hole on her left.
Her left foot went through
the gap followed by her right. She concluded this must be the room the
creature had whistled from. It was not here now. The curtains hung motionless,
drawn together.
The air held a peculiar
odour. Peculiar but familiar. She could not remember where she had encountered
it before. The memory soared across her minds sky just out of reach of
the net trying to grasp it and bring it to her consciousness.
Silently she ran to the
window, pulled back the curtains and saw the lock. Her escape route would
not open.
A scream, low in volume,
high in pitch, making it more of a squeal than a scream, sounded from above.
Emily dropped to the floor as if it was a bullet she had heard. The squeal
stopped but was replaced with a more fearful sound.
She listened to the two
sets of footsteps run down the stairs. She listened but could not move
to a better place to hide, hoping the darkness would shield her from the
eyes of the creature. Her gaze was on the foot of the stairs through the
hole she had entered the room through; it was barely visible in the poor
light.
One of the sets of footsteps
gave way to a series of bumps. The small boy came to a rest at the bottom
of the stairs giving Emily a view impaired only by the lack of light.
The boy started whimpering
and as the creature grew nearer to him Emily heard something else. Something
familiar. Something terrifying.
Emily could hear the creature
but it was not the content of its words that filled her with fear because
they were unintelligible. Her fear resulted from the recognisable quality
of the voice.
The memory that had been
circling her mind flew straight into her imaginary net. She recognised
the smell. The creature reached the small boy and picked him up by the
arms. Emily stood up. She recognised the smell. A powerful bright light
emanated from the creature's hands causing her to squint.
She screamed as she saw
the creature. The smell was a perfume. She screamed again as her mother
turned towards her. A third scream left the young girls lips as she realised
what her mother was doing. Everyone has a certain amount of time on this
planet before they die; her mother was stealing this from the boy she held
in her hands. The third scream did not end like the first two.
A single tear fell from
her eye, following the contours of her face, as her scream slowly changed.
Another tear traced the path the first one had created as Emily's scream
became a high pitched whistle.
The End
Copryright 1999 Steven Arkell
