Finally, she returned to the table and sat down. Immediately, the air about me was infused with a beautiful and heady aroma. Her lips were also shocks of a darker shade of red.
“I’m awake,” I said, breaking the awkward silence that had descended between us. “The name’s David Heather.” We shook hands. I knew who she was.
“How long have we been working together?” she asked, before sipping her coffee.
I started to stutter.
What the hell is wrong with you, for fuck’s sake? She’s a girl! Remember those?
“You mean how long have we shared the same crowded office and the same conditioned air? I’d say a of couple years,” I replied, steadily and slowly this time.
That didn’t hurt, did it?
“Has Turner, Hodgeson, and Berkley Solicitors been around that long?” she replied, shaking her head. That’s when we both broke with laughter. “Two years and we’re talking for the first time today? Now that is funny.”
I shook my head.
“First time for everything, isn’t there?” she asked.
“Are you going to the office Christmas party in a few days?”
“I can’t,’’ she said, apologetically almost. “I’m heading to Bournemouth to stay with family.”
I looked down into the brown steaming surface of my coffee.
“I’ll be back in the sunny north east on New Year’s Day,” she added, placing a hand on mine, a smile on her lips.
I was a little slow on the up-take with girls, always had been.
“What do you have planned for that night?”
“We,” she said softly. “What do we have planned?”
***
Four o’clock could not have arrived sooner. Walking home, barely able to contain the joy that was burning inside of me, I smiled. Passers-by regarded me with strange and curious eyes, but I ignored them. Tina and I had exchanged phone numbers. As I had walked her to her car, she gave me a gentle kiss on the cheek.
Snow had fallen two hours earlier, and now a thick coating of the blasted stuff had made moving around treacherous. I managed to see my apartment block through the darkness, lights shone in its windows.
That’s when I felt an oppressive chill rush through me. It was almost like the sensation I felt earlier that morning. That’s when I realised I was standing on the same spot as those foot prints. I failed to notice now that they had been covered with snow.
I needed to get off of the street. I put the key in the lock and turned it.
***
I thought about how I treated my old friend, how I should have listened to Philip when he needed me.
It had been Halloween, and we decided to make our own Ouija board from old pieces of paper and a board I found in his garage. We had the house to ourselves. His mum and dad were at a party further down the street. They were pretty young at heart. Sometimes I thought they were too young to be his parents. They gave up trying to persuade him to join them, so off they went. Maybe they were secretly happy Philip wasn’t going after all?
“No…this is how it’s done,” I said, arranging the pieces of paper in a semi-circle on the board. Each one featured a letter of the alphabet, crudely scribbled in thick black ink. There I added a piece with a YES and No within the circle, also a HELLO and GOODBYE.
Philip nodded. “Looks pretty professional, I suppose.”
I looked at my wristwatch. “Almost the witching hour,” I said, grinning. “Let’s rock and roll.”
Nothing really happened at first. We dimmed the lights and lit candles on the mantelpiece. The flames danced through the crystal ornaments, casting shadows across the ceiling. The room was large, and although the central heating was at full cylinder, I still felt an iciness in the atmosphere. My teeth chattered. The beer was going down well, I observed, noticing the large number of empty cans lying around. Maybe that was making me shiver a little, I thought.
I felt awkward and somewhat exposed by asking if anyone was there. It was almost inevitable that Philip would say something stupid. But he watched the ceiling for signs of a presence. His eyes were wide, his bottom lip quivering slightly, as if in anticipation. We kept our fingers on the small upturned glass at the centre of the board, waiting. I asked again. And again.
Nothing.
The candles died as though snuffed by a sudden chill breeze. The door behind me slammed shut, and the crystal ornaments flew across the room, shattering on the wall beside me.
“What the hell is going on, David?” he whispered.
I shook my head slowly, surveying the room. “I haven’t a clue…“
Something grabbed at Philip’s hair. Its fists were invisible, but I could see that he was in great pain. The door flew open, almost bursting from its hinges with the impact against the adjacent wall, and Philip, kicking and screaming, was swept along the floor, disappearing from the room in the space of three seconds. Before I could take a second breath, the door had slammed shut once more and my friend’s screams quickly receded down the hall.
I got up and tried to open the door, but the handle was solid. It didn’t even turn, as though someone or something held it fast from the other side.
I remember calling his name, beating my fists against the door, but the thing was stuck. I hadn’t felt so helpless in my life. So all I could do was stand there and watch for movement, for anything. Listening to Philip’s screams above me, heavy footfalls almost coming through the ceiling as whatever had him, moved across the room. Plaster sprinkled down in places, and the lights shook.
Then came silence.
It was more terrifying than my friend’s cries for help. I stood still, afraid to move, watching the door. Small blotches beat across my field of vision in tandem with my hammering heart. And slowly, quietly, the handle turned. The door crept open an inch at first, and I’m sure to this day that a wet eye twinkled in that darkness, watching me, before it opened fully.
I searched the house, calling his name, but Philip was nowhere to be found. I even contemplated getting his parents from their party, but I kept looking instead. He was around here someplace…
He sat in a ball in the attic, his knees pulled up tight against his chest. I would have missed him if it were not for the sudden eruption of lightning beyond the window, illuminating the small, cramped surroundings. He had been crying, his face, when I managed to get close enough to look, was grey and stained with tears.
He couldn’t walk, he told me. He was embarrassed. I didn’t understand at first, until he tried to cover himself over with his torn jeans and underwear. They were stained with what appeared to be blood. We decided not to go to a hospital. They wouldn’t believe us anyway. Besides, we didn’t actually say the word, but we both knew he had been raped.
***
I knew that many people, male and female, have learned to live with that experience in time. As harrowing as it seemed, I was praying that Philip would learn to smile again in no time at all. I promised him my discretion, and I meant it. He was my best friend. We had overlooked the fact that it had been committed by something else, not a human monster at all. For that reason, I wanted him to get checked out.
He shook his head, tears appearing at the corners of his joyless eyes.
Days later he came to me, complaining about the strange dreams he was having. Such night terrors! I told him that after what he had been through, it was understandable. But he insisted it had nothing to do with the rape. He said that something stayed with him that night, it came from the board. It breathed its words, barely whispering in a strange language he had not heard before. It mentioned such weird things, he said, and he could almost understand that outlandish language. He said that it spoke of the afterlife. That where it came from, eight suns burned down. They could see them up through the ceiling of the sea. Heat often sat upon the water, creating steam that threatened to rid them of the air they breathed beneath the waves. That the suns often teased them that way, like a child burning ants with a magnifying glass. How
they despised those burning stars, and craved the diamonds that followed them in the darkness. Those stars didn’t tease. They were cold and beautiful.
It was going to take him to their sea, he said. Even though he had protested, that he was human and unable to breathe beneath the waves. So in time, it said, it shall cut him his gills. Two behind each ear, and two in his sides.
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I’d not heard such strange nightmares in my life. But he insisted that they were real. That the creature was wet, it filled the air with dampness. His bedroom walls were black with mould. His carpets had soaked through, and he couldn’t rid the place of the horrible, salty stench. But the description of the creature itself made my blood turn to iced water, and I needed to sit down.
It stood, crouching, arching its back as it touched the ceiling. Its beard of squirming tentacles cut the air, manipulating the oxygen about it. It had the power to turn Philip’s air supply off like turning off a tap. It was its amusement, watching the boy’s face turn a shade of blue, clutching at his throat before it turned the air back on. Its eyes were amber shards of glass, heavily veined. The head resembled that of something he would imagine dwelled at the deepest region of the ocean, gripped by the pressure no man could endure. Beneath its arms, and reaching down to its curled-up tentacle-like legs, was a gossamer thin pair of transparent wings. It said that the time was getting short and it would carry him off across the universe, cutting his gills while he slept in the three-thousand-year transit. Then it would let him fall into the ocean.
We stopped hanging around with one another after that day. I wanted to believe him, I told him so. That I was sorry he’d been…violated. But this, he had told me, about the nightmares and that creature, was too much for me to digest. After a few days he stopped trying to contact me. Two weeks later his parents, fraught with despair, informed me that Philip had walked away and hadn’t returned. I wanted to tell them everything, that their son had a perfect excuse for wanting to run away. But I kept quiet. I kept quiet for nearly three years, and now the memories came flooding back to me as though it were yesterday.
It was fair to say, as I now lay awake, staring at the ceiling, that sleep and I were no longer friends.
***
Another night passed, another without sleep, so I crossed through the park opposite my apartment block. It cut my journey to work in half. It was the main reason I never used that route. But after a sleepless night, I needed to get away from everything, to break away from the ritual of passing the same buildings, the same cars, the same pedestrians. My hair was sticking up at different angles, and my shoe laces were undone. I couldn’t even remember locking the flat door behind me. I didn’t care, I just needed to escape for a time. My feet kicked up small geysers of slush, soaking my trousers through to my skin.
That’s when I spotted Philip.
I knew it was him although his back was facing me. He stood, as still as stone, looking down into the grey coin of the pond. its surface frozen. It was thin by the looks of it, but the temperature had fallen so rapidly during the previous night, that I’m sure he could take a step onto it and make his way across.
There was something on his back. It looked like a large, black rucksack. Except it turned what appeared to be its oval shaped head, its eyes glowing dully in the early morning darkness. Eyes of heavily veined amber.
I looked away as though the eye contact between us had the power to turn me to stone. But I had to look back, it was almost beautiful. It was black, and as it slowly writhed about Philip’s body, the snowy ground was reflected in its surface. Like a slug it moved about his shoulders, and he didn’t even flinch or gag with its close proximity. I imagined the stench and the texture of its skin against my neck and cheeks, feeling my stomach clench.
It was speaking to him, I realised. A small opening, encircled by a dozen rows of jagged teeth, appeared in its side. Its eyes never left mine. And that’s when Philip turned his head in my direction. His eyes were silver spheres. A smile creased his lips.
I looked away and quickened my pace. When I reached the gate leading out of the park, I dared to peer over my shoulder.
There was nobody there.
I have no idea how long I stood there, but when I finally moved once more, the orange eye of the sun had opened on the horizon.
There were lights burning up ahead, and I made my way through the snow towards the twenty-four hour supermarket. My toes were frozen and the movement helped to restore the heat to my body once more. I knew I was out of bread and milk, but I bypassed the display counters, heading straight for the alcohol aisle. Looking up at the large clock above the delicatessen counter, I realised that it was only seven thirty-five.
The air caught in my throat, and I stood still, holding the bottle of wine. My throat went as dry as sand paper. The hairs shifted across my scalp, and sweat trickled beneath my arms, pasting my tee shirt to my skin. Early morning shoppers passed me like ghosts, their cheap aftershaves and perfumes encircling me. But they were nothing, simply shadows.
I watched the giant creature as it shifted gracefully behind the glass of the fresh fish display case. Its long, purple tentacles reached up over the edge of the glass, suckers kissing the pane. It turned to look straight at me. And it smiled, its teeth…
The wine bottle fell from my hands and smashed upon the floor in my haste to get out of the supermarket. I knew that I was seeing things, I knew in my heart that it was all in my mind. But what had happened to my mind?
***
I didn’t leave my apartment for the rest of the holidays, failing to attend the office Christmas party. I didn’t really fancy going anyway, I thought, Tina wasn’t going to be there.
I thought about calling her, or just dropping her a text message to her mobile phone, but I decided against it. It was a family holiday; I’d call her when she returned.
Late at night, my eyes would flick open like those of a doll, and I’d run over to the window. Down below traffic passed sluggishly through the driving snow. I’d press myself to the glass to gain vantage of further up the street, but there was nobody there. Occasionally I’d hear something whisper across the carpet just beyond my door. There it stood, me with my ear against the panel, inches between us. Then it would slowly make its way down the hall. I’d open my door, expecting—hell, I didn’t know what to expect!
There was nothing but darkness beyond the threshold, except small snowy footprints. I arched my neck over the balcony railing, peering down into the blackness there. Sure enough, there was a trail of white powder leading down the steps. As I looked down at the snow, it was then I realised that they didn’t lead anywhere else. They stopped at my door, right where the whispering sounds came from minutes earlier.
I stopped looking out of my window from there on in, afraid in case Philip was out there, looking up at me. His eyes of silver, watching. Nothing was the same again. Food looked at me from the pan, eyes appearing in the bubbling contents as it boiled on the hob. So, after a day or so, I gave up, my stomach churning with hunger. After a while I got used to it, like a person getting accustomed to the sound of a noisy neighbour. It seemed inevitable, final. Every programme on the television gave me crushing headaches, ones with the power to hold my head in a vice-like grip.
There came a knock on the front door.
***
Her emerald eyes widened with shock, her radiant smile fading, mouth falling open as she saw me. Without a word, Tina stepped into my home. The cold air followed her, and my skin crawled at its touch.
I ran my hands through my hair, and my fingers made a loud rasping noise as I scratched my heavily bearded face. My bare feet were purple with poor circulation, the radiators placed at intervals around the flat were ice cold, for I hadn’t noticed the passage of time.
There came a strange smell from the small kitchenette, a dirty and rotten smell. I looked at the green mould on the plates and the cups before rinsing two mugs out, added two scoops of coffee granules,
then filled the kettle. As I waited for it to boil, I grabbed my bathrobe from the hook on the bathroom door and put it on. I noticed how Tina kept her coat on as she sat on the sofa. If anything, she had buttoned up the front. I didn’t realise just how bloody cold the place was until I saw the vapour from her breath swirl about her face.
“What the hell has happened to you?” she said, her hands firmly in her coat pockets. “You do realise its New Year’s Day?”
I swallowed hard, ignoring the sound of the kettle bubbling in the kitchen, and ran to the bathroom. Looking in the mirror, my eyes wide with bewilderment, I surveyed the damage I’d done to myself over the past two weeks. My hair was grey at the temples, I had indeed let a beard inherit my erstwhile clean shaven face, and my teeth were stained badly from my diet of coffee. It had become my only source of nourishment, as everything else I touched looked at me, and moved about the plate.
“Are you okay, David?” Tina called from the other room.
I wanted to answer, I wanted to turn around and leave the room, but I was transfixed with the movement behind my shoulder in the mirror.
It lay in the tub, as black as ink. Tentacles, long with purple undersides, spilled over the sides and touched the floor. Large, round suckers seemed to blink at me. Each one was a beady silver eye. Purple lids wetted the spheres as they rolled in their sockets. Its round head turned towards me, a maw of knife-like teeth appearing in its flesh. It made a sound resembling a zipper being pulled open.
“Hey, are you okay!”
Tina had appeared in the doorway, holding onto the frame as though for dear life. I was curled up against the wall at the other side of the room, my knees pushed up tightly against my chest. I looked like Philip that night long ago.
The creature spilled onto the floor. I kicked out with all my might, my eyes wide with fright.
Within Stranger Aeons Page 2