sides, preparing for whatever might be behind him. His pulse pounded as he raised his eyes, only to find himself staring at the light blue, horizontal blinds that covered the window.
There was nothing there.
He had passed the point of being tired days ago, and maybe this was just his mind’s way of letting him know that it was now officially time to get some sleep. Shaking his head, he shuffled back into the bedroom, his legs still shaking. He was just about to climb onto the bed when he heard something behind him.
Whirling, he stared at the entertainment center, the blackened screen reflecting the thin light that crept into the bedroom beneath the curtains. The top shelf was lined with spare change, his wallet and keys, and a small lamp, a VCR and DVD player stacked on the shelf beneath. But there was nothing else over there.
Turning, he climbed onto the bed on all fours, heading toward the pillow.
The noise came again, this time louder, like the sound of footsteps on floorboards, muffled by a thick layer of carpeting.
Scott whirled, toppling onto his side on the bed and stared back at the entertainment center. There was a large shadow looming over the bed. He could make out the outline of a man, nearly a full head taller than he was. The shadow lingered for only a moment before dissolving into the darkness, the silhouetted visage dripping into a pool of its own blackened form on the floor.
His whole body shuddered at once, the overwhelming reaction to the fear ripping through his flesh, crippling him as he lay on his side atop the mess of blankets on the bed. The breath that had been trapped in his lungs escaped in loud gasps, and he fought with his own flesh to make himself move. His wide, unblinking eyes stared at the edge of the bed, waiting for whatever had been there to materialize once again, but there was no movement in the slightest, not even the sparkling motes of dust reflecting from the moonlight that slipped in through the window.
His trembling hands pried him from the bed, lifting him to his haunches as he inched closer to the edge of the bed. Peering down his nose, he tried to see the floor, to see if there was, indeed, anything there. Rising to his knees, he gazed down at the floor, the light blue carpeting swathed in shadows, but there was nothing tangible there. No swirling pool of darkness as he had expected.
Climbing off the bed, he walked over to the dresser where he had just shed his clothes before donning his pajamas. Pulling off his nightshirt, he flipped on the light, once again slipping into the jersey he had worn earlier in the day. He tugged off his bottoms and climbed back into his jeans, stepping into the rubber bottomed slippers that lay on the floor, side by side, to the right of the oak dresser.
Slowly, he crept through the room, peering deeply into every corner and recess, looking for any clue that might help to rationalize what he had seen. Turning to the left, his eyes still blinded by the sudden burst of light from the overhead fan, he stepped into the darkness in the bathroom, his left hand fidgeting on the wall while his fumbling fingers tried to flip the light switch.
The line of globe lights mounted into the fixture above the mirror suddenly burst to life, the bright yellow filaments burning brightly as he scanned the room. There was the outline of a human form visible through the opaque glass of the shower stall.
But as suddenly as they had come on, the lights in the bathroom burnt out with a loud pop, the glass from all four bulbs showering the floor with tiny fragments of glass. His feet crunching on the jagged shards, he inched toward the shower, both trembling hands open in front of him. Latching onto the handle to the shower door, he yanked it open, the magnetic seal popping before the metal rim of the glass door clanged against the bathroom wall.
His heart seizing in his chest, he stared into the darkness, preparing to lunge at whoever was in there. But all he could see was his bath towel hanging from the showerhead, the long dark blue cotton looking black against the rich blue marble.
Warm air traced the back of his neck, sending goosebumps straight down his spine in waves. He could almost taste the stale air is as it warmed his flesh, stale and reeking of carrion. Whirling, he stared straight into the darkened face of a large shadow, two thin slits glowing amber from the pits of blackness in the face.
Throwing himself backward, he landed on the floor, his lower back slamming into the base of the shower. He stared up at the figure, eyes locked on the thin crescents that glowed in the center of the face.
“There’s something I want to show you,” the figure said in a deep voice, the words tripping icily over his lips as they cascaded down to the floor where Scott lay, trembling.
And as soon as it had spoken, the shape was gone, disappearing into the shadows. Scott was left string into the suddenly blinding glare of the light from the bedroom. He sat there for a moment, his body paralyzed from the shudder that passed over every inch of his skin, stabbing sharply into the tissue beneath. Fighting through the onslaught of tremors, Scott scrambled to his feet and dashed into the bedroom, his frantic stare scouring the room for any sign of the apparition that he had seen, but there was nothing but the humming from the fan as it circled overhead.
The voice played over and over in his head, repeating the lone line that it had uttered to the point that within his brain it sounded as if the voice were all around him in the room, taunting him. There was a familiar intonation in the voice, which sounded as though the words were drawn through a throat full of mud, but he couldn’t quite place it.
He turned towards the bedroom door, which was still closed tightly.
There was a loud cracking sound from behind him. Spinning, he faced the wall of windows. The curtains swelled as a gust of wind tossed them into the air from where they had rested against the cold glass. He bounded over the bed, grabbing the shades and yanking them to the side. A long crack splintered across the center of the window, the sound of splitting glass filling the air as the crack continued to widen, the frigid winter wind seeping through the minuscule gap.
Something caught his eye, a dark shape cast against the snow-covered lawn below. He could feel the eyes from the shadow staring up at him from below, their intense stare burning straight through him, searing the backs of his own eyeballs. Their eyes locked in a captured gaze for only the briefest of moments before the shadow turned, slowly crossing the lawn toward the line of trees at the very edge.
Turning, Scott leapt from the bed, darting across the room and bursting through the closed bedroom door. He hit the hall at a full sprint, leaping down the stairs at the end as he turned and sped towards the kitchen. Slapping the pin that held the door brace in place, he pulled out the stopper and unlocked the sliding glass door, throwing it wide. He bounded out onto the deck. He could barely make out the dark form of the shape against the dark outline of the row of trees, the branches barely even bending as the figure passed through.
Leaping down the snow-heaped stairs, the coldness snapping at his exposed ankles and soaking into the cloth slippers, he pounced onto the lawn. His breath burst from his lungs in plumes that trailed behind him as he sprinted across the virgin snow, focusing on the thin gap in the trees where the shape had merged with the shadows. Throwing up his hands in front of his face, he hit the line of trees without even slowing, the needle- fortified branches grabbing at his clothing.
The skin on the backs of his hands peeled back in lines, fresh blood piercing through the cold, red flesh as the hurdled through the thick undergrowth. Feeling a sharp pain crumple the toes on his right foot, his elbows landed in the snow, his face ramming his hands into the snow as the frosty powder filled his ears and covered his forehead and hair. He floundered there for a moment, fighting through the pain and the cold, trying desperately to regain his feet.
His right foot, the toes bloodied and twisted, fished through the snow for the slipper that had fallen from his foot when he had tripped. Finally slipping his bright red foot into the snow-packed shoe, he pushed himself to his feet and stared into the small clearing in front of him.
The shadow stared at him for the far end of the clearing, watching him for a moment before merging into the wall of branches beyond. The thin moonlight that slipped through the cloud-infested sky made the field in front of him glitter, the carpet of snow uninterrupted by even a single footprint. His eyes scanned the mass of foliage for anything that would betray the fact that there had been something there. But there was nothing. Only the thin wisps of powder that kicked up from the frozen earth, dancing in unison before slamming into the scrub oak, rattling the branches.
Racing through the small meadow, piles of powder kicking up behind his heels, Scott dashed into the next wave of trees, staring down at his feet, his arms covering his forehead, trying not to trip over the twisted trunks of
