Ruby was different. It wasn't bad, necessarily, just, special. She seemed to know much more than the children at her school. She was very observant, she would never ask for something to be repeated, and her brain could process information that was much ahead of her age.
And, Ruby could hear things normal people can't hear. Sometimes, if you press your ear to the wood floor, if you are on the second story, you will hear a quiet tap. It is faint, and barely audible, and you can't hear it if there is much background noise. Ruby, however, sat in class, did her homework, lay in bed hearing the quiet tap, tap, tap.
It seemed normal to her, she'd dealt with this her entire life with nobody to complain to. Because of the quiet tap, Ruby never slept. She couldn't. It was impossible with her condition, and something constantly distracting her brain. Invading, eroding, demolishing. That's what happened, day after day. Tap, tap, tap, tap. It would always be that way, she didn't suspect a thing. She thought it was normal. It would go on, and on, and on, until she died.
Except one day it didn't. Ruby lay awake in her bed, pondering, when it stopped. It didn't stop gradually, it didn't lose its rhythm, it CEASED. Ruby blinked. Her head was empty. Nothing. She could think normally, but she didn't find it normal at all. She'd dealt with it forever, why would it stop?
Ruby stepped down from her bed. The door was closed, as it always was at nighttime, and she reached for the doorknob. And as she rested her hand on the shiny gold metal, she heard a soft plink. The plink evolved into a continuous sound, like the tap, but like when you leave the sink on just a bit and it leaks.
Ruby twisted the doorknob, and opened it just a crack. She was frightened, after all. Nothing. She made her way to the bathroom, to check if she'd left on ironically, the tap. And she didn't. So she exited the bathroom and came down the stairs.
The house was empty. Ruby was startled not to see her mother with some pancakes for breakfast, and her father reading the paper. She snuck around the house, and her stomach growled from hunger. She lay her eyes on the refrigerator.
The fridge. She'd never been allowed to get food on her own because her parents feared she'd get overweight. But, nobody was in the house, so nobody could tell her no. As Ruby stepped closer, the plink got louder and louder. Finally, she grabbed the silver handle and flung it open.
The plink was coming from her parents, dead, hung with their blood dripping and making a faint tap, tap, tap, onto the wood floor.
Submitted June 13, 2015 at 11:28PM by deathpet http://ift.tt/1L5NAMS nosleep
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