by Lukens, Mark
He wanted to step into that light more than anything in the world. It seemed like a familiar place to him even though he was sure he’d never been there before. It felt safe. It felt like home. It felt like love.
Julie stood at the edge of the light, basking in the glow. She hesitated, like Hank.
“I see people in there,” Julie whispered.
Cassie nodded, still crying.
“I know them,” Julie said and let out a sob.
“They’re waiting for you,” Cassie told them.
“I don’t want to go without you,” Hank told Cassie.
“I can’t go yet,” Cassie said, “but I’ll be there with you eventually.”
Cassie ran three steps and hugged her parents, trying to get her arms around the both of them. “I’ll be with you before you know it.”
Hank and Julie held onto their daughter and cried. They knew she was telling the truth, just like they knew this bright light was a door to a place they were supposed to be. They let Cassie go and entered the light together.
MAY
A KNOCK IN THE NIGHT
On a Memorial Day weekend getaway, a young couple stays the night at a cabin in the far corner of a friend’s remote property. They wake to the sound of someone knocking on their door—they are about to receive a terrifying guest in the middle of the night.
“Wake up! There’s someone knocking at the door!”
Joel jumped awake, his heart instantly thundering in his chest from Kelly’s panicked voice. He sat bolt-upright, his eyes wide open and trying to adjust to the pitch-black bedroom.
What happened to the lights?
For a moment Joel forgot where he was.
I’m at a friend’s house, his sluggish mind finally answered.
Kelly pushed at him in the darkness. “Someone’s knocking at the door, Joel,” she hissed.
“Who’s at the door?” he finally asked, his voice cracking from sleep. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and reached down to grope in the darkness for his underwear and pants; he suddenly felt very vulnerable right now, naked and afraid in the dark.
He found his jeans. He slid them on and then zipped them up.
The knocking sounded from the front of the cabin again—three knocks, loud and impatient.
“What are you doing?” Kelly practically squealed at him. She was not happy about coming on this trip to see Joel’s friend, Daniel, in the first place, and she definitely wasn’t happy staying the night in this cabin.
Rap. Rap. Rap.
Three loud knocks in the darkness. Nothing else. No one calling at them from the other side of the door. Just three loud knocks.
Joel tried to answer Kelly, but his words were frozen in his throat, a sudden and paralyzing fear overtaking him for a moment, yet he wasn’t sure why.
But he got his fear under control. He remembered where they were—a cabin in the woods on Daniel’s property. He remembered why they were here on this Memorial Day Weekend—they were going to go canoeing down the river in the morning. They had gotten here late, and Daniel didn’t have any extra room in his house with the other guests he had, so he thought they’d be more comfortable in this cabin at the edge of his property.
Three more knocks.
Okay, Joel said to himself. He needed to think logically. It was probably Daniel out there, or one of his friends, knocking on the front door. Maybe they needed something.
In the middle of the night? What could be that important? Was someone hurt?
“I’m going,” he mumbled to Kelly after she pushed at him in the darkness.
He forced his feet to move towards the open bedroom door. There was a light on over the stove in the kitchen that allowed a little light to see by, even all the way back here in the bedroom.
He stepped out into the hallway, walking through the gloom towards the other end of the cabin which was really one big room divided into a kitchen on one side and a living room on the other. He felt strange as he walked towards the front door, his skin prickling, hairs standing on end like there was an electric current in the air.
A light came on from behind him—Kelly turning on the bedroom lamp.
Joel made it to the front door, leaving a trail of lights in his wake like breadcrumbs. The front door was made of solid wood with no windows. Not even a peephole.
A moment later Kelly was right behind him, clutching at him as he reached for the door handle.
“What are you doing?” she nearly screamed at him.
“Seeing who’s out there,” he told her.
“Don’t open it,” she snapped. “Look out the window first.”
Joel sighed and walked over to the living room window that looked out onto the front porch. Kelly flipped the switch next to the door for the porch light.
Joel looked out the window at the porch that ran the length of the front of the cabin. There was no one on the porch, no one by the door, no one anywhere that he could see. The only vehicle parked in front of the cabin was their car.
“I don’t see anyone,” Joel said as his eyes rested on a pile of firewood stacked up at the edge of the porch. There was an ax leaning against the firewood, and the blade of the ax gleamed in the porch light.
“Nobody?” Kelly asked. “He was just out there pounding on the door.”
“There’s nobody out there now,” Joel said and moved away from the window. Something about that ax tugged at his mind, but he wasn’t sure why.
Kelly watched Joel with wide eyes as he walked back to the front door, reaching for the door handle again.
“What are you doing?” she squealed at him.
“I’m going to see who’s out there.”
“No, Joel. Please. Just make sure it’s locked.”
Joel sighed and gave her a weak smile. “Okay.”
Kelly seemed to relax just a little.
“Maybe I should make sure the back door is locked,” Joel said after he made sure the front door was locked.
“Why would someone knock like that on the door in the middle of the night and then just walk away?” Kelly asked.
“I don’t know.”
Joel went to the kitchen—he needed something to drink.
“You think it was your friend Daniel? Or one of his friends?”
Joel grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge and drank half of it down. He set it down on the counter and glanced at the clock in the stove—two-thirty a.m.
“Maybe there’s an emergency or something,” Kelly said. “Maybe you should call Daniel.” She stood in the same spot in the living room, hugging her arms like she was cold even though it was warm inside the cabin.
Joel didn’t answer.
“Joel?”
“I left the cell phone in the car,” he said.
“Why?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t mean to. I just forgot it.”
Kelly looked at the front door like she was thinking about running out to the car to get their phone. Instead, she glanced over at the phone on a table next to the couch. She hurried over to the phone and picked it up. She pushed the buttons and then shook her head. “Phone’s not working.”
Joel saw a phone on the wall in the kitchen. He checked it, but this phone wasn’t working either. No dial tone—dead. The phone was still connected to the wall, it was just dead.
He hung up the phone and stared at it as a thought occurred to him.
“What’s wrong?” Kelly asked as she walked into the kitchen, staring at him.
“Nothing.”
“What is it?”
Joel hesitated, not sure if he should say anything. “It’s just that the knocking stopped as soon as I got to the front door. Whoever was out there would’ve seen me turning on all of these lights.”
“What are you trying to say? It isn’t Daniel or one of his friends?”
“I don’t know what I’m saying … it just seems weird, that’s all.”
“This was a dumb idea, staying in this cabin,” Kelly spat o
ut. “Coming out here.”
“I wanted to see Daniel. He invited me. Invited us. And I wanted to come.”
“You haven’t talked to Daniel in years, and then from out of the blue he invites you out here to his place with his rich friends.”
Joel didn’t answer.
“We should’ve stayed at a motel in town.”
“Town is twenty-five miles away.”
Kelly brushed past Joel and grabbed a bottle of water out of the fridge. She opened it, sipped it, and Joel saw that her hands were trembling.
Joel sighed. He put an arm around Kelly’s shoulders and pulled her close to him. “I’m sorry. It’s probably just Daniel and his friends. Maybe they’re just playing a prank. We’ll all have a big laugh about it in the morning.”
Kelly stared at Joel, and he didn’t think she was going to be doing any laughing about this in the morning.
“I’ll check all the windows and doors again, and then we’ll get back to bed. We’ve got a big day tomorrow.”
Kelly nodded and gave him a weak smile.
Joel pecked her on the cheek, and then went to check the windows in the living room. He peeked out the window and he still didn’t see anyone in the darkness beyond the porch light. His eyes found the ax by the firewood again. It seemed like it was in a different position to him, like it had been moved slightly. No, his eyes were just playing tricks on him, that’s all.
Kelly left the light on over the stove and Joel left the porch light on.
They walked down the hall together back to the bedroom. At the end of the hall was the back door. As Kelly entered the bedroom, Joel went to the back door.
He tried the door handle. It was locked.
He thought about unlocking the door and peeking outside. But he really didn’t feel like poking his head out into the pitch-black darkness.
Joel turned to head back to the bedroom and his heart jumped in his chest when he heard the three loud knocks from the front door. Kelly collided with him as she bolted out of the bedroom.
They stood at the edge of the living room and stared at the front door at the other end of the murky cabin.
Three more knocks. Loud knocks. Urgent. Demanding. The knocks were so heavy that the door seemed to shake in its frame. It didn’t even sound like a fist was making that sound, it seemed like something much harder—like a heavy piece of metal—was producing that sound.
Joel marched down the hall to the living room. He was sure it had to be Daniel playing around. He was about to unlock the door, but Kelly floated up behind him like a ghost in the darkness and grabbed his wrist.
“Don’t,” Kelly whispered and locked eyes with him.
“It’s just Daniel,” Joel said in a loud voice, hoping Daniel would hear him and realize that the game was over. Joel was tired and wanted to get back to sleep.
But there was something about Kelly’s eyes—they were so wide and terrified.
“What is it?” he whispered as his stomach suddenly fluttered with fear. She knew something.
“The porch light,” Kelly whispered. “It’s out.”
Joel looked back at the front door. The knocking had stopped as soon as they were in front of the door. He glanced at the light switch next to the door, the switch was still up. Then he glanced at the window in the living room, the curtains still pulled back, and he could tell from where he stood that the porch light was out.
He hurried over to the window and peeked out, hoping to catch Daniel in the act.
No one out there in the darkness.
“You see anyone?” Kelly whispered.
Joel was about to answer, but something caught his eye—or a lack of something. The ax next to the stack of firewood was gone.
He felt his stomach drop.
He rushed into the kitchen and rummaged through all of the drawers.
“What are you looking for?” Kelly asked.
Joel could hear the quiver in her voice. She was scared. And he was scared now, too.
He tried another drawer. He looked in all of the cabinets. But he couldn’t find anything.
“I’m trying to find a knife,” Joel said. “Something we could use as a weapon.” Joel saw a wood block on the counter that was supposed to hold an assortment of kitchen knives—but it was completely empty.
Kelly shuddered and she held her hand to her mouth like she was trying to bite back a scream.
“I don’t want you to worry,” Joel said as he held her shoulders and locked eyes with her. “I’m not saying anything is wrong. I would just feel better if I had something with me. A knife or a hammer or maybe a baseball bat.” He tried a smile on her, but he could tell it wasn’t very convincing.
Joel and Kelly searched the closets. They searched everywhere they could think of, but they couldn’t find anything to use as a weapon.
“I can’t find anything sharp in this place,” Joel finally said. “I can’t even find a damn potato peeler.”
He checked all of the windows again to make sure they were locked just for something to do as the nervous energy buzzed inside of him. He checked the front and back door again, jiggling the handles.
Joel came back to the kitchen and stood beside Kelly who leaned against the counter, hugging her arms. She seemed like she was staying close to the light, like it was her only protection in this dark nightmare.
“Something’s wrong here,” Kelly said in a grave voice. It wasn’t a question; it was a statement, an unarguable fact for her.
Joel was about to say something to try and make her feel better, but his words never came out because of the three loud knocks at the door.
Kelly barked out a short scream and her hands flew to her mouth. She stared at the front door with bulging eyes.
Joel crept towards the door.
“What are you doing?” Kelly hissed, but she didn’t follow him, she didn’t leave the safety of the light.
Joel ignored her. He stood right in front of the wood door as three more loud knocks sounded. Someone was right on the other side of this door and they were definitely using something to knock on the door with, something hard and metallic. The head of the ax, he thought.
His heart jackhammered in his chest and he was breathing so quickly that he was afraid he was going to hyperventilate. But he managed to yell at the door.
“Who is it?!”
No answer from the other side of the door.
“Who’s out there?!”
Still no answer.
“Is that you, Daniel?! This isn’t funny anymore!!”
Joel hurried to the window. He pushed the curtains all the way open to look outside. He was afraid for a moment that he would see some kind of grotesque face peering in at him from the other side of the glass. Or maybe a large man in a mask holding the ax.
But there was no one on the porch. Joel pressed his face against the glass to see as far as he could, but there didn’t seem to be anyone out there. His eyes roamed back to the stack of firewood. The ax was still gone.
He looked back at Kelly who still hovered by the stove light.
Joel ran across the living room and grabbed Kelly. He ushered her back to the bedroom. They hurried to the bed. The bedroom was dark, but there was still some light coming down the hallway from the stove light.
“What are you doing?” Kelly asked as they huddled on the bed.
“It’s got to be Daniel,” Joel whispered. But if this was a prank, then it had gone way too far now. And he was going to let Daniel know that. In fact, he was pretty sure they were just going to leave in the morning. A real friend didn’t carry a joke this far.
Because that’s not your friend out there, his mind whispered.
Joel tried to push the thought away.
“Maybe we should make a run for the car,” Kelly whispered.
“No,” Joel said. He didn’t want to tell her about the missing ax, he didn’t want her to worry any more than she already was. “We’ll wait until the morning. I’ll stay awake the rest of the nig
ht if I have to.” Joel sighed. “And then we’re leaving in the morning. I’ve had enough of these high school pranks.”
Kelly cuddled up closer to Joel. He could feel her body trembling, and he suddenly felt terrible for putting her through this.
But he didn’t know it was going to be like this. He’d met Daniel years ago in high school. Daniel had been a rich and popular kid, and he could be a great friend sometimes, but he could also be eccentric, doing very strange things for no reason from time to time. And maybe he’d gotten worse over the years.
Joel wondered why he’d even come here? But he knew why. Daniel and his friends were rich and influential people now after they’d left college, and he had to admit to himself that he wanted to get inside their circle of affluence, learn to be like them, learn to be one of them.
Joel realized that he had almost drifted off to sleep when he heard three more knocks at the front door.
They both jumped up and sat on the edge of the bed, waiting, listening, breathing hard, trying to be still and quiet.
The knocks sounded different this time. Louder. Closer.
Joel got up and crept towards the open bedroom door, towards the splash of light in the hallway from the stove light. He stepped out of the doorway and stared down the hall at the living room, at the front door. And now he realized why the knocking sounded different, why it sounded closer.
A man dressed in black clothing and a hood stood at the front door—he was inside the cabin. He pounded on the door with one fist, and in his other hand he held the ax from the front porch. The hood hid most of the man’s face in shadows, but Joel could see the man’s mouth which was curled into an evil smile.
Kelly shrieked from beside Joel in the hall.
They turned and ran for the back door. He didn’t risk a glance back at the man; he could hear the stomping sound of boots running across the floorboards. He could see the man in his mind’s eye running at them, lifting the ax up, ready to chop it down into their flesh and bone.
