It’s in our bedroom.
My wife shakes me so hard I wake with a sharp grunt. She’s sitting bolt upright in bed. I turn my head towards her, my eyes wrinkled from sleep, my eyebrows knitted together from confusion. Her eyes are unblinking, terrified, transfixed on something at the foot of our bed. I sit up, blinking, my eyes adjusting to the early morning light, the white curtains hiding the promise of a beautiful clear summer’s day.
Then I see the thing at the foot of our bed.
My wife and I remain frozen. At first I’m paralyzed, then my fear turns to anger and I motion to get out of bed. Suddenly, I’m petrified again from fright as I take a closer look at the thing. The figure is tall, lean, and lanky. It has the proportions of a large simian; its long arms stretch all the way to the floor, and its hands are dragged. These hands ended in five deadly claws with wicked sharp points. The things is dark as pitch, and I can’t tell if it has dark skin, or if it’s made from a totally otherworldly substance. Its mouth is large and stretched into a horrific grin. Its jagged teeth are unnaturally white and it bares them with a menacing glee. Its ears taper off into subtle points like that of an elf, and it has long straggly, black hair that has clumped and caked together by some brown material I did not wish to think about. My brain is confused by this sight, I go blank. I thought it’s a joke. But I can smell the thing. It has a smell that could not be produced by anything living. Anything natural. I’m so utterly confused still. Something like this cannot exist. And how could it be? How is it here on some random summer morning, standing here in plain daylight. These kinds of things only happen at night. There have been no other signs. No strange unexplained moving of objects, strange sounds, eerie smells and cold patches. We have not read from any weird books, played with Ouija boards or been cursed by gypsies.
But there it stands.
Grinning at us.
Not moving a single limb.
It’s simply not possible. I begin to shake. I move my hand toward my wife slowly. I do not break my gaze on the thing. I stare at its eyes. They are large, white, and milky. Dead. My breath comes out hard and fast. As I grab my wife she jumps slightly, but does not turn her head away from the thing. Her face is twisted with terror, and white as snow. She trembles as she squeezes my hand so tight it goes numb and my fingers turn white. All I think about is getting away from the thing. I start to whisper to my wife, when the thing raises a long thin claw to its lips, its grin swiftly changing to pursed lips. “Sshhh”, its voice sounds slippery, slimy, squelchy. It sounds like something as it’s swallowed by a peat bog. I freeze. My heart freezes. My blood freezes. My wife is clenching so tight my hand feels like it’s being crushed. I tug at her chin and gesture for her to follow me. Slowly and silently, eyes glued on the thing, we step out of bed, still in our summer pajamas. Strangely, I suddenly am more worried about being found dead in my Spiderman pajamas than anything else. I chuckle hysterically at this random and inappropriate thought as we run barefoot from our bedroom.
It’s in the corridor.
It’s in the corridor.
Shit! It’s in the corridor now.
It didn’t make a sound. It stands at the entrance to the bathroom, just to our right as we exit the bedroom. I turn back to the bedroom. It’s gone. It has moved, without walking or scuttling or running. It can travel from place to place without needing to move. Does that mean there is just one of them? My heart was beating so fast I felt dizzy. The grip I had on my wife is now more desperate. There is no avoiding it. We have to run right by this thing to get to the front door. My stomach drops and my vision swims from fright.
We run past it.
The smell gets so much worse.
It reaches out its clawed hand and caresses my face softly as we bound down the hall. My wife and I fight back tears. My mind is in tatters. All I can see now is the front door. I rip it open, and tear through the door, wife in hand, into the warm morning air. We don’t close or lock the door. The air is humid and sticky; it is hard to breathe. My chest is burning as we sprint to our little green car and leap inside.
It’s in the driveway.
It’s in the driveway! How could this be possible? What the hell is this thing, standing, grinning in the morning sun. I start the car as my wife and I buckle our seatbelts. The thing just stands as still as before. Smiling that disturbing smile. My eyes pour out tears from pure stress and fear, I’m sobbing and my wife is near catatonia. I slam my foot on the accelerator and we take off straight for the thing. It jumps nimbly to one side, grinning like the Cheshire cat. As we reach the gate I don’t check for cars. I don’t care. It’s a small village and I take our chances. I swivel my head around to stare at the thing as it stands in the driveway, staring at us, unblinking, smiling. I stare at it in turn as I drive the car around a corner and watch the thing disappear as we move down the road. I continue to stare out the back window, so sure I will see it bounding after us, using its arms to run like a gorilla. But I see nothing. I turn my head slowly to face the front window. My heart beat begins to slow, my wife and I are now screaming from stress and fear. Tears flooding from our eyes. It suddenly smells horrible in the car.
“Sshhh”, my blood ignites with fear. It’s the things voice. Coming from the seat behind my wife. We freeze and fall immediately silent. Fighting back our own whimpering, slowly, we turn.
It’s in the car. It’s on the backseat.
It’s in the car now. Suddenly I hear a noise and turn back to the front to see that I’ve crossed lanes completely, a small BMW heading straight for me. I yell and make a sharp turn back towards my lane, my heart in my throat. As we return to the correct side of the road, I see the thing reach out a hand to my wife. It slashes her just once across her chest and neck, and it’s so fast I just see a blur and then blood. Scarlet blood spurts from my wife in pressurized pulses. I watch her bleed and gurgle. She grabs my hand, but it’s limp now. “I told you to shhhh” says the thing, that voice so beyond natural, it sounds like a swamp trying to speak.
I am dead and numb.
I can’t contain myself. I veer the car towards a cliff. We fly off of it and into a precipice. The thing just grins.
The cops don’t believe me.
I have survived the crash. My wife is dead and they think it was me. I lie and tell them a wild animal got in the car, killed my wife, and forced me off the road. They shake their heads. Suddenly, there’s a bang. A car outside the hospital has backfired. Momentarily distracted by this, I steal one of the cop’s guns.
I am alone. It’s nighttime now. I see it outside the hospital. It stands and grins up at me.
I cock the gun.
It’s in my room.
It’s here.