A week passed after that night. The alcohol continued calling after me and forcing me to drown in it. Every time I did, the pale humanoid appeared closer. Its faceless appearance made me uncomfortable every time I saw it and the first thing that always came to my mind was that the creature was real so I kept staring at it for some time. Once, it put me in a very awkward position while riding on a bus. It appeared in front of a lady at end of the bus. Since I stared at the creature, the girl got annoyed by me. She walked up to me and complained about staring. I heard her and understood her complaints, but I kept staring at the creature. I guess she assumed that I was mentally ill… which I was.
I even saw it while working. I was having a really bad time at the job so I started bringing a flask. It’s so hard to stop, but when you start doing it again, there’s basically no escape. It doesn’t matter how hard you try, in most cases, nothing will work. While standing behind the register, I saw it through the large windows. It was hiding behind one of the pillars holding the roof above the gas pumps. I got distracted by it and one customer almost left without paying due to frustration. I didn’t blame them and even offered to pay 20% myself.
At that point, the last and the closest time I saw it was just behind the fence in my parents’ yard. It held the top of the fence with its hands. For the first time, I noticed its claws. Every other time, I was focused on its missing face to notice other parts of it, but since half of it was obscured by the fence. The claws didn’t look like the talons of predatory birds or the retractable claws of cats. Instead, they just looked like longer, thicker, and sharper human nails. Its fingers were long but not unnaturally long and its body seemed to be fit, but not muscular.
I returned to my job a day after May’s funeral. I needed something to keep me occupied and I thought that it might also keep me from drinking. Since I could see the creature only when I was under the influence of alcohol, I assumed all the depression and sadness combined with the alcohol made me hallucinate something I was traumatized by. As soon as I broke the line of sight with the creature, it disappeared making it hard for me to believe it was real. I decided that the thing I need to do is get closer to it without breaking the line of sight. The problem is that even the smallest thing could make it disappear. For example, there are thin lines of silicone connecting the large pieces of glass at the front of the convenience store. One time the creature appeared behind one of the pumps. I went to investigate and it only took that thin line to break the line of sight for it to disappear.
On the 22nd of April, I decided that I needed to get closer for good. I knew that the creature was going to appear outside the station since it still hasn’t gotten close enough to appear in the store while I’m in it. I decided to take a smoke break and drank the entire flask in a place where the cameras couldn’t see me. Don’t worry, I didn’t smoke. It was probably one of if not the stupidest ideas I ever had, but that’s what I had to do. Curiosity killed the cat, you know? It didn’t take too long for me to spot it hiding behind the same pump it did a few days ago. It was the pump the furthest away from me, but if I squeezed myself in between the two closer pumps, I had a possibility of getting to it without breaking the line of sight… and that’s just what I did.
I took slow steady steps toward the creature while staring right at the place where its eyes were supposed to be. Despite their absence, it felt like its look pierced through my flesh into my soul and tried destroying me from the inside. As I got closer and closer, this high-pitched uninterrupted sound appeared from inside my head. The closer I was to the monstrosity; the more deafening it was. When I was really close, I had to grab my head with my arms and squeeze hard to distract my brain from the pain. I stopped in the place and fell onto my knees. The sound was so loud I just couldn’t stand it anymore. I closed my eyes and holding my head, I screamed out of pain.
Somehow, I managed to gather the strength to look at the creature for one last time. Standing before me, it fully revealed itself. Its legs bent more like that of a goat, yet the feet still looked like a human’s apart from the fact that its heel was not in contact with the ground. The claws on its legs were the same as those on its hands. Lastly, it showed what I believed to be its true face. Two large gaping holes appeared where its eyes were supposed to be. They were so dark to the point it looked like they were completely devoid of light. Not a single photon reached them… or it did. The things weren’t exactly holes as they seemed to have been made of matter so dark it absorbed all the light that reached them. As soon as I laid my eyes upon its, the world around me started to shake, and the ringing noise I heard previously got so bad I fell unconscious.
“Sir, sir! Are you okay?” I heard.
When I opened my eyes, I saw a woman standing over me. She was in her forties and was trying to wake me up by shaking me. My head was hurting really bad and I tried standing up. The woman helped me move into the sitting position, but I needed to gather some strength before I could stand up. When I was sitting, I saw who I assumed to be the woman’s daughter talking on the phone. I could barely hear anything. Despite looking like they were speaking a bit louder than it is normal, I could only hear mumbling. The daughter had a teary face and was trying to calm herself down while talking over the phone.
I tried getting myself up and the woman tried holding me on the ground. I pushed her away gently and stood up. She was still trying to tell me something, but I couldn’t hear her. I went into the store and into the bathroom. I needed to take a look in the mirror. When I saw myself, I was horrified. I was bleeding from my nose, ears, mouth, and even eyes. Only then, I tasted and smelt the blood. I spat the blood into the sink and washed my mouth and nose with some water. I washed my face and realized that the reason why I couldn’t hear anything was that my ears were blocked by coagulated blood. It somehow gathered in a small pile when I sat up. I put my finger under some water and leaned my head to the side. After putting my finger into my ear and shaking a bit, the coagulated blood fell out in small pieces. I did the same with the other ear. When I was done, I realized that the woman was standing in the doorway.
“Sorry for pushing you,” I apologized. “I… I just wasn’t myself out there. When you found me… was there anyone else?”
“No,” she answered. “Were we supposed to?”
“I don’t know,” I lied. “I was outside and it just felt like everything went black. The next thing I remember is seeing you trying to wake me up.”
“My daughter called the ambulance and the police,” she told me. “They should arrive soon.”
“Thank you.”
My eyes widened when I remembered what I saw. As I said, before this incident, I believed that this creature was just a product of my and May’s imagination, addiction, and depression. But after what happened that night, I knew it was real.
“Fuck,” I whispered to myself absolutely terrified of what happened.
“Is everything alright?” she asked me.
“Ye… Yeah… I… I just remembered something,” I told her.
I walked up to the door and she moved out of my way. I left the store and saw the daughter standing next to their car and waiting for her mom. She must have been 16 and probably thought that I was dead. I walked up to the pump behind which the creature was hiding to check if it left any tracks. It didn’t. There was nothing there.
“What happened?” I heard the woman ask me.
“Uhm… I… I believe I saw someone peaking from behind this pump before I fell unconscious,” I told her. “Maybe they hit me so hard that I lost the memory of what happened.”
I was in a hospital 15 minutes later. The emergency brought me in. After an examination, they decided that my case was very weird. The wounds that were bleeding earlier were there, but the problem was that they found no other physical trauma. There wasn’t a single place where there was a dent or a wound from a blow with a blunt or a sharp weapon. Apart from those little cuts that damaged the capillaries, there were no other wounds. Not physical ones at least. Throughout the examination, I was overcome with dread and disgust for the thing that was getting closer to me. However, it clearly didn’t want me to get closer to it.
A bit surprised and enamored doctor let me go in the morning. Before I could leave, I had to answer some of the police’s questions. My story was the same one I told the woman who found me. I went out for a break and saw someone peaking at me from behind one of the pumps. Then, out of nowhere, I went unconscious and I didn’t know what happened. Most of it was a lie, but as you know, there was some truth to the story.
My parents were waiting for me in front of the hospital. I called them earlier that morning telling them that everything was okay. After that, I called my boss and explained the situation. He apologized to me and explained that even though he wanted to, he couldn’t give me more days off. I told him that I understand and that he should decide what to do since in the last few days, my state of mind just kept getting worse and worse.
I wanted to tell my parents about the creature so badly, but I knew that they weren’t going to believe me. That left me only one person. I knew that Melina was going to at least listen to me and try to give me some advice. I sent her a message telling her that I needed to talk to her. She agreed to meet me but I decided to do it during the day. The day was never my time but I assumed that I wouldn’t drink while the sun was shining bright. A park was a perfect place to meet. I believed that sitting next to a lake and listening to the songs of birds would make me relax.
We walked while trying to find the place with the least people. After finding a perfect bench further away from people but still near the lake, I put my hands together and looked towards the floor. I bent down putting my hands on my forehead and I took in a deep breath. Melina put her hand on my back and assured me that I could tell her anything. I turned my head slightly toward her and gave her a little smile before taking a look at the lake.
“We both know that May has been a troubled person…” I started. “But do you know what happened in her last days? Did she ever tell you?”
Melina just stared at me for about half a minute before responding.
“She told me that… she did it again. She called me immediately after she did it,” Melina told me.
“The heroin, you mean?” I asked.
“Yes… It was 11 PM when she called me. She was crying and saying something about a figure…”
As soon as she said it, I sat up with widened eyes.
“I picked her up and brought her to my flat where I calmed her down and let her sleep in my bed.”
“You mentioned a figure?” I responded.
“Yes. It was just some hallucination from the heroin.”
I grabbed her by her shoulders and turned her towards me.
“She wrote about it in the letter. The figure drove her to do what she did. May… you can’t hallucinate from heroin.”
“Wh… What are you saying? That figure… you think it’s real?”
“I know it is…” I sighed. “I saw it.”
She stared at me. Instead of being surprised or scared, she seemed to be disappointed.
“You brought me here to make fun of May’s heroin abuse?” she asked me.
“No, NO, NO NO NO NO!” I told her. “No, that’s not at all what I meant. I genuinely saw that fucking thing. The first few times I saw it, I believed it was just a hallucination or something. I thought that I was just so creeped out by what I read to the point that I just started seeing it…”
“And what convinced you that it was real?”
“Last night, I… I saw it again. It appeared on my work and I tried getting closer. Instead of it disappearing, I heard this terrible sound that made me drop to the floor. It showed me its full and dreadful form and as soon as I saw it, I fell unconscious. When I woke up, I was bleeding from my eyes, my nose, my ears…”
She was silent for a moment. Sadness sparked in her eyes, but the disappointment disappeared. She put her arms around me and hugged me. I was so surprised that I didn’t even return the hug.
“Did you start drinking again?” she asked me.
“Y…” I stopped and contemplated saying it for a few seconds. “Yes. I did.”
“When?”
“That night we went to your place,” I answered. “I saw the bottle on the table and I just couldn’t resist it. I drank everything that you left the night before and as soon as I did, something drew me to the window. I saw the creature then and every single time I drank after that.”
“I’m so sorry that you have to go through this.”
She wrapped her arm around my head and gently pulled it toward her shoulder. Leaning onto her, I started to cry while she calmed me down. Fortunately, the trail in front of the bench was almost empty, and barely anyone passed next to us. Melina tried calming me down, but she wasn’t very successful. I calmed myself down after some time and thanked her for being there for me. She agreed to help me deal with this situation. Later that day, when I was at home, I heard knocking on the front door. When I opened them, I saw a police officer.
“Are you Dylan Mesh?” the officer asked.
“Y… Yes, that’s me…” I replied. “May I ask why you are here?”
“We’ll need you to come with us,” he told me. “We got a report of your bad mental state and we need to take you to a hospital.”
“Wha… What are you talking about?”
“We’ve received a call from a person telling us that you might try harming yourself. You have to come with us.”
“Melina,” I whispered as the cop put his hand on my shoulder.
He took me to the car while my mom tried asking him why they were taking me. My dad stood just outside the front door and was looking at me. His expression was one of sadness and not of disappointment even though he didn’t know what happened. My mom tried getting me free from the cop, but his partner gently pulled her away. I was sitting in the back seat, unrestrained. I watched as I got further and further away from my parents.