Upon Waking

by Park, J. R.

  ‘Fi,’ he gently whispered again, ‘is that you?’

  The figure slowly turned her head from the window to face Stuart. She had the same beautiful hair that flowed so gracefully down her back as the photo on the dating website but he was hard pushed to find any other resemblance to the beauty that had caught his imagination online. As the hair parted, it revealed a face, wrinkled and speckled with small lesions. Some were scabbed over but others looked sore; open and weeping and dripping with a mixture of blood and puss, some of which had begun to dry across her blemished face.

  The haggard features smeared with congealed fluids and wounds also failed to hold those magical brown eyes Stuart had marveled over, instead her eyelids were swollen and closed. Ridges of scar tissue crisscrossed the surrounding skin almost concealing trails of black thread that had been sewn into her flesh, sealing her eyes shut.

  A pair of thick lips, split and dry, slowly cracked into a smile.

  Her deformed hands reached out as she jumped off her stool and launched herself at a startled Stuart. He stumbled backwards to avoid her reach and tripped on his heels. Crashing to the floor he watched her gnarled hands swing out, just missing his face. She swung out a second time but missed again, her fingertips inches from him.

  The woman strained to reach him but couldn’t get any closer. Stuart noticed a metal chain trailing from her neck. Following the links that were pulled tight against the strain of her attempted attack, he saw it was attached to the bedpost.

  She crawled back to her stool and began to babble. Her voice was low and husky, the sound of a voice scarred through screaming. Was this really the same person that produced the shrill scream he’d heard whilst lying amongst the dead?

  ‘Come for me? Come for me?’ came the gruff ravings, her words almost tripped over themselves, jostling to leave her tongue first, creating a demented, bludgeoning of speech. ‘Of course you’ve come. Always, always. They come always come. Me? For me? Don’t look, don’t look please don’t look.’

  She cowered on her stool and held her hand across her face for protection.

  ‘It’s okay,’ Stuart reassured her as he felt the courage to edge closer again, ‘who are you?’

  ‘Friend. Friend. All were friend,’ she shook her head slowly as she spoke. ‘Friend. School. Cassie, play with me. Boys play too. Are you boy? Please don’t make me watch! My fault. My fault. It wasn’t. Wasn’t!’

  Her rantings veered from growls to yelps and back again whilst she grabbed the chain round her neck with both hands and pulled on it.

  ‘I didn’t mean to. Not mean. They liked me. Liked me. Not her. Cassie. Cassie. Please don’t make me watch! She lied. Love? She never loved. He liked me. Left her waiting. Waiting for no one. Me. Me he came to see. Hospital look after her. Cold. Wet. Fountains. Rain on the fountains. She waited. Hospital came. Too cold. Heart too cold. Skin too cold. Nearly died. Die. Die. Why didn’t you die? Please don’t make me watch!’

  Stuart sat on the bed and tried to calm her down.

  He spoke slowly and calmly, holding his hands up and palms open in a display of friendly intention.

  ‘Shhhh. Shhhh. You have to keep quiet. You have to keep quiet,’ he said, ‘then we can both get out of this.’

  Surprisingly she responded to his requests, like a child following direction from a teacher, and lowered her voice.

  ‘That’s better,’ Stuart praised. ‘What happened to your eyes?’

  ‘Bad things,’ she burbled quietly. Spittle began to dribble down her bottom lip as she spoke. ‘They showed me bad things. I took them out. All gone. She can’t get me now.’

  Stuart thought back to the screams he heard previously.

  ‘Is there anyone else here?’ he asked

  ‘Always someone else here,’ she answered. ‘Always someone else. Cassie brings them. The boys. Brings the boys and makes me watch. Not with my eyes. Clever. Me. Clever, clever. Cassie finds others. Makes other eyes watch.’

  ‘Where are they?’ Stuart pressed.

  ‘They won’t last,’ she hung her head. ‘They never do. Only me.’

  He followed the length of chain wrapped around the bed frame and saw it was held in place by a large padlock. The lock showed signs of rust and wear, but it was still solid and robust against Stuart’s attempts to prise it apart. The frame was cast iron and well soldered, it would be no mean feat to snap it, and in his wounded condition he feared he simply didn’t have the strength to even try and smash it from the joins.

  ‘Oh Stuart,’ he heard his name echo round the house, the tone spoken so sweetly was at complete odds with the shiver it sent across his body.

  That was Cassie’s voice.

  ‘Oh Stuart,’ she called again, her voice bouncing round the florally papered walls of the house. ‘You are a lucky boy. How did you survive? Silly me to be in such a rush, I didn’t check properly did I? Bad Cassie.’

  Her voice raised and lowered in volume as she walked about the house. Her footsteps, like heavy hooves, pounded the floor as she paced the rooms downstairs.

  ‘Where are you?’ she called as if playing a game. ‘Come out, come out wherever you are.’

  The clunk of her shoes grew louder as she climbed the steps to the landing.

  ‘You were such a disappointment,’ she mocked, calling across the hallway. ‘All this blood you’ve dropped around the house, you’ve made such a mess. Did you think I wouldn’t notice? You could have been a nice boy, like the others. Chris was very good. He stayed put. But you’ve been bad. Now you’re really going to get it.’

  The floorboards creaked under her weight as Stuart heard her getting closer. He looked around Fi’s room for a weapon. It didn’t matter what, just anything he could use to hit her with. Why didn’t he take the tin can with him? As stupid a weapon as it felt at the time, it would have been the best thing to him now. Except for furniture the room was empty, the only item he could see was the hairbrush on the dresser.

  In desperation he reached over to take it. In doing so he leant even closer to Fi. Instinctively she hissed at his approach and gnashed her teeth, her incisors just missed his arm but prevented him from grabbing the handle.

  ‘You’re not with the dog?’ he heard Cassie scoff in a booming voice.

  On cue, Fi began to yelp and bark like a wild animal. She rocked on her stool excitedly and held her tongue out, panting between the noises she made.

  ‘Shhh,’ Stuart tried to keep her quiet, but unlike before, this time she did not respond. ‘You’ve got to keep quie-‘

  The door burst open and Cassie charged in with shocking speed. She caught Stuart by the neck, lifted him up and pinned him against the wall. An evil smile spread across her face as she squeezed his throat. He tried to kick out against her, but his weak legs limply bounced off her thick calves. Cassie’s big fingers clenched tighter round his windpipe.

  ‘You are going to pay for crossing me,’ she snarled through her teeth.

  Black spots appeared in his vision as his oxygen starved brain struggled to stay conscious. He’d been overpowered by her before, and was not going to let it happen again. He had to break free.

  He pulled at her fingers round his throat but the massive digits were too strong for his feeble hands. He kicked out again but Cassie didn’t even flinch at his attempted attacks. He was losing strength as his throat was forced closed by her vice-like choke hold.

  Her grin grew manically wide with devilish glee, and her puffy face flushed red as she felt her unwanted escapee begin to go limp in her grip.

  Suddenly Cassie screamed in agony and released him from certain death. Stuart fell to the floor, but was quick on his feet. As he turned to run out the door he saw Fi crouched on all fours, her mouth dripped with blood whilst she cowered behind the enormous girth of her captor. Cassie held her calf muscle in pain, nursing a bloodied wound that was bordered with teeth marks. She fell onto the bed as she lost balance and howled abuse at Fi.

  Stuart did not wait to see if any re
tribution was to be carried out, or protect his saviour from any that might come her way, all he could think about was getting away from this house of hell.

  He scrambled out into the corridor and turned, unfortunately in his haste he had lost all bearings, he turned the wrong way finding himself in a large bedroom. A double bed occupied the centre of the room, its bedspread decorated in pictures of roses and lavenders, in front of the bed stood a tall, vertical pole that reached the ceiling and to his right was a wardrobe; its door had been left open revealing a young, bloodied woman inside. Her wrists were tied to the overhead clothes rail by a small length of chain. She hung with her head slumped forward; her long, black hair covered her face. Was she dead or just unconscious? Stuart didn’t have any time to ponder the question as he fell forward on to the bed.

  Cassie had quickly followed behind him and sent a large fist square into his back. He lost his breath as he hit the mattress, but instinctively turned and rolled. No sooner had he done that than a knife came crashing down, slicing into the bedding where he had just laid.

  She pulled the knife out of the mattress and leapt at him, wildly slashing the air. Stuart dodged just in time, sending Cassie crashing into the wall. As she landed she knocked the dresser over, its mirror sliding off the top. Picking up the heavy, ornate mirror with both hands Stuart raised it above his head and smashed it, hard, over the back of Cassie’s skull.

  Striking her before she even had time to turnaround, she fell to the ground as the glass disintegrated. The sharp fragments sliced the back of her head into a patchwork of cuts and gashes.

  She collapsed, face down, her arms went limp and she stopped moving.

  Everything went silent.

  Taking his opportunity Stuart fumbled in the dark and patted her body down.

  Where was the knife? She must have landed on it.

  He tried to roll her over, crouching beside her unconscious body and pushing her huge torso with both hands. He managed to lift her a few inches, but the sheer bulk of the woman was too much for his compromised strength. His arms gave up and she rolled back onto her front. As she did so a set of keys fell out from her apron pocket, jangling as they hit the floor.

  Without another thought Stuart grabbed the keys and ran for the front door. He didn’t know if she was dead or alive and he didn’t care.

  He had the means to escape.

  He could get help, raise the alarm, and the others would be freed.

  His body felt wrecked and weak but the adrenalin continued to pump through his veins. He felt sick with the feeling and wanted to cry but the extra strength carried his legs with a new burst of speed. Bolting out of the bedroom door he ran along the landing and turned the corner. He bounded down the stairs, taking multiple steps at a time, but as he neared the halfway point he missed his footing. His left foot rocked forward, clipping the stairs and pushing him off balance. He tumbled down, his chin crashing against the next step and flipping him over until eventually he crash-landed at the foot of the stairs. He heard a sickening snap as his ankle grew warm and wet.

  Stuart didn’t feel the pain until he looked down. But when he did he saw a jagged bone jutting out at a right angle to his shin.

  Turning to face the door he began to crawl across the carpet. He shook wildly with pain and swallowed back the sick that climbed his throat. His goal only lay metres away, but right now it seemed like miles. Clenching the set of keys in one hand the other dug into the fibres of the carpet, finding all the grip they could purchase they dragged him nearer to his freedom. Inch by inch he crawled ever closer. The pain was almost unbearable from the knife wounds and broken bone, but he gritted his teeth and swore at himself.

  Come on you useless piece of shit, he thought, get your sorry ass to that door.

  A sound came from upstairs. Was that Cassie? Fi? Or one of the other helpless victims the murderous bitch had abused?

  Stuart put the keys in his mouth and clawed the carpet with both hands, digging his chin into the surface for extra leverage. He pulled again and dragged his belly across the nylon weave. Stretching out his arm the fake veneer of the door connected with his fingertips, its slippery grain bringing a smile to his face. He was so close.

  Another pull of the arms brought his nose so near to his exit he could smell the paintwork round the frame.

  Reaching outwards and forwards he took hold of the door handle and pulled his body up. Taking the keys from his mouth he cycled through them, trying each one into the first lock. The first key wouldn’t fit, nor the second. How about the third? It was too big. Come on!

  After a number of unsuccessful attempts he found the perfect match. Turning the key he heard the sound of the mechanism unlock. He was one step closer to freedom, but still had two more to go.

  Fumbling with the set of keys against the second lock, he turned and looked back down the hallway for a split second. To his shock he saw the thunderous charge of a wounded Cassie careering down the stairs. He barely had time to blink before he felt his head being held in her steel-like grip and his whole body thrown back down the hall.

  He howled in pain as he landed under his broken leg, the weight of his body forcing the break to splinter. He looked to the ceiling and watched as Cassie stood over him, her eyes flashed like devils as her face twitched with rage.

  Cassie lifted her knife high into the air and, with a forceful slashing motion, drove the blade deep into Stuart’s stomach. She lifted the knife again and thrust it down; this time slicing through one of his biceps. The skin peeled away, revealing pink, fleshy layers. A crimson spray freckled the carpet as the knife was raised and driven down once more, this time piercing his rib cage, twisting through the bone and puncturing a lung.

  Lying at the foot of the stairs Stuart could do nothing to protect himself. He looked up the stairwell and prayed the boy asleep in the guest bedroom would find a way out.

  Cassie’s attack continued with a crazed and ever increasing frenzy. She hacked and slashed, slashed and hacked, time and again as the knife dug into his defenseless flesh. Over and over Cassie stabbed, cutting, slicing, severing, maiming, until his lifeless corpse resembled nothing more than a split bag of red paint.

  Opening his eyes he encountered a darkness so consuming he wondered if he still had them closed. Blinking a few times Chris reassured himself they weren’t, but try as he might his eyes would not adjust to the light.

  A hint of relief traced across his face as he realised it was too dark to see the vile horrors he had witnessed earlier. No longer did he have to look at the…

  He shuddered as he thought back.

  The foul views lay just metres away, he knew that, but the darkness concealed them for the moment. It was little consolation, but after what he had endured it felt like the most divine of miracles.

  His thoughts made him mock his own idiocy; this was no place for God.

  The darkness gave his eyes some respite but the low levels of illumination could do nothing to mask the stench. A mixture of rotting meat and bleach filled the air; decay and sterility in one offending, aromatic cocktail. It stung his nostrils, forcing him to reduce his breathing to little more than small, shallow gasps for fear of being sick.

  His ears buzzed and his head felt swollen as his blood, following gravity, had rushed downwards, away from his feet.

  Chris looked up towards them and wiggled his toes. He still had feeling there, just.

  How long had he been here? He could not tell.

  Every second, every minute held no significance. As indistinguishable as they were to each other in this darkened room of horrors every moment felt like a never-ending slice of infinite oblivion.

  He tried to move his arms but they were securely strapped to the wall. Pulled out from his sides at right angles, he was fastened into the shape of an inverted cross. The straps held him tightly, chaffing at his wrists as he struggled in a futile attempt to free himself. His shirt was nothing more than a torn rag that hung in strips from his body. The red st
ripes that ran down the arms were barely visible, washed through with his own blood. Weakly he pounded the wall in frustration and tears gently trickled from the corners of his eyes, following the tracks of those that had flowed before in some other slice of this torturous eternity.

  The soothing moisture of his sorrow brought a feeling of refreshment to his weary and wretched body, but it did not last long. Comforts were soon quashed in hell.

  He’d grown numb to the pain, almost used to it since he’d been strung up in this cruel way, but his sudden angry movements reignited his agony. Clenching his teeth he tried to block it out, tried to focus on another sensation. He felt the blood continue to spill from the huge gash, torn across his stomach. He concentrated on the crimson fluid running down his exposed chest, but its gentle tickling did nothing to abate the searing torment.

  Chris tried again, this time focusing on the jagged flaps of skin that dangled from the borders of his injury. He thought about how they waved in the air, spurred into movement by the rising and falling of his breath, sticking and sliding across his body with their bloodied trails. He felt the thick, gristly flesh of his intestine resting outside his torso. It hung in loops, part of its bloody length caressing the underside of his chin.

  Grotesque as these distractions were, they were all he had, and woefully inadequate.

  Chris couldn’t see the full extent of his wounds but the relentless pain told him enough.

  He screamed in anger, but his mouth was so dry the only sound he could produce was a pathetic rasp, like that of a dying snake. He tried again but this time his throat tightened, forcing itself partially closed in protest. Gasping against the sharp, prickly sensation, it felt like he was trying to swallow a bag of needles, their razor points jabbing in all directions.