by Spike Black
Big, strange houses at night don’t scare me.
She had long been of the opinion that smoking pot settled her nerves, calmed her down, made her invincible to fear. She studied the joint between her fingers.
Her hand was shaking.
It was a creak. Big deal. Old houses creak, you dumb bitch. Get over yourself.
Hell, she’d been in her newly-built apartment for ten months and already that place creaked like a hunched crone. But the fearful side of her brain, the larger, more dominant part, intervened.
Just a creak? Sure. Or a psychopath on the stairs.
Lizzie chuckled at her own stupidity. She puffed on her cigarette.
Her palms were moist with sweat.
This was insane. She’d been upstairs and there were no lurking psychopaths.
He’s been waiting for you in the attic.
No, he hasn’t.
He’s at the bottom of the stairs now.
Fuck off.
Listen. You can hear him cackling in the hallway.
Don’t. Please. She could feel a steady pulsing in her throat. Just don’t.
It was nonsense. Of course it was. It was all in her head.
Forget about it. Chill your boots. Settle into your high.
She closed her eyes. Drew deeply. Took a moment.
Exhaled.
Goddammit.
Her eyes snapped open. She knew what she had to do.
She stepped into the hallway, recalling the words of her therapist, Fran: Face your fears.
It had been almost a year since the incident, and a change of county, a new town, a new life - it had been good for her, had allowed her to move on, had almost, almost allowed her to forget. There were times when she had convinced herself that the events of that terrible night were erased from her memory. But, in truth, there were some things
(oh God, the window)
the very worst of things, that stayed with you.
Forever.
The hallway was lit only by the eerie glow of streetlights. The long branching shadows of windswept trees cavorted all around her.
Fear is only as deep as the mind will allow, Fran’s silky tones informed her. She had been pretty, Fran, in a middle-aged, crow’s feet and cardigans kind of way. And her dark-paneled office had smelled of leather and strawberries. Oh, how Lizzie longed to be back there.
She held out her dwindling cigarette like a pathetic spear - her only weapon. She jabbed at the air as she edged forward in the darkness. Surely not even psychopaths, she figured, enjoyed the sensation of burning eyeballs.
“Bring it on, arsehole,” she accidentally said out loud. She sounded tough, and she liked it. Nobody in their right mind, she was certain, would ever want to fuck with her.
But there was that voice again. Psychopaths, on the whole, tend not to be right-minded individuals.
It had a point.
There was another creaking noise, from behind her this time. Her heart leapt.
She turned, slowly.
There, on the stairs.
Her blood ran cold. A figure in the dark.
She jumped, dropping her joint, and let slip a pathetic shriek.
A little girl, seven years old. Cute as anything.
Lizzie finally exhaled. “Christ, kid. You scared the crap out of me.”
The little girl hugged her teddy bear tight to her chest. “That’s a bad word.”
“Yeah,” Lizzie said. “I know a whole bunch of them. You want to hear some more?”
***
Entering April’s bedroom was like being assaulted by fairies. They were everywhere - on the wallpaper, on the lampshades, on a lantern by the bed - and Lizzie hated them, the winged pixie bitches.
She scanned the heaving bookshelf. “What does your mum normally read you?” She eyed the spines with contempt. Sparkly, shimmering books. Most of them, unsurprisingly, about fairies.
April sat in bed, propped up against a pile of pink pillows, waiting patiently. “My mummy doesn’t read me stories. My daddy does.”
“Duh.” Kids were so dumb. “Your dad, whatever.”
April explained that she had a whole bunch of favorite books, and she liked to read them on rotation. Tonight was the turn of The Wee Faerie Princess.
Lizzie wasn’t listening. Her attention was drawn to a leather-bound book. Cat’s Curiosity, by Bertrand Powell. It was old, that was clear from the damage to the bottom of the spine, and the leather was a dull, pea-soup green, not screaming for attention like the other glitter-flecked atrocities.
Lizzie pulled the book from the shelf, the weight of it surprising her as she took it in both hands.
The cover itself had no title or author, merely an embossed illustration. At the center stood a little girl in a pinafore dress. Tree branches grew from her ears and flowed to the edges of the book, where they formed a frame for the cover, large apples hanging decoratively at the corners. The girl in the illustration did not appear to be disturbed by her leafy protuberances; on the contrary, she seemed delighted with them.
Lizzie looked closer. The girl’s expression was partly obscured by scratches in the leather, but Lizzie could make out the narrowed eyes, the pinched nose, and the toothy, demonic grin.
The girl was staring directly at her.
Lizzie jolted, instinctively moving the book away. She thought of Fran.
Confront the things that scare you, each and every day, and soon you’ll see that there’s really nothing in this world to be frightened of at all.
“What about this?” Lizzie said, holding the book aloft for April to see.
The little girl craned her neck for a closer look. “What is it? I’ve never seen that before.”
“Perfect.” Lizzie carried the book over and sat on the end of the bed.
April pulled her covers up high. “It looks scary.”
“You’re too old to be afraid of stupid stories, aren’t you?”
“I’m seven.”
Lizzie secretly loved the idea of scaring this kid. She was too squeaky clean, with her fairies and pink pillows.
She opened the book to the first page. The paper was yellowing. It emitted a musty smell. She read aloud.
Cat was a curious little girl
With a pinafore dress and a cutesy curl.
She was ever so naughty for someone so young
And thought it funny to stick out her tongue.
“Stop that now,” her mother said
“Or a bird will peck it out of your head.”
Cat was curious; the thought made her giggle
So she stuck out her tongue and gave it a wiggle.
A blackbird watched from a nearby tree
Thinking her tongue was a worm for his tea.
Swooping, he pecked it off with his beak
And never again was Cat able to speak.
Lizzie curled her lip into a sneer. The creepy cover had promised so much more. “Totally lame.”
April smiled. “I liked it.”
“Yeah, you would.”
April sulked. Lizzie didn’t care. Even seven-year-olds should have standards. She glanced at the illustration on the facing page. A detailed drawing of a little girl in a pinafore dress, her tongue in the grip of an angry blackbird’s beak. The girl looked eerily pleased at her predicament.
The picture made Lizzie’s flesh crawl.
She closed the book. “Let’s talk instead.”
April brightened. She sat bolt upright. “Okay.”
“What would you like to talk about?”
April thought for a moment. “What were you smoking downstairs? It didn’t smell like my daddy’s cigarettes.”
Lizzie stared back at her, lost for words. She sighed. “We can always read a bit more, I suppose.”
April cheered. Lizzie picked up the book.
Three words.
Scratched furiously into the leather of the cover.
DON’T
LOOK
INSIDE
&nbs
p; Lizzie screamed. She jerked back.
What the hell?
The words were angry. A warning.
DON’T
Shrieking for her attention.
LOOK
She turned away.
“What is it?” April asked.
Lizzie cowered behind her hands. “Don’t -” She stopped herself.
She couldn’t bring herself to say the words aloud. If she did, then that was an admission that they were real. But, of course, they were not real.
How could they be?
“I don’t know,” Lizzie cried. “I just don’t know…”
Those three awful words had not been there when she had taken the book from the shelf. She was certain of that. But the way the letters had been scratched - with a sharp implement perhaps, or long fingernails, deep into the leather - it made no sense. How could the words have just appeared there? Her mind raced, grasping for a logical explanation.
It snagged one.
Rick the Dick.
That fucking prick.
Rick the Dick was Lizzie’s name for her sister’s boyfriend. He had also been her dealer before she skipped town.
That loser gave me some messed up shit.
It wouldn’t be the first time. He gave her a pill in Ibiza; her fellow clubbers had become rubber-faced, wobbly-headed creatures, crowding around her, suffocating her, dancing like hungry demons in the eye-splitting strobe light.
She never called him Richard again after that experience.
Motherfucker. What had he done to her? Now she was seeing things. She wanted to slice off his balls.
She blinked hard. Rubbed her eyes. Picked up the book.
DON’T
LOOK
INSIDE
Still there. Ah, fuck…
Her heart hammered upward into her throat. Her legs jerked, pleading. Let’s get out of here.
But her body stayed firm. It’s all in my mind. It’s not real.
April leaned in for a closer look. “Cool.”
Lizzie gasped. “You can see that?”
“Of course.”
An optical illusion, maybe. Or one of those trick covers where the writing reveals itself when tilted into the light. Lizzie ran her fingers over the letters. Carved deep into the leather.
This was no illusion.
DON’T
LOOK
INSIDE
She felt a desperate urge to look inside.
Her mind screamed one word.
No.
But her fingers compelled themselves on, grasping the edge of the cover.
Heed the warning.
Her hands were possessed. A mind of their own.
Stop. Please.
She absolutely did not want to look inside.
Or did she?
It begged the question - what actually was inside? Didn’t she already know? Was there really anything more than just a crappy, rhyming children’s book?
Besides, what was the worst that could happen? It was only a book, after all. It wasn’t as if a lion or a ghost or a monster could leap out and devour her.
“Go on then,” April said. “Open it.”
That was all the encouragement Lizzie needed.
She flipped open the book.
CONTINUE READING!
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