Liam was always a hollow child, but I compensated for his callousness with my boundless love. And I still love him. That might horrify you after learning what he did.
A mother cannot wrestle with her biological predispositions, as much as I have longed to do so. If you have a warm, empathetic child, then I suppose you might not understand. That’s a good thing. I don’t want to believe in the existence of others with Liam’s perturbing power.
“I spy with my little eye…” Liam began. “… something beginning with ‘F’.”
“Falafel?” My husband, David, eagerly asked.
“Huh?” My six-year-old son blankly responded.
“Ignore your father,” I groaned. “He’s just hungry.”
“Fire?” Alicia teased.
Liam walloped his older sister on the upper arm, briefly furrowing his sturdy brow. He quickly composed himself, but I saw that fleeting flicker of humanity. Fear was the only emotion my son ever seemed to possess, and only the mention of fire could elicit that response.
“Alicia!” I scowled. “What have I told you about scaring your brother?”
“He scares me constantly,” Alicia huffed.
“Well, you’re nearly a grown-up, so I expect you to be the mature one,” I sighed. “What about ‘Field’, Liam?”
Liam shook his head and smiled, but it was not a warm smile. It was not a human smile. It bubbled with boiling brutality, like a poison-laced broth. His pause filled me with terror.
“Fox,” He whispered.
David scoffed. “Fox? Where did you see-”
My husband slammed the sole of his boot onto the brake pedal before he finished the question. The rubber of the Range Rover’s tyres scorched against tarmac, and the bulky vehicle drew to an emergency halt. A fiendishly-fast blur of red materialised on the road before us, and we found ourselves eyeing a fox.
That ordeal occurred a year ago. We often talked about the unsettling nature of the coincidence. How had Liam known the fox would be in the road at that exact moment? Had he seen one a few minutes earlier? David chalked up the close call to calamitous chance.
But my maternal instinct told me otherwise. Something had always been deeply wrong with Liam, and — two days ago — my dreadful suspicions were finally confirmed. We were on a family road trip to the Lake District. At the mid-point of a ceaseless country road, my son made a request that chilled the blood in my veins.
“I want to play ‘I spy’,” Liam said.
David laughed. “We’ve not played that since the time you almost caused a car accident.”
“Please,” Liam pleaded. “I spy with my little eye something beginning with ‘M’.”
“Mud,” Alicia sighed.
In the reflection of my wing mirror, I noticed my daughter staring dejectedly at the passing countryside — murky farmland stretched to the horizon. Busy beads of rain trickled down the glass panes of the Range Rover, cascading towards the metal bodywork. The weather seemed to be worsening with every passing minute.
“No,” Liam replied.
“Magnificent holiday?” David chortled.
Liam shook his head, then he smiled menacingly at me. “Any guesses, Mum?”
I gulped, fearful of my own son. “Main road?”
Liam sighed, faux-exasperated. “No. Shall I tell you?”
“If it would put an end to your dumb game,” Alicia said.
The air in the car thickened. It became a foreboding fog that only I seemed to perceive. Call it what you will — a mother’s intuition, perhaps. I saw a ghastly glint of glee in Liam’s eyes. Raw power that shone far more brightly than a year prior. I trembled as my son uttered the answer.
“Maze.”
There is no rational explanation for the following events. The sun glared through the windscreen, bathing the world in blinding light. A second later, it cleared — revealing a sudden end to the road.
Everyone but Liam screamed as David slammed on the brakes, bringing us to a halt about three feet before the abrupt termination point of the road. When I looked in the wing mirror, the road also came to a dead-end about twenty feet behind us. Horrifyingly, our tiny stretch of road was encompassed by a ten-foot-tall tower of maize — corn crops — in all directions.
“A maze of maize,” Liam giggled.
Our son leapt from the car and disappeared into a narrow passageway through the slender, towering strands of corn. I shot a pale, petrified look at my husband. His expression mirrored mine.
“Did I… veer off the road?” He asked. “How did this crop field appear?”
“We’re still on the road,” Alicia quivered. “There was nothing alongside us but muddy fields, and now… we’re surrounded by freakishly tall crops.”
“Clarissa, wait for-” David started.
I had already thrown my car door open, and I started to shout for Liam to come back. I watched him disappear farther into the maze and turned to face my husband.
“Why are you still sitting there? Come on!” I implored.
Exiting the car in a mad rush, I frantically dived into the maze to pursue my son. I knew exactly why David and Alicia were frozen in the car. They were still trying to process the supernatural phenomenon they’d witnessed. But I’d assumed something sinister about my son long ago. I was focusing on finding him — there was no time to waste. I wish, more than anything, that I’d waited for the rest of my family to catch up. I wish we’d banded together in that ceaseless cage of corn.
“Liam!” I heard David call from ahead.
How is he already in front of me? I wondered.
The dimensions of space and time seemed a little muddy and misshapen in the maize field. We were in Liam’s world. Then again, we always had been. And that fact became abundantly clear when I heard my husband’s cry for help. I emerged into a clearing to find Liam staring silently at his father. David hung on a wooden cross with his bloody limbs constricted by rope.
“Liam!” I screamed. “Let him down!”
My son’s smile was beyond cruel — cruelty is a human construct. It was an insidious grin from the bowels of Hell.
“You made it to the end of the maze! Well done. Now, let’s play. I spy with my little eye…” Liam began.
“Don’t…” I whispered.
“… something beginning with ‘I’.” He finished.
“I don’t want to play, Liam,” I sobbed. “Please let Daddy down. I’m not mad! I just-”
“- Guess!” Liam growled.
Synchronising with his guttural outburst, the grey, rainy clouds darkened to black, and thunder rumbled. I suddenly realised that the worsening weather during the car journey must have been caused by my unholy son.
I whimpered tearfully. “Erm… Insects?”
Liam smiled. “No, Mummy. Insides.”
The scene that unfolded before me was unthinkably terrible. It has plagued me for the past few days, and I have no doubt that it’ll plague me for the rest of my days. David started coughing. Crimson specks spluttered from his parted lips. The following sound, like a hefty wad of paper being torn in two, was almost as horrifying as the piercing screams that escaped David’s throat.
It was the sound of his flesh peeling backwards, as if he were being unwrapped. Red meat was slowly uncovered. I could only watch in helpless horror as the man I loved was turned inside out. Organs started to spool from his mouth, and the life drained from his eyes, which were starting to fill with blood.
It was a brief spectacle, but one that plays endlessly in my mind. And when it was all over, Liam silently surveyed me. He was hoping for a specific reaction, I think. My sinister son was about to say something when a noise interrupted his thought. An engine. The Range Rover.
Shredding through the edge of the maize field was a blazing box on wheels. My daughter was not behind the wheel, thankfully. The driverless vehicle, propelled — as I would later discover — by a weighty handbag on the accelerator pedal, ploughed into the clearing. Liam screeched as it barrelled towards him. In a barbarous burst of flame, the cross carrying David’s corpse collapsed. The smell of burning flesh, wood, corn, and diesel filled the air.
Following a dazzling burst of sunlight, the real road and its earthly surroundings returned. All that remained of Liam’s nightmarish maize trap was the carcass of our car and Alicia, standing on the roadside in floods of tears. I embraced my daughter, and we mourned the loss of our family.
We were picked up by a concerned passer-by and driven to the nearest police station. There was no sign of anything that my daughter and I had seen. No maize field. No cross. No fire. No David. No Liam.
My husband and son are officially listed as missing persons. Alicia and I have been bouncing from hotel to hotel, hitching rides and sleeping when we dare to do so.
Liam is still out there. And I know it might sound strange to all of you, but I really do hope he’s safe. He’s still my son, after all. Yes, I have to protect Alicia. I know that. I won’t let him hurt her.
I just pray that my son isn’t playing ‘I spy’ with any other unfortunate souls.