The couple days after my ordeal with Jack and David in the cornfield left me feeling broken and hollow. I had a million questions, but as it turned out, no one was willing to even speak of my friend. My mother acted as though it hadn’t happened at all. I’d ask her some question about how she spoke to him if she’d never seen him, and she’d shush me. It was the single most frustrating experience of my life.
Dad got really quiet, he hardly talked to anyone unless he absolutely had to. He always looked tired. Always raggedy and worn out. I found out about a week after our escape from the field, that dad was sleeping on the porch, with a loaded shotgun at his side. He didn’t buy Jack’s story of David’s missing eyes. He’d come up with his own theory. Someone was hiding the cornfield, and had tried to kidnap me. He wanted to make sure they didn’t come back.
It was a week theory. One formed on little grounds. But he was a religious man, grasping at straws, trying not to believe in the monster under the bed.
I think Jack’s reaction was the worst, though. He went from being an outgoing, loving, wonderful older brother, to a complete stranger. He was a jittery, anxious mess. He mumbled, constantly, about empty eyes. He was plagued with nightmares so intense that he’d wake screaming in the middle of the night. Most of those nights, he would flail about. Twice he knocked his lamp off the side table. Each time, it caused a thunderous, ear-splitting noise that made my heart jump into my throat. Both times, my parents ran into his room to make sure he was okay.
By the third time a loud noise came from his room, neither of my parents checked on him. While they weren’t angry with him, and while they wanted to help, none of us knew how. So, we ignored it. It probably wasn’t the best approach, and I know Jack felt disconnected with the family. Looking back, I wish I’d found a way to reach out to him in his time of need.
Johnny and Jim became distant, though not in the same way as Jack. They did it on purpose. Never staying in the room with anyone but each other for very long. They grew unbelievably close, and began to watch movies with each other almost every night. Usually they were superhero themed. Their favorites being Superman and Batman. While they weren’t thrilled with being around the rest of the family, they made it very clear that they’d rather die than be in the same room as me.
But in the end, I’d finally gotten the answers I’d craved from the two of them. They’d been in the living room, watching Superman II, when I climbed up on the couch. Johnny scowled at me, but I pretended not to notice.
My six-year-old frame fidgeted on the couch as I waited for a good point on the movie to speak. After what seemed like years, there was a lull in action. Seizing the moment, I turned to my brothers. My stomach flipped with nervousness, but I pressed on anyway. How else was I going to get answers if not through them? Mom and dad weren’t going to tell me anything, and asking Jack anything right now seemed cruel. “How’d mom talk to David if he wasn’t there?” I asked, proud of myself for keeping my voice steady.
Johnny glared over to me, his lip curled up in a sneer. I shrank back, suddenly very worried that my question might result in a physical repercussions. I’d been hit, once, by Johnny, and wasn’t eager for a repeat. “She didn’t talk to him, stupid.” He hissed, his voice flat and cold. It made my heart speed up. “You were playing a game. She just played along. Don’t you remember when Jim had an imaginary friend and mom and dad talked to it too?”
“Yeah,” Jim sneered. “At least mine was normal. It was just a dog. And I knew it was fake.”
I’d lifted my arm in protest, brandishing the massive bruise along my forearm. “Does this look fake?” I demanded, my eyes narrowed in absolute hate.
Johnny’s face twisted into a hateful glare. His teeth gritted tightly together. My heart fell. I tried to scramble away, but I wasn’t fast enough. Something hard collided against my back, sending me crashing against the pale living room carpet. Pain bloomed along my side and arms. I turned around, my brothers wobbled, and became distorted as I watched them through tears. “Get out of here, freak!” Johnny hissed.
I picked myself up, and did as I was told, wiping tears away from my eyes with the sleeve of my shirt. I cried that night, like most nights after David’s disappearance. Despite knowing it was wrong, because of all the pain he’d caused my family, I missed him. He’d been my best friend. He’d made me feel better when Johnny broke his arm, and I knew he’d make me feel better about Johnny pushing me.
My six year old mind wasn’t capable of understanding what was going on. I couldn’t believe that David, who had seemed so very real to me, was imaginary. I couldn’t accept that no one else could see him. I couldn’t understand why Jack was so sad and frightened.
My loyalty to my best friend hadn’t faltered. I was positively convinced at the time, that David hadn’t meant any harm. I fully believed that he’d only pulled me into the cornfield because he was frightened of my dad. An understandable reaction. My father was scary when he was angry. (Something that, admittedly, didn’t happen often.)
At the time, it never crossed my mind that he’d actually tried to kill me twice. I never pieced together that he knewboth the black widow and the coral snake were venomous.
The days drug on. I fell into a deep depression. Eating and sleeping became hard. I was no longer in love with the outdoors. I was actually looking forward to the start of the school year. It was a welcomed change from being stuck at home all day with siblings who were either broken or completely hated me. The only person that had remained unchanged by the events was Joey, and he was simply too young to have developed resentful feelings toward me.
Our family seemed entirely broken, and I felt that I was to blame. I tried to fix us twice. My first attempt, happened at dinner time, exactly one week after my escape from the cornfield. I’d waited for everyone to sit down, and begin eating before I announced that everything was okay, because David did have eyes. Everyone fell silent. Johnny and Jim glowered at me. My mother told me that David wasn’t appropriate dinner conversation. Jack broke down, and left. My dad announced he wasn’t hungry and retreated to the back porch. I excused myself, and went to my room, where I continued to brood, feeling worse for having broken us further.
My second, and last attempt, came the following day. It was Sunday, we were on our way to church, and I suggested, in all my six-year-old wisdom, that we take our concerns to the priest. My father locked on the breaks so hard I thought I might fly clear to the front seat. My mother glared down at me. I thought Johnny was going to skin me alive, the way he glared. Jack cried again. I was told that I should never tell anyone outside of the family what happened.
I decided in that moment, that the only way to save our family from this odd sort of destruction, was to completely ignore the subject of David entirely. After all, that seemed to be what everyone else wanted.
Days bled away, and eventually I had my first nightmare, regarding my old friend. In the dream, I was asleep, until I felt a light, slick prodding at my cheek. I opened my eyes, only to see an eyeless David standing above me. I woke screaming, and crying. When my mother rushed in to see what was wrong, I lied. I told her I’d had a nightmare about being chased by a massive dog. It had been a reoccurring dream for me just last year, and was the sole reason my father had yet to get the German shepherd he so desperately wanted.
She believed me. She gave me a kiss, a hug, and told me to curl back up. She reminded me that there weren’t any dogs around.
I didn’t sleep for the rest of that night.
The next day, I was greeted with terrible news. Mittens, the barn cat, who had just had a litter of kittens less than two months prior, had gone missing, along with all seven of her babies. My brothers and I spent hours looking for them. We even set traps, arming them with fresh meat, and wet cat food. It took a solid three days for Jack to decide that a coyote or fox must have gotten to them. I was devastated, but I kept my sadness to myself, not wanting to burden anyone in the family with it. I’d learned over the course of the last week and a half that no one was interested in my problems. It was the sort of despondent revelation that filled me with a sudden sense of haplessness. My world, once so small and safe, had been shattered, leaving in its wake, something ugly and raw.
The next few days went on as normal. I took the pictures I’d drawn of David and I, and I threw them away. Without my chatter, and the reminders that used to hang from the refrigerator, the family began to feel normal again. Dad started sleeping in bed. Mom stopped walking around with that wide, delusional smile on her face. Jack had a few good days, in which he didn’t cry…and he even laughed. Johnny and Jim were still distant, but they stopped trying to push me around so much. Joey never changed. He remained the sweet toddler he was, too young to understand much of anything. It was nearly a full two weeks after David had disappeared that our family started to mend. Saturday morning had started as it usually did. Jack, Dad, Jim and Johnny were out on the farm, doing whatever it is they did. Mom and I were inside. She was washing dishes in the kitchen. Joey was playing on the floor, beneath the kitchen table, reciting the colors of his toys to himself. I was in the living room, dusting; my least favorite job.
The front door slammed, and rapid footfalls echoed in the hallway. I assumed it was Jim, who often sprinted through the hallway, rounding the corner, and sliding to a halt in front of mom as she stood at the sink. He’d usually ask her for water or lemonade to bring out to the boys while they worked. I peeked around the corner, bored, and looking for a reason to abandon my post. I hoped mom would ask me to get Jim whatever it was he wanted. Mom must have thought it was Jim too, because she’d dried her hands, and was waiting, leaning against the counter. She stood, looking dumbfounded as the footfalls stopped, but no one entered the room. Curiously, she stepped over to the hallway, to look. I watched as she paled, blue eyes widening. She wiped her hands nervously on her apron, and moved back to the sink. Curiously, I stepped into view. “Who is it, mom?” I asked.
“Jim must have run back outside.” She answered.
“The door only opened once, and I never heard footsteps back to it.” I countered, the words out of my lips before I could stop them.
Mom’s lips pressed into a thin line. Her eyes shone with an odd mixture of fear and anger. “What are you supposed to be doing right now?” She demanded.
I shrank away. “Cleaning.” I answered, my voice defeated.
“Then I suggest you get to it.” She snapped, as she submerged her hands once more into the soapy water. I spun around, intent upon going back to my work before I was yelled at. But a sharp cry of pain caught my attention. My mother pulled her hand back, blood trickled down her hand and into the soapy water, staining it red. My eyes widened. “Son of a bitch!” She shouted. I gasped. I’d never heard her swear before. She was such a soft-spoken, sweet woman. It sounds stupid, but I didn’t know she knew how to swear. “I thought I put all the knives up!”
Quickly, keeping pressure on the deep cut along her pointer finger, she rushed out of the kitchen and toward the downstairs bathroom. I could hear her fumble with the medicine cabinet as I walked closer to the sink. The large knife block, that my mother kept just to the left of the sink had toppled over, three knifes had fallen into the soapy water. I pulled them each out, careful not to cut myself, rinsed them off, and placed them back in the block.
“Jasmine!” My mother called from the other room. “Come in here! I need help getting this band aid open!”
I glanced over to Joey, deciding whether or not I should take him with me. I stared at him, as he walked from toy to toy. It was too risky to leave him alone. I walked toward him, arms out, trying to get him to come to me. “NOW!” My mother shouted from the bathroom. I jumped, and scurried down the hallway, deciding that he couldn’t get into much trouble in the few seconds it would take to open a bandage for my mother.
I pulled the paper apart, and took the protective layer of plastic off, before handing the massive bandage to my mother. She took it, and placed it over the top of the huge gash, before wrapping it all in what my father referred to as ‘people tape’. It was some sort of medical tape, used to keep water away from bandages, and to keep gauze in place. We used it frequently on the farm.
I dashed back into the kitchen, my heart beating out of my chest, as images of my brother getting past child locks, and under the sink, where we kept the bleach, danced through my head. But as I rounded the corner, my eyes landed on the toddler, who sat under the table, playing with a small blue block. He repeated the word blue over and over. I smiled, feeling stupid for having been worried.
I scolded myself inwardly for being so silly. I’d allowed myself to get sucked in to Jack’s delusions. I’d somehow convinced myself that something nefarious was happening, when in all reality, Jim had likely come in, and run back out, and the knives had probably just fallen over.
It wasn’t until I made it all the way back to the sink that I saw the glowing red dot on the stove. My heart sank. I made my way, slowly, over to it. All the burners had been turned up as high as they could go. Joey was too short to reach it. None of my brothers would have done that. Neither I nor my mother had done it.
Nausea swept over me, as I crossed the room, and turned each of them off. I should have told my mother, but she was visibly shaken from the recent happenings, and I didn’t want to worry her. Besides, she was only going to ignore it, the same way she had ignored everything else. When she came back into the kitchen, I only gave her a small smile. “I’ll finish the dishes.” I offered.
Her features softened. “Thank you, Jazzy.” She answered.
I spent the next several hours on edge, and jumpy. Suddenly I was unsure of everything. I couldn’t convince myself that David wasn’t the entity Jack thought he was. I felt like my eldest brother, constantly looking over my shoulder, waiting for something bad to happen.
But hours passed, and nothing happened. Eventually I managed to put the thoughts out of my mind. Lunch came and went, the boys showered, and changed into regular clothes. Joey sat in the kitchen floor with dad while the two pushed toy cars to one another. Jim, Johnny, Jack and I sat in the living room. Jack was reading something, while the boys and I watched a movie. Johnny had tried to kick me out, but Jack had snapped at him, and assured me I could stay.
Mom was tending to the garden, happy to have a break from being indoors.
“Jim!” My dad snapped from around the room.
“What?” Jim asked, from his place beside Johnny.
My father went silent for a long time. The sound of cars sliding against linoleum had entirely ceased. Nearly a full minute of silence passed before my father responded in a small, careful voice. “Are you in the living room?” He asked.
“Yeah.” Jim answered, as he stood up, and went to stand in the doorway. He leaned against the frame, as he spoke to my dad, who was just out of sight. “What?” He asked again. Silence.
Jim stared into the room expectantly, before understanding washed over his features. He stiffened, his eyes widened. “Is mom in the bathroom?” He asked.
Johnny clicked the pause button, the familiar streaks of static molded to the screen, interrupting the fight scene between Batman and a villain I didn’t recognize. We all fell silent, straining our ears, trying to listen for whatever it was that had frightened Jim, and apparently my father. Finally, I heard it, the sound of the shower running. Jim was infamous for taking too long of showers, which explained why my father had barked at him for it.
“Maybe it’s your mother.” Dad reasoned.
I turned around, looking out the window, only to find my mother, stooped onto the ground, just her hair visible in the glass. My breath hitched.
The shower immediately shut off. The door creaked open. I watched as Jack winced away, trying his best to ignore the exchange, and submerge himself into his book. It quacked in his hands. He bit his lower lip. “Stay with your brother.” My father commanded. I heard him move down the hall, toward the bathroom. “Jane?” He called for my mother. “Honey?”
I looked back again, only to find my mother’s hair bobbing slowly up and down as she weeded the garden. I knew he wouldn’t get a response.
The footfalls ended. “Who is it, dad?” Jim asked.
Silence that seemed to last forever filled the home.
“No one.” Dad answered, I jumped with the sound of his voice. Goosebumps rose along my arms. I stood up, and made my way to the bathroom, shaking off Johnny’s protests, and squirming past Jim as he tried to physically stop me. I scurried down the hall, skidding to halt beside my father, and peeking into the bathroom. The mirror was steamed. The walls were slick with fresh water. The shower curtain had been drawn. My father was looking inside of it, the color had leaked from his face.
He took a step back, and shooed me out of the room. He closed the door.
The shower started again.
My father squeezed his eyes shut. I tried to turn around, but he grabbed both of my shoulders, and pushed me forward with such force that I couldn’t have stopped if I tried. We spilled into the kitchen, dad immediately let me go, and barked my brother’s names.
The toilet flushed.
He picked up Joey, and informed everyone that we were all going to town to grab ice cream. Joey clapped and shouted celebratory words.
The bathroom door opened.
Footfalls padded down the hallway.
Jack pushed Jim and Johnny out the door, his whole body trembling as he hurried them along. My father grabbed me by the arm, and pulled me outside. His grip never faltered as he drug me forward, the whole while I craned my neck around, trying to get a glimpse of whatever it was. Somehow I’d convinced myself that it couldn’t have been David, that David was definitely a real person. Whatever this was, was different.
Dad pulled me outside. The warm air, and the stench of the pigs outside hit me. Dad slammed the door, and urgently pulled me over to the driveway. Gravel crunched beneath my feet. The door swung open. It slammed against the wall, with a deafening bang. Jack screamed, and immediately grabbed both the boy’s arms. He pulled them along as he sprinted toward the car. Ear-shattering crashes erupted into the pseudo-silence. Over and over the door swung wildly, slamming shut, and bouncing against the wall. “Jane!” My father shouted, as my mother rounded the corner, heading toward the front door. “No one’s inside!” His voice shook as he screamed the words.
My mother’s eyes widened, she dropped her spade on the ground, and headed toward us, her gate swift and clipped.
I opened the car door, and was immediately hit with the smoldering heat. My father almost always let the air conditioning run for at least ten minutes before putting Joey in the car, but today was different. He buckled him into his carseat, despite his wails as the hot metal of the buckle touched his sensitive skin. “It’s too hot! I’m thirsty!” He cried.
“We’ll buy you a drink when we get to the store.” Dad said, a wide, fake smile plastered upon his lips. I could see the fear and anger just below the surface. He looked a lot like Jack always looked. Except Jack wasn’t keeping himself together nearly as well as dad was at the moment. He was sitting in the very back of the old Station Wagon, his features had crumpled, he was crying silently as he stared at the house. The door could still be heard slamming furiously.
I don’t remember being scared in that moment. I could see the fear on everyone else, but my mind couldn’t process what was happening. I sat, quietly, stunned, unable to function or speak, or even move. I simply receded into myself.
My dad peeled out of the driveway, leaving the home behind us. I think he hoped the few hours we’d be out would see everything returned to normal.
We got icecream first, as promised, my father bought Joey something to drink, as well as a small vanilla cone. Then, despite the fact that we really couldn’t afford it (my father had just purchased a new work truck that same month) we went out to eat. We spent nearly three hours out, before we began the long drive home.
The sun was just touching the horizon as we pulled into the driveway. Joey was nodding off. Jack was still a mess in the back. Jim was trying his hardest to comfort Jack. Johnny was pissed, and brooding quietly to himself while glaring death to me. I was busy watching the home for any sign of a moving door.
I saw it before it hit the car.
BANG
My window cracked with the force of the heavy metal. My father swerved, and nearly hit the light post. My mother shrieked. Jack burst into tears, and so did Joey. I stayed motionless. The spade my mother had been using to garden earlier had come hurdling toward me. Had my window been down, like it usually was, it would have likely driven itself straight through my skull. “Dad, dad, can we please, please stay at a motel. Or…or…can we grab the tent? Can we sleep anywhere but here?” Johnny begged from the back seat. I turned around to meet his gaze. He looked like he’d aged ten years in those few moments. His eyes were puffy and red from crying. His skin was blotchy. I didn’t recognize him as my brother in those moments of terror.
“I…don’t have any money…” I could hear the defeat in my father’s voice as he spoke.
“Then the tent?” Jack begged. “Please, dad, please, can we get the tent?” There was a certain urgency to his words that I had never heard before. A kind of fear that I hadn’t known existed in adults swept over him. “Dad? Please?”
“Yeah, yeah.” My dad answered, nodding his head. “Yeah, Jackie, yeah, we can camp for the night. I’ll call up Steve while we get our stuff together. See if he isn’t willing to drop by and do chores for the next few days. Everyone go inside, pack up your clothes, and get together the coolers. Pack food that won’t go bad. Grab all the bottles we have for water, and fill them.” His instructions were given in a way that left no room for arguments. His eyes landed on Joey. “Jack, you stay out here with Joey.” He instructed. “Jazzy, Johnny, Jimmy, you guys all go upstairs, and stay together for the love of all things holy.” He locked eyes with Johnny. “I mean it. Don’t any of you go anywhere else without the others. You understand me? Mom and I will go to the basement and get the camping gear.” Everyone nodded.
I could see the shame on Jack’s face. Not only had dad called him by his old nickname, but he’d given him the task of looking over Joey. Everyone knew it was just so he didn’t have to go inside. He was so broken already, I don’t think anyone trusted him to keep himself together long enough to do anything.
We piled out the car. Jack grabbed Joey and set him atop the car, while we all filed inside. We didn’t notice the water until we got to the far end of the hallway, connecting to the kitchen. There was, what I thought to be a large puddle in the middle of the floor. It took until I heard the faucet to understand what had happened.
The sink was on.
Judging by the flooded kitchen, it had likely been on the entire time we were gone. Our shoes slipped and slid as we walked through the kitchen, looking around, entirely dumbfounded. My father turned the sink off, but it didn’t stop the noise. Jim was the one to peek down the side hall to the bathroom. “The bathroom’s flooded too.” He announced.
My mother burst into tears.
“This doesn’t change anything. Get upstairs. Get your stuff together.” Dad insisted. We fled upstairs, only to find fresh puddles, leading into the bathroom. Someone had plugged the drain in the sink and the tub, and turned them both on. The bathroom and part of the hallway was flooded. It would be a miracle if the living room – the room directly below the upstairs bathroom – wasn’t soaked.
While we gathered our things, and my father gathered the tent and camping equipment in the basement, my mother mopped. She cried the whole time.
Finally, we had gathered everything, and headed outside. The last noise we heard, before closing the door, and locking it behind us, was the sound of the kitchen sink turning on.
Our drive, to the woods, just a few miles away, was entirely silent. We lost something that day. Something so much more than a good night’s sleep, or the convenience of having a refrigerator and microwave at our disposal. We lost our will to fight. We lost the upper hand we’d once had. We’d lost the battle, and whatever was in our home, knew it.
It was for this reason that the next few days passed in a haze. We went to bed. We got up. We ate. We got dressed. We sat around in the woods. We didn’t speak. We ate again. We sat around, silently. We ate again. We slept.
This went on for three days, before my dad decided he couldn’t take it anymore. His fear had melted away, leaving on anger and aggression in its wake.
Despite my mother’s tears, Jack’s pleas, and Johnny’s refusal, we went back on the third night. My father insisted that we wouldn’t be driven from our own homes.
I wish we’d just left the whole fucking place behind.
The house was flooded, yet again, and the wood flooring had become waterlogged, and swollen. The sinks had been shut off and drained. Somehow that was more frightening than anything. We all helped my mother mop up the mess. She still cried.
I wanted to sleep downstairs, or in the room with Jack and Jim, but my father refused. He insisted that if we ignored this presence, if we prayed, if we acted as though nothing was wrong, it would go away. Jack didn’t believe him, and he made this very evident. For the first time in my life, the night ended with screams. But it was all for naught, my father won the argument. Eventually, I was sent off to bed.
I don’t know how, but eventually, sweet oblivion pulled me down.
Something slick and wet touched my cheek. “...Jasmine…” Came the whispered call. My dream world shattered giving way to the darkness that had encompassed my room. The sun had long-since died along the horizon, and the timed night-light I had on my desk had turned off. The moon and stars were hidden behind clouds, the room was completely dark.
And then it wasn’t.
For no discernable reason, the floor lamp across the room clicked on. Light flooded the room, instantly causing me to cringe away. As I slowly blinked away the pain, and tried to focus, I became very aware that something was wrong. There were small puddles in the middle of the room. At first, while I studied them, my brain wouldn’t allow me to fully comprehend why this was significant.
Water.
Puddles.
Foot prints.
Suddenly I couldn’t catch my breath. Understanding hit me all at once. And the familiar urge to vomit filled me. I opened my mouth, intent upon screaming, but I couldn’t force any noise to leave me. My hands shook, and my bladder emptied. Hot liquid spilled down my legs, and puddled beneath me, soaking into sheets. The pungent odor immediately stung my nose, causing me to gag. It was the first time I’d had an accident in years.
BANG!
I had no idea what the noise was, only that it sounded like a gun shot, and had happened just inches to the left of my bed. Fear gripped me tightly, forcing the breath from my lungs, and filling me with the sudden need to puke. I screamed, and leaped off the bed. My legs wobbled as I sped toward the doorway.
BANG!
The door slammed
Click
The room went dark.
I spun around, my body pressed tightly against the wood of the door. I was hyperventilating, unable to take a full breath. My hands shook, as I searched blindly for the light switch.
I stopped dead as a new sound penetrated the pseudo-silence.
Breathing.
I could distinctly make out someone else breathing.
With trembling hands, and a new reserve to get the door open, I clicked the light on; and screamed. “DAD!” I shrieked as loudly as I could. My voice was panicked. My heart clawed at my chest, trying to free itself from the cavity. Before me stood the person I’d managed to half-convince myself had just been some sort of dream. The person I couldn’t believe was responsible for the horrors that had filled the home the last few days.
There David stood.
Red shirt soaked, and clinging to brown skin. Black hair flattened against his scalp. But the most terrifying part, the reason for the desperate screams, the reason I couldn’t breathe, or think, or even manage to cry, was his eyes.
They were gone.
Just empty sockets in their place.
“DAD!” I shrieked a second time. My hand went to the doorknob as I tried desperately to open it. It was locked! Except my door didn’t have a lock.
“DAD!” Tears were streaming down my face, and I suddenly realized why Jack spent his time crying. “DADDY!”
Frantic footfalls exploded from my parents room. “Jasmine!” My dad called back, his voice wild with fear. “Jasmine!”
“DAD!” I shrieked.
I physically shook as my dad hit the door with all his might. “Open the door, baby!” He shouted, banging against it, and jiggling the doorknob.
“What’s wrong?” Jack’s voice came out of nowhere.
David took a few slow, dangerous steps toward me, rounding the bed. His bare feet hit the ground with a sickeningly, wet noise. He left puddles with each of his steps. I sucked in a sharp breath. “No, no, no, no, no!” I whimpered, as I stumbled further away from him, to the corner of my room. I curled into myself. “Please leave, please go away, David.” I begged through ragged sobs.
David cocked his head, slowly, staring at me with empty sockets. A wicked smile spread along his lips. He took another step forward.
“DADDY!” I choked out through desperate sobs.
“Unlock the door!” My dad shouted from the other side.
“There’s no lock!” Jack’s words were quietly hissed, I knew they weren’t meant for my ears, but I heard them all the same. There was a pause, a full two seconds of absolute silence. David took another step.
My dad’s furious pounding became frantic. I could practically hear the panic behind each the blows he dealt to the door.
I molded myself against the wall, convinced I was going to die. “Back up.” Came Jack’s voice.
BANG
Splintered wood showered the room, as Jack’s foot collided with it, forcing it open. A figure dashed into the dark room, and scooped me up, pressing me against his muscular frame. I let out a quivering breath, and wrapped shaking arms around my father’s neck. My small face buried into his shoulder as I cried away the fear and pain that wracked my six-year-old body. “Daddy!” I said the word over and over, each time, it brought with it a sense of peace and safety.
My father’s hand rubbed my back, and he allowed me a few minutes of quiet as I sobbed.
“Can we leave?” I choked out. “Please? Can we go camping? Please?” I craved the boring serenity of the forest. I needed the safety the trees offered me. I couldn’t stay here anymore.
“No.” Came my father’s response. My heart sank. I began to wail. Tears streamed down my face as I loudly begged my father to allow me to leave, but he refused. “We have to ride this out, Jazzy. We can’t let this thing drive us away. We can’t let this ruin us.” He continued to talk, but I’d stopped listening. Despair and desperation filled me to the very brim, until I thought for sure I’d burst. “Would you like to sleep downstairs on the couch, Princess?” Jack asked, his voice soft, and his features strong. He wasn’t crying. He wasn’t sad or frightened. He looked…determined. “I’m going to sleep down there. I’ll stay with you through the night.” He swore.
My father tossed him a glare, but stayed quiet as I nodded my head rapidly.
Jack pulled me into his arms, and a sense of safety washed over me. Despite his many breakdowns over the course of the last few weeks, I still thought of the man as invincible. I melted into his arms, and allowed him to carry me down the stairs. He pulled extra blankets from the closet with one arm, because I refused to be put down.
Jack made his bed on the couch, while I curled up on the chair. I’d initially wanted to sleep beside him, but the couch wasn’t large enough.
We turned on the tv, and put in Aladdin. It was my favorite movie at the time (mostly because my name was in it). Jack, who usually wouldn’t have agreed to watch it, seemed happy about it, saying he needed something light to calm his nerves.
Despite the fear that still wracked me, I hadn’t slept decent in nearly four days. Soon enough, exhaustion took over, and I found myself fighting heavy eyelids. I dozed off around the time Genie started singing about being the best kind of friend.
When I woke up, the tv was making a high pitched whiny noise, a blue screen illuminated the room. The rest of the house was quiet. I nearly sank back into sleep. Had I not heard the sharp intake of breath from the left side of the room, where Jack had fallen asleep, I might have.
Jack was curled up at the edge of the couch. His whole body trembled. His eyes were wide, and shiny with fresh tears. He was staring straight at me. I remember, in that moment, being confused. Not knowing why he’d be looking at me as though I’d grown a second head.
“You’re in my spot, Jack.” The words were sharp and venomous, they were heavy with the promise of violence. My body stiffened. I felt as though my lungs had been deflated. My stomach lurched. Fear gripped me tightly, wrapping withering fingers around me, and sucking everything but ugliness and despair away from my small body.
Slowly, I turned, only for my eyes to land on the same wet, eyeless version of the boy I’d once known. He turned to me, his lips twisting upward. “Are we having a sleepover?” He purred. David reached toward me, and the world seemed to slow. I willed my body to move, but it refused to obey. “NO!” Jack’s voice boomed from my left. A massive hand wrapped around my arm, and tugged me out of the chair. David’s face twisted with anger, but I was safely in Jack’s arms. He sprinted up the stairs, me pressed tightly against his chest, much like I had been when we’d first run from David, back when he’d been my friend, instead of my monster.
Jack threw open the doors to the boys’ rooms. “Up!” He shouted. “Get up! We’re leaving! We’re fucking leaving!” He barked. Both the boys sat up, looking rather groggy, and confused, but they did as they were told.
A small shriek from the other side of the hall sent me crashing to the ground. It took me several dizzying seconds to realize that Jack had dropped me, before sprinting toward Joey’s room. He threw open the door, it bounced off the wall with a loud thump, causing Joey to scream louder. Jack scooped him up in his arms, and headed down the hallway. The toddler never stopped screaming. “Let’s go!” He shouted again.
“What the hell is going on?” My father shouted above the noise and confusion as he stormed out of his room.
“You want to stay in this hellhole?” Jack spat back, eyes narrowed in absolute disgust. “You fucking do it, but I’m not staying, and I’m sure as hell not leaving them.” He shouted, stabbing a finger at my brothers and I. “Get your shit, and come with us, or fucking stay here. I don’t give a good damn!”
My dad narrowed his eyes in anger, he opened his mouth, probably to shout back, but before he could, Jack’s fist shot out. It connected with my father’s jaw, sending him staggering back.
My breath caught in my throat.
I couldn’t believe what I’d just seen.
Before my father could react, Jack shoved us forward. We all fled, rushing down the stairs, and tearing through the hallway. My father bounded after us, he was roaring angrily, shouting something about kicking Jack’s ass. But as we spilled outside, and the cool air hit us, we stopped in our tracks.
Johnny vomited.
“Fuck!” My dad shouted.
“Fuck me!” Jack hissed.
Jim cried for the first time since my father had blamed him for breaking Johnny’s arm. I didn’t understand what everyone was so upset about. I followed Jim’s line of sight, as he sobbed and wailed. There were things hanging from the trees. They swayed as the summer breeze bade them to dance. I turned my head this way and that trying to understand what they were. At first I thought them to be hummingbirds, hovering in the trees.
It took until Jim choked out the word “Mittens!” for the shapes to make any sense to me. There, in the tree, against the light of the moon, hung our cat, and all seven of her kittens. Strung up like fucking Christmas decorations, their small bodies limp and lifeless. It was single most lurid, grotesque thing I’d ever witnessed. My stomach churned. My mind went numb. I collapsed onto the ground. I couldn’t catch my breath. I puked. It splattered along my legs and night shirt.
I was a fucking mess. Covered in vomit and piss, I sobbed away the feelings of absolute terror. “Get to the car!” My father shouted, but he sounded distant, as though I was hearing him from under water. Something pushed me to my feet, and pulled me toward the car. I curled into myself, and sobbed the second I hit the seat.
Mom and dad filed into the car soon afterward, and we sped away from that god forsaken house. There was a lot of shouting happening, but I couldn’t focus long enough to understand any of it. I tried to piece together everything I knew about the situation.
Mittens and the kittens were dead.
David had done it.
David was dangerous. I knew this because he scared Jack and Dad, the two strongest, and bravest people I knew.
David was haunting us. David wasn’t human.
David was going to kill me.
These thoughts ran through my mind long after my father had parked the car just outside of the woods we’d escaped to prior. They ran through my mind as the family tried, without success to sleep in the cramped vehicle.
They ran through my mind, until a single word, spoken in a terrifyingly familiar voice broke through the silence. “Jasmine?”
We had been huddled in the car, holding tightly to one another as we tried to cling to thoughts of safety.
David shattered all that.
A sense of cataclysmic doom that settled over us as we stared back at the sopping wet boy. I felt as though the ground had been pulled out from under me. As though the world were no longer real, or solid. I felt wronged. Destroyed. Violated.
It was an odd sensation.
But one well deserved, I thought.
We’d found a haven, a place of safety. A home in the forest, where we though the monster that had systematically demolished our lives couldn’t reach us.
And yet…here he was. Standing just inches away from my window. Hand on the cracked glass. Empty sockets staring out at us.
Submitted December 04, 2016 at 12:03AM by TheLovelyFreja http://ift.tt/2fWZuPf nosleep
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