It’s always happening late last night. Every shift features endless bloody annoyances. Like the same few notes of the song played again and again. I wasn’t starting to enjoy my job anyways. All these midnights and early mornings and then always little bits of trouble. It’s always drunk students or loners throughout the campus on my watch. Well, this time I bumped into something much more than trouble.
I usually do my rounds from the security office. One starts at 10 p.m. and another at 3 a.m. I read the plaques that commemorate clever blokes or ladies. They had built something from nothing - if only to keep my eyesight decent. I crossed by the mathematics building, and under a bridge that connected it to the next. Rain dripped from the sides and hit the plaque. I couldn’t read half of it at any rate. “Edson Jones. 1899-1976. Something arrangement of something Game Of Life”. Then she called.
“Denise? Are you alright?”
Her coughs echoed and distorted under the deep shelter of the bridge.
“Hi, Dad. Didn’t mean to scare you.”
“It’s fine, don’t you worry. It’s just a bit loud with this echo.”
“Oh, I can call back another time? I couldn’t sleep and you know, Mum is picking me up tomorrow. I mean this morning.”
“Treasure, don’t bother thinking that, you know your dad wants to talk.”
I can’t remember why I paused.
“How’s the shift then?” She stifled another coughing fit, making her voice minute.
“Oh, it’s alright, not like your university I bet. Probably got you making a noise in the campus bar all night”
I shouldn’t have said that. She held her breath and waited. The wind picked up and cackled along the phone speaker. I missed what she spoke for a minute. I decided to move closer to the mathematics building.
“Look, Denise, you should get some sleep. I love you.”
She was about to say something. But she didn’t, and let out a weak reply, and hung up. I was already walking away. But I had unconsciously walked into the side door, and it had locked behind me with a deep rattle.
It was an old place to be sure, with the 80s-style concrete blocks and white blinds drooping over windows. But these doors were still freshly installed. Wet trailed in, deep into the barely illuminated darkness inside.
Fire exit lights made nightly stars amidst the main foyer. Odd staircases and furniture were arranged anywhere and everywhere. A corner sofa here, with two coffee tables, set for no one. A few high-sided chairs by the side of the door. A lone table sat underneath a window. It seemed people would be here, but they weren’t.
I took several minutes debating which corner, staircase, or recess would actually contain an open door. A deep-eyed door to a lecture theatre hummed with the littlest wind. A delicate silhouette flickered in the windows.
“…two or three… more than three … exactly… pass ourselves on…”, or I thought I heard, whatever it meant. The voice seemed to shudder within the walls as if it was behind the thickest glass. I crept towards the obsidian windows but froze before I thought they could see me.
The semi-circle of chairs descended into absolute darkness. It moved away from the smearing of light near the door. Wiry thin shapes of people were etched into the shadows. They were covered with lines of grey bugs, writhing. They grouped and stood together at odd intervals in the lecture theatre. And at the centre, on the stage, even in the heinous blackness, a featureless face hung. Its lonely deep eye sockets found me.
A hissing of gas came through my mouth. No fire could have taken away the sharp chill that lined my throat. It was looking into me, tip-toeing and plucking my nerves one and off my bones like an elastic band. I remember a name it growled in my ear.
My hands couldn’t reach my phone. Skin stretched and cracked in sunburnt motions. I must have fallen back into the door because my jacket had ripped off and caught in the handle. The hissing sent a sensation of fleas across my face. I closed my eyes and rolled as hard as I could, and slammed my shoulder against the floor. The jacket came undone. The door didn’t stop the gas noise.
I pushed past the scattered arrangements of the chairs and tables. Voices were a choir with hissing. The first door was barred shut. The chill shot across my feet. A set of double doors opened. The further set was locked. I heard it speak again along on my neck. I threw myself up the small set of stairs to somewhere halfway between the first and the second floor. I found and barged right through a fire exit. It slammed and the air outside was rash against my sweating forehead.
It took me no time to return to the office. I heaved my backpack onto my shoulders and stuffed my jacket into my hand, leaving the door open. And peculiarly, not a word was said about my early absence the next day. I didn’t feel like I was there anyhow, really alive and sitting still as if nothing had happened.
So I called Denise, leaving voicemails, and leaving messages. I had to ask if anything had occurred during her time at the university. She tells me she desperately needs me and her mum back together again. She told me exactly three are needed. I didn’t reply. Now I sit in the security office, waiting.