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The airing cupboard door has clicked open, slightly. All I can do is stare.
A familiar, soft tapping sound that’s hard to hear with any certainty, is coming from within the cupboard. It sounds disturbingly like the noise I make when… Toby has jumped off my bed and is eagerly heading towards the noise, I make, when I’m offering him a treat. I desperately want to stop him and try to whisper him back to me, without making it too obvious to anything else listening, I might actually be awake. But it’s not enough, he’s gone inside and the door of the airing cupboard softly closes behind him with a cold, ominous, click. Oh my God not my Toby – not my Toby! The light in the cupboard, rather than switching straight off, faded to black, and no sooner has it done so, did I can feel it coming, bringing with it an encroaching, unnatural terror. I’ve got an almost overwhelming build-up of anxiety inside me that something very bad is about to happen. Toby is softly meowing from the airing cupboard, but I’m far too scared to help him. I badly want to save my baby. The storm is picking up again outside. I swear I can hear my blood pumping in my ears. It’s getting louder.
Toby’s pawing at the door, now. Suddenly, he stops, and lets out a long wary hiss accompanied by that unnerving low growl he does when he sees a cat he doesn’t like in the garden.
Something large seems to have crept into my room from the open door, making the floor creek uncomfortably under its apparent hefty weight. But I was watching my door the whole time. How did I miss it? I’m so Goddamn still it’s almost painful; how long can I keep this up?
I can see something in the corner of my eye, something, I’m not sure what, it’s tall, possibly… hairy. It’s moved, following the walls of the room’s darkest shadows, moving spider-like and without sound onto my ceiling. Toby is growling and scratching frantically at the inside of the airing cupboard door. I can’t see where the thing is, now. I’ve lost it somewhere up there, in the darkness. But I feel it, alright. Watching me, with its dark intentions.
Lying as still as I can, I know the thing is above my bed looking down at me. I’m watching the shadows intensely for any change in their appearance whilst frozen with fear and too petrified to speak. Christ, now I badly need the bloody toilet!
It’s been a while. I’m not sure if there is anything there at all, now. There was, though, I feel when it’s nearby. Perhaps It’s waiting for me to doubt myself. Maybe it senses what I’m thinking? It’s being so still up there, hiding in the fixed shadows of my uneven ceiling.
The harder I looked the less I can see, it seems. My heart’s racing, though.
Softly, I’m not sure, but I think something is moving ever so softly, falling as lightly as dust and, slowly, with many of its drifting limbs trailing silently behind, an ambiguous black form is emerging, camouflaged by the night. It’s almost impossible to see it, but it’s definitely there. This, thing is reaching out in an attempt to touch me with its floating tendrils. I’m so scared – what do I do? The menacingly elongated tendrils are drifting around me with intelligent, deliberate intentions, octopus-like, each one falling over my ever-so-still face, each touch a cold, icy vapour. I… I don’t know what to do, I’m struggling to breathe like I’m being smothered to death. I’m sure I’m screaming at it, but nothing is coming out as I wave my lethargic, heavy arms in a blind, muted panic. What’s wrong with me? It’s so hard to breathe and fight back; I just can’t stop it coming for me! Is it just toying with me? I swear we’re face to face, yet I still can’t make it out. All I can assume, is that it wants me to know I’m at its mercy, and I should live in fear of it.
It’s testing me, I think, it must want to see how much fight I have in me. Well, I still have some bite left you bastard! With all my strength, I’ve managed to scream and shout at the top of my voice whilst shooing it away. My arms are lighter and have some strength back… I can breathe! It worked, although I have knocked over my pint of water on the bedside table in doing so. Who cares? I guess the bang of the glass must have helped scare it off. Every lungful of air is a Godsend. A Goddamn Godsend. The oppressing weight of evil has been lifted. Toby, his cries are so muted from the cupboard. I may have my strength back, but my gout is still very present; the adrenaline is helping, though. Poor Toby, ‘It’s okay, I’m here!’
I’ve finally made it to the door of the airing cupboard; it’s opened with far more ease than I expected. I can barely see anything inside; he must be terrified.
I can hear him shuffling around somewhere in the bottom of the cupboard behind the mess of bath towels. He’s hiding. ‘Com’on, it’s alright.’ Getting down to floor level is unbelievably painful, not to mention insanely hard. ‘Toby,’ the cupboard goes farther back than I thought. With my outstretched arm, my fingertips can just about feel the delicate tips of his fur. He’s purring now. ‘Good boy, come on.’
Something is touching my outstretched legs on the landing. What the Hell is that? Toby’s still purring, he doesn’t know. Whatever is on the landing is creeping with an eerie grace towards my exposed feet as they lay vulnerable outside the cupboard, all I can do is wait; stroking Toby is helping. Christ I’m scared; the evil is back. I can feel it. It’s so oppressive I can’t move. I’m paralysed with fear. Toby, however, is still purring from deep inside the cupboard, behind the towels, clearly unaware of what’s happening.
Whatever it is out there, it’s moving along my leg towards me, I can feel it’s fur faintly brushing against me as it does so.
The door of the cupboard has been knocked and as it casually creeks open, I can’t bear to look back. If I just stay still, if I just keep stroking Toby…
Against my better judgment I have to open my eyes, whatever it is it’s that’s entered the cupboard is face to face with me. The cupboard seems darker than it was before, my eyes are slow to adjust. Against the ambient light of the night on the landing is a familiar silhouette, ‘Toby?’ The purring in the back of the cupboard by my hand has stopped and I can smell, very clearly, that vile stench. On the landing the silhouette of Toby is growling. All I can do is stare at Toby as his growl morphs into a hostile and wary hiss at the pile of towels where my hand has been this whole entire time. If it wasn’t Toby’s fur I was touching? A fierce hand has grabbed a hold of my arm! It’s so strong – like stone! My screams, they’ve scared Toby away! Oh my God – the thing’s biting my forearm, its teeth, its horrible teeth – all I can do is scream and scream and scream!
8:27am. Back in bed again. But, how? I don’t remember getting here at all. I just remember – actually, I don’t want to know. I’m just grateful the storm’s brighter than it was a few hours ago. Hopefully the sun’s light will keep it at bay for a while.
I seem to have pissed the bed too; haven’t done that for a while. Jesus Christ, my head’s spinning like a top and my arm, what’s wrong with it, rubbing it makes it hurt more. I remember… the airing cupboard. My arm. Sheepishly, I’ve checked my right arm and, there appears to be, a sizeable bite mark; a raw couple of very nasty puncture wounds above and underneath my arm, like something clamped down on it hard. It’s still bleeding. This thing wanted to do me serious harm. I’ll have to sort it out as soon as possible, so it doesn’t get infected. It’s horrible. Looks, possibly, like a rat’s bite. Would make sense; must have been a big-ass rat. I feel sick. I can’t believe they’re in the house now.
My water glass is back on the side table. I remember now, it fell. But I can’t remember why exactly. It’s empty and there’s a watermark on the floor where it fell. I just don’t remember putting it back up here, though. I don’t remember much, actually. There’s that vile smell again: shit and meat. God, I really don’t feel well. Must have drunk a skin-full last night. ‘Fuck off! Not now, you sadistic prick.’ That bastard’s here. That Goddamn smell is going to make me throw up.
My head is killing me more than the gout right now. Resting my head on the cool porcelain of the toilet is really helping. I hate being sick. Wait… It’s all coming back to me now, all the horrors of last night, all at once, why? A fucking hand grabbed me from inside the airing cupboard! An actual fucking hand! I don’t understand why any of this is happening. Is it still in there? What the Hell is happening?
What the Hell am I going to do?
Hole
The morning light, despite the savage snowstorm, is filling the living room; I’m sure it’ll protect me, the light. I’m running my mouth while sitting under about half a million blankets and, as I sit here, it’s hard to ignore the faint, clouds of pale condensation leaving my lips with every shivering breath. I’m horrendously cold, but feeling brave now I’m drinking again and shouting what needs to be said at this fucking thing.
I know the demon’s listening to my rant, the room’s filling with its malevolent darkness, along with that disgusting stench of shit and putrefied flesh.
I don’t care, I’m drinking early; ‘Not much change there, I know,’ except this time I’m angry.
How fucking dare this thing come into my home and make me feel this way. How dare it punish me for reasons known only to itself, what arrogance, what an unearned sense of entitlement.
‘I’ve taken varying degrees of excruciating abuse my whole stinking life. I suffered as a child at home, all the way through school and later with my shitty marriage, not to mention the bloody public’s disrespect day in day out while I worked in A and E.
I’ve taken it all over the years and I’ve taken all I can fucking take. Well, I’m done taking it – now some supernatural piece of shit is going to add to it? I don’t fucking think so.’
This is the bravest and most fearless I’ve felt in days, I fucking love it! ‘Ya-hear me? Piece of shit!’
It’s close. I can feel it. The sight in my peripheral vision is softly darkening, like the gloomy vignette around an old Victorian photo. Outside, the storm has grown noticeably quieter while a familiar and visceral smell creeps slowly past me, as if a warning hiss from a venomous snake. Maybe I’ll stop talking out loud now? It’s bright in here, how can it still scare me? I’m exhausted.
So drowsy. Strange, I’m in my main bedroom again, lying on my bed. I swore I’d never come back in here. The storm still rages. But the light from outside is bleeding through the crack in the curtains; at least it’s not dark yet. How the bloody hell did I get here? It’s freezing in this room – far colder than anywhere else in the whole rest of the house. Was I so drunk that I blacked out and wandered up here to bed? Usually takes a lot more booze to do that to me.
So, so tired, I can barely move anything except my head, even that feels like shifting lead. Never in all my days have I felt like this before. Must be what being paraplegic must be like, a bit. Damn I’m tired.
Staring at the ceiling helps fight the strange disorientation, I feel really uncomfortable. Not drunk, though. This is different – drugged, maybe. Feeling, controlled somehow.
What’s that? It’s small. Fist-sized. Within the textured, yellowing-white of the ceiling directly above me, is the blackest hole I think I’ve ever seen. I can’t help staring at it. I don’t know why I can’t ignore it.
It’s horrible now, but still, I can’t seem to look away, it’s mesmerising.
I’m scared. I can’t move and I can’t look away. My heart’s racing, but I can’t stop staring at this hole, this frightening, Godforsaken hole. It’s coming. I can feel the most tremendous fear entering me, its demonic power is dwarfing my entire lifetime of pain and suffering, like my face is being pressed firmly from behind into the ripping teeth of a revving chainsaw. That damn hole, I can’t take my eyes off it, as if it wants to draw me up off the bed towards it. I can’t look away, but I can’t move. I can see the detail in the fluffed-up edges around the black void seem chewed out by the unseen rats. I’m screaming and screaming, but like always I fail to make so much as a whisper. Glancing around as much as is physically possible for an escape route, I spy the bedroom door and look straight into the landing mirror. Independent of any visible interference, It’s rattling on the wall to what appears to be the rumble of distant thunder, as it too, like the ominous hole, is as black as pitch.
No, not again! This is not fucking happening to me again! I’m not a bloody victim. I feel so angry. I want this fight; I can take anything – Goddamn-it! I’m done with taking shit from everyone and everything the world and all its bastard sons have to offer. I can feel the most terrible rage growing from within the depths my very soul, a rage of the most purest hatred. It’s filling my veins, every strand of muscle fibre in my being like a bubbling, gory flood of fevered hatred. I’ve never felt so powerful, so capable. I love it. I want more!
My movement’s increasing and glancing around, I see my empty vodka bottle laced in days of accumulated dust, it’s within hands-reach on the bedside table. Fighting to move through my invisible constraints I’ve gripped the bottle by the neck and arranged it bat-like up, turning it into a weapon of war against every wrong I’ve ever suffered, in my whole woeful life.
Black mould is visibly spreading out from behind the landing mirror, like tendril limbs from a dark dimension. The storm outside is raging. All inside the room is blowing now, it’s chaos here. I’m up and out of bed charging at the demonic mirror, my senses impulsive, teeth clenched and glaring, frothing at the lips and with only one psychotic goal in mind, I raise the vodka bottle above my head so the mirror, conscious or not, can witness the tool of its destruction.
Thunder rumbles outside ever louder, flashes of lightning, as if the storm and my savage mania are one and the same. With all the venomous darkness in Hell, I unleash my decades long fury upon its evil black glass, smashing it into a billion pieces. With every furious swing a dark shard of mirrored glass splinters off and fights back at me. I don’t care, I am a warrior, I’m in control and I’m not giving in anymore. Glass slices through my vulnerable old flesh and streaks of blood erupt fountain-like from every conceivable wound. I’ve just thrown what’s left of the vodka bottle as hard as I can at the centre of the mirror and it sailed off, unhindered by glass and on into the infinite black of this hellish gateway. Undaunted and with a white-knuckled grip I ripped the evil thing off the wall, bringing its remains crashing down to the floor. What’s left behind is a black putrefied mould that seems to quickly wilt away, leaving only a fading scorch mark in the wake of its cowardly retreat.
Its defeat isn’t enough. The sound and power of the room’s chaos is part of me. I have become the storm, the thunder, the hate. The Thing is downstairs, still in the living room, I can smell it, I wanted to rip it apart piece by bloody piece.
With speed akin to flying, I’m gliding downstairs after my prey and before I know it, I’m standing at the doorway of the living room; my rage evaporates in an instant. I see myself on the sofa covered in blankets staring back at me with deathly black eyes, grinning. Staggering backwards in horror, I’m in shock, what’s happening? Bumping into the wall behind me hard, I winced in pain.
Opening my eyes again and again, I’m in my bed as if nothing happened. I can see the pitch-black hole in the ceiling above me just as it was before and what I see drains all my remaining fight from me. My fearless rage has all but left, replaced by the terror I’d felt not long before, but now it’s stronger, more intense, and worst of all, it’s inescapable.
Seemingly staring back at me through the grim, gnarled hole above, a small, deformed thing bobs excitedly up and down from inside. Where are its eyes?
There’s no sound anywhere, not even from the storm. Within the shadows, I can vaguely see the meatball-headed creature, but I can tell its entire flesh appears grotesquely warped, like that of a first degree burn victim, whose charred skin weeps tirelessly under an ever-yellowing-bandage. Prominent veins stretch out in all directions over its misshapen surface and angrily throb.
Unable to resist staring up at this demonic horror, I can feel myself being lifted up off the bed. This thing’s actually drawing me up into the air towards it; drawing me closer and closer to a fate more brutally violent than anything I can barely imagine. It’s bobbing frantically now and appearing in and out of view with the more excitable it gets.
Its eyes… its eyes are opening and forcefully splitting the meat of its face to do so, as if birthing them into existence. I’m screaming for my life and again, no sound leaves my lips. The fear is now all-consuming and unrelenting. I can smell its hideous stench of rotting flesh as I creep closer and closer. The creature’s bobbing faster and faster, becoming a blur. There’s a shredded grin as wide as its head. It’s moving impossibly fast, yet I can make out the occasionally glint of sharp crooked teeth, all unevenly framed within its unnaturally wide, mutilated mouth. Oh my God, the moisture of its breath on my face, it’s the smell of human shit.
I’m trying everything I possibly can to push myself away from the ceiling, but nothing’s working, I’m too weak and my pissing limbs refuse to work. I’m yelling and yelling but can’t resist being forced face-first into this fucking hole.
It’s pitch black in here. Where is it? It’s so difficult to see in here, that smell though, it’s getting stronger. My God, I think I see it even though it’s obscured within dense shadow. It was hiding. Shit, it’s coming at me… It’s so hard to see… that hideously blank face and those snapping, crooked, frightening teeth. I’m not waking up! I don’t want to die, not like this! Christ its teeth are biting into my cheek, its ripping and pulling and tearing the flesh away from my face; I feel them grating against my jawbone.
