by Amy Cross
“Me?” She turned to her daughter for a moment, before forcing a smile. “I'm not sad, sweetie. I'm just... You're right. It's bedtime.”
***
They were screaming all around her, reaching up from the darkness and pulling on her body as she tried to climb up to freedom.
Every time she managed to get free of one grip, two more took hold. Their arms swarmed around her, and their hands – frayed and rotten, with pieces of loose flesh hanging down – clawed at her flesh. She reached up and tried to grab hold of something, anything, she could use to pull herself up the gray wall that seemed to have been stitched together from scraps of human flesh. Finally, one of her hands found the inside of a woman's face, and she was able to slip her fingers through the vacant eyes. With every last ounce of strength in her body, she hauled herself above the crowd of figures massing in the darkness, but her brief escape only caused the figures below to howl louder than ever with frustration.
Looking over her shoulder for a moment, she saw them snarling up at her. She glanced toward the horizon and saw a vast sea of figures surging toward her. The air seemed to almost shudder with their cries.
Reaching up again, she slipped the fingers of her left hand into a mouth and then pulled herself up a little further. Her feet scrambled for purchase, eventually slipping into two more mouths and allowing her to climb higher still. With tears in her eyes, she looked over her shoulder again and saw that there were now thousands of dark figures reaching up to her, while in the distance she could see the sphere's other wall, with glints of light bursting through from various mouths and eyes.
Turning, she was about to climb up a little further when she realized she could see movement through one of the eye-holes in the wall of flesh right in front of her. Leaning closer, she spotted a figure walking across a dull, gray kitchen, and she heard echoing voices in the distance, their tones sounding slow and drawn out, as if -
Suddenly she felt a hand grabbing her ankle, its fingernails slicing into her flesh, and she looked down to see that the dark figures had begun to climb after her. She tried to shake the hand loose, before reaching up and trying to climb again. A moment later, another hand grabbed her leg, and she felt herself being dragged back down. She held onto the wall, with the fingers of her left hand poking through a pair of eye-holes, but the flesh began to tear as she was pulled further and further down, and as more hands took hold of her, claiming her, dragging her screaming into the sea of darkness.
They'd won. After so many years, they'd finally got her.
“Lizzie!” she shouted, sitting up in bed suddenly. Sweat was pouring down her body and her heart was racing, and for a moment, in the dark bedroom, she could still feel those hands touching her. Looking down at her arms and chest, she instinctively started to search for cuts or bruises, but there were none. After a moment, she managed to start pushing the dream away, only to suddenly realize that she wasn't alone. There was a small figure standing in the dark doorway that led out to the landing.
She paused for a moment.
“Lizzie?”
She waited, but now that she was certain her daughter was watching her, she felt a shiver pass through her body. The sweat caking her body suddenly felt cold, and as she leaned forward she realized that something seemed very wrong. Lizzie often ran through to her room in the night when something had scared her, but she'd never before stood in the doorway like this, just staring, silhouetted against the landing's dull light.
“Lizzie?” she said again. “Are you okay? Do you want to come in with me?”
She waited again.
No reply.
“Did I scare you?” she asked, sitting up on the bed, which creaked a little under her weight. “I was just having a bad dream, that's all. Even mummies sometimes get those.”
Lifting the edge of the duvet, she waited for Lizzie to hurry over and dive in.
“Sweetie?”
After a moment, she reached over and felt for the bedside light. It took a few seconds, but she managed to find the switch, and then she turned back to Lizzie, who had taken a few steps closer.
“What is it?” Emily asked. “Did something happen in your room again?”
Lizzie stared at her for a moment, with a strangely blank expression, before slowly a faint smile began to spread across her face.
“Lizzie?”
She waited, and she told herself she was imagining things, that her daughter was just playing a prank.
“Lizzie, sweetie, I...”
Her voice trailed off as she saw that Lizzie's smile had grown, while the little girl's stare was fixed on her with unblinking intensity. After a moment, Emily leaned to one side, hoping to get a better view of Lizzie's eyes, which seemed almost completely black.
“Lizzie -”
“I know your name,” Lizzie said suddenly, her voice sounding slightly deeper than usual. “I've seen you before.”
“I...” She paused. “No, sweetheart, you -”
“Your name is Emily.”
She froze for a moment, staring at her daughter and waiting for her to blink, waiting to see a hint of white in the two dark pools of blackness that stared back at her.
“How was your dream?” Lizzie asked.
“My dream?”
“You were calling out.”
“I told you, it was just a nightmare.”
“Did you enjoy it? Did you like seeing the dark place?”
“I...” She paused again, feeling a shiver pass through her body. “Lizzie, why don't you get into bed with me and -”
“It was cold, wasn't it?” Lizzie continued. “So many screams. Do you finally understand?”
“Understand what?”
The little girl paused. “Why I have to get out of there.”
“What are you talking about?” Emily asked, crawling across the bed until she was close to the edge. “Lizzie, why are you up right now?”
“Don't call me that.”
“What -”
“It's not my name.”
“Lizzie?”
“Don't call me that!” she said again, with a hint of anger in her voice.
“I...” Pausing, she reached out to touch her daughter's face, but she held back at the last moment as she felt an unusual chill in the air, coming from Lizzie's body. She wanted to believe that she was imagining things, that maybe this was still part of the dream, but deep down she knew it was really happening. “What...”
Lizzie's grin broadened.
“Are you playing a game?” Emily asked. “Lizzie...”
“I wanted you to see,” Lizzie replied, tilting her head slightly so that her mother could see into her large, black eyes. “I wanted you to understand what it's like in the dead place, so that you realize why I have to get out.”
“No,” Emily whispered.
“No?”
“Please, stop...”
Slowly, and a little awkwardly, Lizzie took a step closer.
“What are you doing with my daughter?” Emily asked finally, with tears in her eyes. “What do you want? Leave her alone, whatever you want, take it from me! Leave her alone!”
“You know what I want,” the girl replied, “but if I can't get it from you, if you keep on resisting, maybe I'll have to get it from your daughter.”
“I'm not resisting! Leave her alone and take me! Don't -”
Before she could finish, Emily saw with horror that something seemed to be moving beneath the skin on Lizzie's face. A moment later, she saw a dark, peeling finger starting to poke out from below the little girl's left eyeball, as if a hand was trying to reach out. Within seconds, the impression of an entire hand could be seen pushing through from under Lizzie's skin, with a dark thumb poking out through the mouth.
“No!” Emily shouted. “Stop!”
“Maybe I should use her anyway,” Lizzie continued, as the hand pushed harder against the inside of her skin. “Maybe it's easier to get through her. I have to get out soon, and all that really matter
s is that it's someone with a link to this land. They're starting to come up after me, they're starting to catch me. Do you know how hard it was to climb this far? I'm so close and I won't let you stop me.”
“Please -”
“It's not fair!” Emily shouted suddenly, taking another step closer. Reaching up, she put her hands on her face, running her fingers against her cheekbones. “I wasn't ready! He had no right to do this to me!” After a moment, she began to dig her fingernails into her flesh, as if she was trying to pull it all away.
“Stop!” Climbing off the bed, Emily grabbed Lizzie and lifted her up, before hurrying out of the room and over to the stairs. Carefully avoiding looking at her daughter's face, she carried her down to the hallway and then out through the front door, not stopping until they reached the street. Finally, setting her down, she hugged her tight, terrified to look at her face.
She waited, shivering in the night's cold air.
“Please,” she whispered, “don't do this.”
In the distance, a siren passed close to the end of the street, rushing off to some other emergency in another part of town.
“Please,” Emily whimpered, with tears in her eyes. “Please, don't hurt my little girl.”
Trembling, she hugged Lizzie tighter.
Silence.
Finally, Emily took a deep breath and forced herself to look into Lizzie's eyes, only to see that everything seemed to have gone back to normal. There were a couple of scratches from the girl's fingernails, but the other distortions were gone.
Lizzie blinked a couple of times, before looking around with a faint frown.
“Mummy?” she asked hesitantly. “Why are we outside?”
Pulling her close for another hug, Emily looked back toward the house and saw to her horror that there was a faint figure visible in one of the upstairs windows, moving briefly to one side before disappearing from view.
“Mummy, what's wrong?” Lizzie asked, sounding as if she was about to start crying. “Mummy, I'm cold. What are you doing? You're scaring me!”
***
“Can I pay half on one card and half on the other?” Emily asked a short while later as she stood in the reception area of a local motel.
“We don't offer that option,” the woman replied. “I'm sorry.”
“Okay, then...” She looked at the two cards in her hands for a moment, desperately trying to work out which had more money on it, before slotting one into the machine. Glancing at the woman, she forced a smile, even though she knew it wouldn't be convincing. She figured she had just enough money, maybe, to get a night at the motel.
“If you'd like to type in your pin,” the woman said, “we'll see if we can get you into one of our rooms.”
As she entered her pin, Emily looked over her shoulder and saw Lizzie sitting in a chair nearby. The little girl seemed to have gone back to normal now, and she seemed more flustered and confused than scared, but Emily was certain of one thing: they had to stay out of that house.
***
“I'm not begging for anything,” she hissed a short while later, sitting on the toilet. “I just... I need a loan, Brad. She's your daughter too, and right now she can't be in that house. We need to stay in a motel, I've managed to pay for the first night but if you can just send next month's child support a week early -”
“What's going on?” he asked. “Don't give me any more bullshit, Em. What exactly are you and Lizzie doing staying in a goddamn motel two minutes from the house?”
“It's complicated.”
“Are you having another of your episodes?”
“Of course not!”
“I can't take Lizzie right now,” he continued. “It's a bad time for me.”
“I'm not asking you to take her,” she replied, “I just need next month's child support a week early.”
“I don't have it.”
“But your job -”
“I just don't have it,” he said again. “Go to the council, tell them you need money, that's what they're there for. You can't be doing that badly if you're okay to stay in a motel.”
“Please don't do this,” she whispered.
“Do what?”
“You have the money,” she snapped at him, “you just don't want to help out!”
“I don't understand what's wrong,” he replied. “You're not making any goddamn sense, Em, do you realize that? You say you had to get Lizzie out of the house, but you won't say why. You say you can't go back, but again, you won't say why. Is it...” He paused. “It's not more of that ghost bullshit, is it? For fuck's sake, Em, have you infected her with your bullshit?”
“Go to hell,” she told him. “I'll find someone else who'll help your daughter.”
As she cut the call, she heard a faint knock on the bathroom door. A moment later, Lizzie stepped into the room with a tired, worried look on her face.
“Who are you talking to?” she asked.
“No-one, sweetie.”
“Was it Daddy?”
“No.”
“Can we go to sleep now? I'm really tired, and my face hurts.”
“Your -” She paused. “Where does it hurt?”
“It's just sore all over.”
“Get into bed,” she replied. “Everything'll be okay, I promise. I've just got one more call to make, and then I'll be right with you.” Looking down at the phone, she brought up Karl's number. He was the last person she wanted to call, but she knew she needed help from someone.
“Do you promise?” Lizzie asked.
“Just go to bed. I swear, I'll be there in two minutes. You've got school in the morning, remember? You need to get some sleep.”
Slowly, and a little reluctantly, Lizzie pulled the door shut, and a moment later she could be heard climbing onto the bed.
“Please pick up,” Emily whispered, as she put the phone next to her ear. “Come on, I need you. Please, God, don't do this to us.”
“Hi,” Karl's voicemail said suddenly, “you've reached -”
Cutting the call, she set the phone next to the sink before leaning forward and putting her head in her hands. For a moment, she thought back to the dream she'd had earlier, when she'd been climbing away from the people in the dead place. It wasn't the first time she'd had that dream and she knew it wouldn't be the last, but she was more worried about whatever was happening to Lizzie. She knew they couldn't go back to the house, but at the same time she didn't have the money to go anywhere else, and she didn't have any friends who might take them in.
“Fuck,” she whispered. “Fuck, fuck -”
“Mummy!” Lizzie called through from the bedroom.
“I'll be there in a minute!”
“Mummy -”
“Just hang on! I'll be there!”
“My face hurts!”
Emily froze for a moment. “What... What did you say?” she asked finally.
“My face hurts,” Lizzie said again, as her voice became a kind of whine, threatening to break into sobs at any moment. “It really hurts.”
Heading through to the dark main room, Emily made her way to the bed and sat down before fumbling to locate a switch for the light. Finding one, she finally turned to look at Lizzie, only to see to her horror that the little girl's face was covered in several huge, thick bruises, which seemed to have developed in the spots where the hand had been pushing through an hour earlier.
“What's wrong with me?” Lizzie whimpered. “Mummy, my face really hurts!”
Chapter Eighteen
Twenty-six years ago
“I said,” he shouted, leaning closer to her ear, “this party is terrible!”
She smiled, before slipping away and making her way along the hallway.
Sighing, Robert took another sip of beer before turning to look back into the kitchen. Several people were chatting away, while a girl was sitting at the table by the window, clearly feeling sick to her stomach as she was comforted by her friend.
“You alright?” Douglas asked, bumping int
o him in a drunken stupor. “Come on, mate, you're not gonna hang around in the kitchen all night, are you?”
“Didn't you get the memo?” Robert replied. “The kitchen's where the cool people hang out.”
“And how would you know what the cool people do?” Stumbling to the fridge, he pulled it open and grabbed another beer before heading back to the door. “I think I've got a chance with that Felicity girl from the anthropology department. Be right back, my man. I'm going to try to lure her in by telling her about the new project we're working on. Girls love ghosts, right?”
Smiling, Robert turned and watched as his friend stumbled back toward the flat's main room. A moment later, he almost dropped his beer as something bumped into his shoulder, and he turned to find that the drunk girl from the table was hurrying past, making her way to the bathroom with her friend in tow.
“Hannah!” the less-drunk girl shouted after her friend. “For God's sake -”
Before she could catch up, the drunk girl – Hannah, apparently – had slammed the bathroom door shut.
“Hannah!” the other girl called out to her, trying the handle unsuccessfully. “Can you open up? You need someone to hold your hair back while you throw up!”
After a moment, the girl stood back, clearly exasperated, before making her way back to the kitchen. As she got closer to the door, she glanced at Robert.
“Rough night?” he asked.
She smiled, although she was clearly frustrated.
“I think I've seen you around,” Robert continued, switching his beer to his left hand and holding his right out for her to shake. “You work at the university, don't you?”
“I...” She paused, before shaking his hand. “Yeah. Yeah, I do. I didn't think I was that noticeable.”
“Rob Slocombe,” he told her. “I work in the -”
“Are you one of the guys setting up that group to investigate paranormal activity?” she asked, suddenly seeming far more interested.
“God,” he replied, “are people talking about us already?”
“Jenna,” she told him. “Jenna Riseborough. I'd really love to talk to you about what you're doing some time. In fact, I was planning to come and look you up.”