The Red Light

by Robert Kiskaden

  “Tammi said you stopped by the office today, I tried to call your cell but it just went to voice mail,” Mike explained.

  “You know service sucks out here in the sticks,” Sarah said smiling. “I was stopping by to tell you that I found something to do a few days a week.”

  “Oh, really, what are you doing?”

  “I saw in the paper that they needed volunteers at a food bank to help pass out food for people in need.”

  “That’s great,” Mike said and had a look on his face like he was thinking hard about something.

  “I heard you have been meeting some new people around town, through some painter guy.”

  “Yeah, Danny, if I’m going to be a lawyer here it’ll be good to know some of the people, we should get out and make some friends anyway,” Mike said.

  “True, we should, maybe I’ll make some new friends down at the food bank tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?” Mike asked and sounded surprised.

  “Yes, tomorrow morning, they are going to start teaching me what to do; I guess they really do need help badly.”

  “What time will you be home?”

  “Oh, around three thirty, early enough to be home when the kids get off the bus, why?”

  “No reason, I just was wondering where to find you if I needed you for some reason,” he said with a smile.

  Sarah was cooking steaks with baked potatoes while Mike was going through the papers inside his briefcase.

  “What are those papers?” Sarah asked.

  “Oh just some possible cases I have been looking through,” Mike answered.

  “Great, I hope you get some business soon, because our bank account is taking a beating,” Sarah said and waited to see how he would react.

  “Don’t worry I have a lot of clients lined up, everything will be alright I promise,” he said with a reassuring smile. “How are things going with your book?” Mike said changing the subject.

  “Oh, it’s going good I have a few chapters finished, it will be a while before I have it completed,” she said as she set the table for dinner.

  The family had dinner and spent the evening watching TV, when they went to bed, Sarah lay awake for a long while staring at the ceiling thinking about the ghosts she had seen since living in the house, and this terrible Uncle Silas clown, was it real or did she dream it, she finally went asleep but had nightmares most of the night.

  The next morning was the same as every morning except that there was a dusting of snow on the ground, they were used to lots of snow in Chicago but living out here with the trees and open fields, and it was a beautiful sight. Sarah showed up at the food bank early and had to wait for thirty minutes for someone to arrive and unlock the doors, it was a woman in her sixties, short and thin, and her hair was gray, Sarah walked up to her.

  “Excuse me,” Sarah said to the woman, “are you Susan?”

  “Hello dear, yes I am Susan, you must be Sarah they said that I would have help today,” Susan said as they both went inside the door at the back of the church.

  “Yes I’m Sarah; it’s nice to meet you, Susan.”

  Sarah went inside with Susan and turned on the lights; they went to the basement and opened the doors where the food is stored. Susan showed her around the old church and it was huge and beautiful, Sarah was impressed with how many rooms it held and how much they did for the community. She spent several hours there with Susan passing out food to people, she felt good about helping and was surprised at how many came in need of food. Just riding through town you would never think that anyone would need it, but like her mother always told her, you only know what you know about others.

  Sarah made it home before the kid’s bus ran, as she pulled up to the house she was surprised to see Mike’s vehicle parked out front. She went in and expected to see him on the couch or at the table where he always looked at his papers from work, but he was nowhere to be seen. The house was silent. Sarah went to the restroom first then she would go look for Mike, while in there she heard the sound of footsteps running up the basement stairs, then the basement door slammed.

  “Mike, are you alright?” Sarah yelled.

  “Yeah, I’m fine,” he sounded startled and out of breath.

  She came out of the restroom and found him sitting on the couch with his hands on his head and his elbows on his knees.

  “Mike what is the matter? You’re out of breath and you’re sweating,” she said concerned.

  “I’m fine, I was down making sure the furnace is running right and just got kind of freaked out.”

  “I hate it down there, but you know I’m scared of basements anyway.”

  Sarah got Mike a glass of tea and sat beside him on the couch, she told him about her day at the food bank and how rewarding it was for her. He explained to her that he didn’t feel well and came home early; she wanted to ask him more about his work but decided to leave him alone since he didn’t feel well.

  Mike took a shower and some cold pills, then lay down in bed for a while. Meanwhile, the kids arrived home and Mary was excited about some crafts she made in school. Teddy was dragging around the house, he was tired from lack of sleep because of nightmares, but he didn’t tell anyone about them because he was so scared Uncle Silas would hurt them.

  Sarah and the children ate dinner but Mike didn’t feel like eating, she felt his head and he was burning up from a fever so she gave him some more medicine and left him alone to get some rest.

  “Mommy, can I have a puppy?” Mary asked.

  “Oh sweetie I don’t know, who would take care of it if you’re in school and your dad and I gone all day?”

  “I can stay home and take care of it,” she said like it was the best idea ever.

  “You can’t even take a bath alone, how are you gonna take care of a puppy?” Teddy said with a sarcastic tone.

  “Mom,” Mary hit her hand on the table.

  “Okay, you two stop it now, we’ll talk about a puppy later, maybe for Christmas,” Sarah said trying to get off the subject. After dinner the kids had their baths and Sarah tucked them in bed, she turned off the lights and got in bed with Mike, he still had a fever but was asleep.

  Teddy could hear things moving around on the floor above him, he tried to ignore it but whatever was making the sounds were very active tonight. Not long after he seen figures passing his door and going down the hallway, it was like they were walking by but he couldn’t see their legs or feet, just from their waist up.

  One of them stopped and faced toward him looking in the doorway, he couldn’t tell exactly if it was a man or a woman, but it was something floating there looking at him. He pulled the covers over his head and he heard the door slowly close, he uncovered his head to peek out and there was the clown standing there, it was Uncle Silas, and the bright red light shined from beneath is bed.

  “Hello there Teddy, I came back to play,” Silas said with a low slow laugh.

  “Go…go away, you’re not real,” Teddy said stuttering.

  “Oh I’m real boy, and I brought you a toy to play with,” Silas said as he pulled a bubble wand out of his pocket. “Oops, I forgot the bubbles. What can we use to make bubbles, Ted?” Silas said while looking around the room like he misplaced something. “Oh, I know.” Silas ripped open the left side of his clown outfit showing his pale white skin, he shoved the bubble wand into the side of his stomach, it made a squishing noise as it went in and a thick black substance poured out and ran down onto the floor. He pulled the wand out and put it up to his mouth, he breathed in deep and blew toward the wand, a huge red bubble went floating across the room slowly, Silas danced as it floated over Teddy’s bed.

  “We made blood bubbles, boy!” Silas was laughing hard and loud as he blew the bubble toward the wall.

  Teddy watched as it hit the wall over his headboard and busted. Blood splattered all over the wall and ran down, Silas kept laughing and dancing around the room and began blowing bubbles all over the bedroom; they were floating everywhere
and busting, covering everything with the thick blood.

  “Here do you wanna try?” Silas held out the bubble wand to Teddy.

  Teddy shook his head no and covered his head with his covers again. He could see the red light beginning to fade. After what seemed like an hour he peeked out from beneath the covers and seen the room was normal, no blood, no red light and no Uncle Silas. He was awake most of the night, listening to the bumping and walking around on the third floor.

  Chapter 12

  The next morning Sarah had a hard time waking Teddy for school and at the table she noticed the black under his eyes and was concerned. “Oh my God sweetie, aren’t you getting any sleep?”

  “Not much mom, I keep having bad dreams,” he wanted to tell her about Uncle Silas but figured no one would believe him.

  “Me too,” Sarah said, “it will get better soon, it has too.”

  Mike came out of the bedroom, dressed and ready to go to work, and he seemed hyper this morning, rubbing the kid’s hair and gave Sarah a kiss before sitting down and eating.

  “I guess you feel better today, that medicine must have helped overnight,” Sarah said.

  “Yeah, I think that medicine did the trick, I feel great,” Mike laughed.

  Sarah found it strange how Mike was acting, it wasn’t like him to be this way, but it is a new place with new people, so it can change you, and she left it at that. Mike headed out for work after the kids were off to school, Teddy kept falling asleep on the bus and would wake up when it hit a bump in the road and bounced him in his seat. At school he sat at his desk in homeroom still dozing off, his friend Jeff came over and sat down beside him.

  “Hey Teddy, why are you so tired, bad dreams again?” Jeff asked.

  “Yeah, it’s our house, it’s haunted,” Teddy said sleepily.

  “Haunted, you have ghosts?”

  “Yep, and they won’t leave me alone, keep waking me up almost every night.”

  “I’m glad I didn’t ask to spend the night with you,” Jeff laughed.

  “Yeah, you wouldn’t want to see and hear the things I do. I can’t even sleep anymore,” Teddy said yawning.

  Mrs. Clayton, their homeroom teacher came into the class, she was a newly graduated teacher and was still fairly young. “Children settle down I have some bad news, Missy Hayslip was reported missing yesterday morning, if any of you have any idea at all about where she is please tell me or the principal. The sheriff’s office and many other volunteers are out looking for her, let’s just pray that she is safe somewhere out there.” All of the children were stunned and some became very frightened and started to cry.

  * * * * * * * * * * * *

  Sarah was reading the paper before leaving for the food bank; she was reading a story about a little girl missing from town. The paper stated that the child went missing yesterday morning before school and hasn’t been seen since. Sarah thought how terrible it must feel to lose a child, not knowing if they were alive or if you would ever see them again.

  She got dressed and started driving down the narrow country road toward town, while driving she was thinking about her children, and the horrible things she has seen since moving into the old house and how she didn’t want them to see any of the ghosts that still lurked inside. Sarah reached down to get her on the go coffee cup and when she looked up there was a deer standing in the middle of the road, she slammed on the brakes and swerved into the ditch on the right side of the road sliding to a stop. The deer jumped the fence and ran off into the trees while she sat there stunned and thankful that no damage had been done. She was shaken but was unharmed and drove carefully to her work.

  Once at the church Sarah and Susan talked about the missing child, it was big news in the town and everyone was searching for her. While they were talking the food bank director Stephanie Watts came down to talk to her.

  “Good morning ladies, I came down to tell you that the criminal background checks came back clean,” Stephanie said with a smile.

  “Well, you knew it would, I don’t know why you have to do that anyway, did mine show that I didn’t put my false teeth in the glass of water last night?” Susan said teasingly.

  “Oh, I knew Sarah would check out, it’s just the rules and we all have to follow the rules you know,” Stephanie said.

  “Well it doesn’t mean that I have to like them,” Susan exclaimed. Stephanie was used to Susan’s picking, she acted grumpy but anyone could tell that she was just playing around and giving them a hard time.

  Sarah put in her time at the food bank and went home, while pulling into the driveway she noticed that Mike’s vehicle was parked out front just like the day before. She went inside and looked around for him but he was nowhere to be found. Sarah went to the basement door and was going to open it when she seen his briefcase on the table.

  She went quietly to the table and opened the briefcase, Sarah went through the papers and most of them were case papers from clients, but there was a manila folder at the bottom of the pile that was separate. She opened the folder and looked at the top paper, it read like a list.

  7:15 A.M. Leaves for school.

  11:35 A.M. Eats lunch alone on back steps.

  3:16 P.M. Walks home.

  3:30 P.M. Arrives home.

  Sarah sat at the table with her mouth open; this list is someone’s routine. What hit her the hardest is that it must be a child because it say’s ‘leaves for school,’ she couldn’t believe this. Mike has always been a normal guy. She heard something down in the basement and she was shaking as she straightened up the papers and closed the briefcase the way she found it. She walked quickly to the sink and began rinsing off the dishes as Mike came through the basement door.

  “Oh, hey Sarah, how was your day?”

  “It was good,” she said trying not to sound nervous, “how was yours?”

  “Good, I came home early again I’m still not feeling well.”

  “Two days home early in a row, that’s not like you at all. You must be pretty sick.”

  Mike gave her an uneasy look, a look like she knew something; he looked down at the briefcase and wondered if she got into it. He picked it up and walked into the living room and sat down on the couch.

  “Yeah, I am pretty sick,” he finally answered after a long pause.

  “Did you hear about that missing girl?”

  “No, what happened?”

  “A girl the same age as Teddy disappeared yesterday,” Sarah explained.

  “That’s terrible, her parents must be so torn up, I hope they find her,” Mike said.

  The rest of the evening Mike stayed silent, he was more withdrawn that he used to be and Sarah can see the major changes in him. Later that night she woke up in bed alone, she thought he may be in the bathroom and looked over and seen the light was out so he wasn’t in there. Sarah got up and peeked around the corner to the living room and seen Mike standing and facing the fireplace, he was talking as if someone was standing there beside him.

  “I can’t do it anymore; you will have to find what you need on your own. I just can’t do it,” Mike said…. “No, not my children, that’s not an option! …Okay, okay just give me time to think and I’ll come up with something. I’ll find another.”

  Sarah tip toed back to bed as fast as she could and covered up, she lay there on her side like she was asleep but she was wide awake now. He was talking to himself like something was going to happen to their kids if he didn’t do something. There was no one there, he was talking to the fireplace, oh my God, was he talking to a ghost? Sarah thought to herself. Mike came back to bed about an hour later and went to sleep; Sarah didn’t get much rest that night she was worried about her children, and her own safety.

  The next morning Mike decided to stay home from work, he was coughing and sneezing and running a fever, Sarah gave him some medicine and told him to stay in bed. An hour later Sarah left for the food bank and just couldn’t get over how much Mike is changing, he never missed a day’s work before, and
she was wondering what he keeps doing down in the basement.

  * * * * * * * * * * * *

  Sarah was sitting on the side of the bed telling him to wake up while shaking his shoulder. He found it strange that she would be there because she just left for work; he rubbed his eyes and when he opened them he noticed that her nose was blue, he rubbed them again and her eyes and mouth were red but she still had a big smile and sounded the same as usual. She leaned close to him, face to face. “Give me a little kiss sweetie,” she said moving closer.

  He knew something was wrong and just figured he must be dreaming he closed his eyes and moved closer to her ready to kiss her lips when he heard a laugh, that loud raspy laugh. Suddenly it was Uncle Silas sitting on the side of his bed face to face with him laughing loudly.

  “So Mikey, I hear you don’t wanna bring me some new blood like your aunt always did for me.”

  “I… I,” Mike stuttered.

  “Shut up,” Silas screamed and the light came on and glowed bright and red. “The deal is, you bring me something to kill and I don’t kill your kids, that Mary is a sweet little thing, her blood would be so good, so sweet.”

  “You bastard! You stay away from her,” Mike said sternly.

  “Oh, I am a bastard Mike there’s no doubt, but I will not stay away from her, I’ll keep her here with me forever if I want, you need to understand who is in charge here.”

  “You’re sick,” Mike said moving away from him.

  “You have no idea how sick. Do you, Mikey?” Silas stood up and pulled out a knife and began stabbing into the air and swinging the knife violently like he was slicing someone open. “I love to kill children Mikey, their screams are like music to my ears and their innocent blood is so yummy I need it. Now stop being a whiney little girl and get me some blood.”