9 Tales Told in the Dark 5

by 9 Tales Told in the Dark

  “Not so fast! Where are your shoes?”

  Alan shrugged.

  “Wipe your feet off, boy, you will not be dirtying up my kitchen,” his mother said. He wished his mother would let him track dirt all over the house, it didn’t matter. No one ever complained about all the dirt they walked on outside.

  “Sorry,” he whispered.

  “All toys inside?”

  “Yes’m.”

  “Good, why don’t you go play in your room until supper time.”

  “Is Daddy going to make it?”

  His father worked two hours west of their house. It must already be storming there. Alan’s mother acted as if the question was not important. She was too busy trying to decide on which microwaveable vegetable packet went well with the pork tenderloin she put in the oven. Alan wished he wouldn’t have to eat dinner.

  “Yes, now go play or I’ll make you do chores,” she never took her mind off potato medley or carrot and beans. It was just something she said enough, like hello and thank you. There was no meaning behind it.

  Alan jogged upstairs and as he sat down he made a wish he’d never made before, “I wish I had a friend to play with right now.”

  The spoken sentence didn’t do Alan’s thoughts justice. In his mind he already saw his friend. He was just as tall as Alan and could’ve passed for his brother if he had one, and he had sandy brown hair instead of Alan’s dark curls. Alan could imagine the other boy right next to him.

  “Did you get all your toys in?” Alan asked his new friend, Adam.

  Alan altered his voice and answered as Adam, “No, I left some on the sandbox.”

  “They’re going to drown.”

  “I gave them life preservers.”

  “Well they’ll get electrocuted.” Alan contested.

  “Lighting doesn’t…”

  Play time stopped. Lighting burst outside his bedroom window the sound came with it. The house shook and the lights flickered on than off. The roof began to crackle with heavy rain.

  “Are you scared, Adam?” Alan asked, wandering over to his window.

  “Oh no, Alan.”

  “Good, me neither.”

  Adam perched himself on the window and gazed out into the back yard. The lighting had struck the sandbox.

  It was black and the rain had to fight the black smoke trying to rise. Adam gasped, his eyes as wide as could be.

  “Your toys are all dead, Adam.”

  Adam couldn’t muster a response; Alan was too busy hoping he hadn’t left a toy buried out there. A storm of thoughts pounded in his head as he tried to remember every game he had played in the sandbox, every location of every toy he had. There would be no rest in his mind; he simply had too many toys.

  Outside the lighting flashed a terrible grin across the horizon.

  “Leave no man behind,” Alan said to his new and faithful companion, after all Adam had no choice but go where Alan went, even if it meant running out into the storm in desperate attempt to salvage his toys.

  “Don’t argue with me,” Alan said. “Keep quiet as we sneak by my mom.”

  Adam of course didn’t make another sound.

  Alan crept down the stairs; in his mind he was walking his friend through the technique of tiptoeing. He proudly told tales of all the times he’d snuck downstairs when he was supposed to be upstairs sleeping or playing. “Just stick close to me, Adam, I’m the pro.”

  The thunder roared.

  “Don’t wuss out on me now, we’ll only be out there for a few seconds and no one ever got struck by lightning in a few seconds. It takes time to aim lightning, Adam, don’t you know anything?”

  Alan’s mother was tapping on the microwave; she had picked tonight’s poison. Alan grimaced as he saw the bag of frozen vegetables sticking out over the counter. He would make Adam eat his vegetables since this entire mission was to recover the toys he left outside.

  The lock was the loudest part of the door, had his mother not locked the back door Alan could’ve dashed outside right then and there, instead he perched behind the counter and waited for the rumble of thunder.

  As soon as it came, he flung his hand over the lock flicked it open, checked back to see his mother’s back then slowly pulled the handle until the door was open enough to squeeze through. He closed the door as lighting flashed and painted his reflection upon it.

  Alan ran off the porch and towards the sandbox. It was still smoldering and black. It smelled awful, too. Alan covered his mouth with one hand and his forehead with another as the rain pelted him.

  “What do you see, Adam?” Alan asked, “Where are the men you left behind? You did leave your men behind didn’t you?”

  “I don’t know!”

  “Some fine Captain you are. Your men depend on you.” Alan spoke aloud in the silencing rain. His lips filled with rain with each syllable. “Get on your knees and help me look!”

  Alan dropped down and started rummaging through the hot sand. In some spots it had hardened like glass—exactly like glass. He could see the leg of a blackened figure protruding from the sand. Alan knew who it was, a corpse.

  “He’s been dead for weeks, leave him.” Adam told him.

  “Leave him—but, Adam, don’t you see?” Alan’s eyes brightened with another flash of lighting and the slam of thunder. “He’s alive!”

  Alan dug his fingers through the sand and pulled the figure out.

  “We’ve got you, where are the others?”

  “He’s alive but he’s dumb, keep looking!” Adam ordered.

  “Who’s in charge here?” Alan snapped and drove Adam silent again.

  Alan tried to brush the mud off the figure but the rain wasn’t helping. He gave up and pocketed the figure and returned to digging.

  He reached something beneath the wet sand, five little legs?

  No, the five things moved; clenched around Alan’s hand. He yanked back. Suddenly his grasp was free and he fell backwards onto his butt. The wet grass splashed and soaked him completely. The rain straightened his black curls over his eyes and between the flickering of lightning he saw it.

  Half submerged, it freed its arms and shoulder and its neck pulled up a round head. It shook the mud from its head and two round-white eyes looked back at Alan.

  Where was Adam now? There was no Adam, all of Alan’s imagination fled him and left him alone in the storm staring at the dark person.

  There was only one thing Alan could do.

  He screamed.

  The thunder couldn’t drown it out. His pitch carried all the way into the house. Alan scrambled backwards still screeching. His mother was calling him from the porch.

  “Alan!” There was fear in her voice as the storm turned the sky pitch black.

  She called his name again and again. His screams did not stop until he slammed into the porch and his mother quickly dropped down and picked him up.

  “What are you doing outside?” She jerked him up. “Why are you screaming?”

  Alan pushed at his mother’s hips until she stepped back inside. He turned, slammed the door and locked the deadbolt. His breath escaped him and he started fighting for it, he crawled down on the ground and hoped to scoop the oxygen up into his mouth.

  “Alan, why did you go outside?”

  The wet figure dangled from his pocket and his mother knew.

  “I told you to get them all in before the storm.”

  Alan couldn’t respond.

  He couldn’t even look back up through the glass door to see if the figure had risen from the sandbox and come for him. He was too scared.

  “Boy, you have messed up my floors. You better tell me what’s going on and take a bath before your father gets home.” His mother tried to banish any hint of caring. “Do you hear me?”

  Alan’s face was that of a wet puppy left for days without food it cracked his mother’s tough love in an instant.

  “Alan, honey, what happened?”

  “There…” he started, “there was somethin
g, some one out there.”

  His mother shot her eyes out into the storm. Alan watched them hoping she would tell him it was all okay now.

  But she couldn’t see anything. He wished that she could. See the thing and protect him, Alan wished.

  Not even within the flashes of lightning. She turned back to her distraught son and spoke soothingly, “Honey are you okay? It’s just a storm.”

  Alan turned and looked outside, he blinked the first time lighting struck but held his eyes open for another flicker. The sandbox looked harmless, empty and thankfully alone.

  “Go up stairs and get cleaned up, I’ll have a mop waiting for you when you come back down.” Her eyes pointed to the puddle on the hardwood floors.

  Alan nodded and went upstairs. He thought it would be safer for him there.

  The stairs mocked him. Each one creaked like they never had before, a chuckle for the scaredy-cat. Alan quickened his pace. He was upstairs and into the bathroom in just two leaps to clear the final set of stairs.

  The clinical white was only offset by the peach colored towels. The bright light felt safe. Alan locked the door. Everything was going to be fine, if only the shower curtain hadn’t been closed. This unnerved Alan. He stood and tried to use the mirror to see within the shower. At last he flung it open and was only greeted by soap scum.

  Alan turned on the shower and stood naked as it warmed. His feet stood in the dirt he’d tracked up. His mother would make him clean the bathroom, too no doubt. He pulled the action figure he’d saved from the sandbox.

  “All this for you.” He chucked the toy into the shower and watched the mud swirl off of it.

  He stepped in, twirled around and wiped the soap on his chest, it would be enough to convince his mother he’d washed. He didn’t turn off the shower. He leapt back out, splashing water on the floor. He dried himself with his towel then dropped it on the floor and swung it around the cabinet and the toilet to get up all the dirt he’d made. He bundled up his dirty clothes and tossed wet towel and all into the hamper.

  Then he reached back in and turned off the shower. His action figure was clinging to the drain.

  “What was it?” Alan asked the toy. But it could not speak; it didn’t even have a place for a battery. “Come on, we’ll debrief you in the morning, glad to have you back, soldier.”

  The thunder crashed outside. The lights went out.

  A few seconds and Alan’s eyes adjusted, he could see his action figure staring back at him in the dark bathroom, looking just as terrified as Alan.

  The stairs started to chuckle again, this time that had the trailing thunder giving them a more sinister laugh.

  Heh.

  Heh.

  Heh.

  The steps creaked.

  Alan knew it would just be his mother. But he was too scared to call out to her. What if it wasn’t? Alan climbed back into the tub and closed the curtain. The stairs stopped laughing. Whoever had climbed them had reached the second floor.

  “You left me out there with him,” Adam’s voice returned to Alan’s head.

  “Shh, no I didn’t.” Alan pleaded back. But Adam would not be quite. He started to blame Alan for everything and he told Alan what everything entailed.

  “You ran so he kept me. Told me he wanted you anyway. But he tortured me when I said I wouldn’t give you up, you hear that, Alan? I tried to protect you. But that was stupid. You didn’t protect me. You imagined me just to save yourself.”

  “Quiet,” Alan whispered.

  “I want him to hear us.”

  Alan realized it was crazy. There was no Adam. Adam was pretend. He could shut Adam away again.

  “You’re not real,” Alan said.

  “But the dirt boy is. He is everything you wished for.”

  It felt like someone left the bathroom. Like a draft of air had cut through the steam. Alan was alone.

  “I wished for a friend, idiot.”

  Adam didn’t respond.

  The doorknob turned.

  Alan almost screamed for his mother, but the words felt down into his stomach where they tried to bury their heads in the sand like ostriches. It made Alan have to pee. He tried not to, even though it wouldn’t have mattered as he crouched naked in the tub.

  The door opened.

  “Alan?”

  The voice was instantly recognizable. Alan almost slipped back into the tub as he leapt up.

  “Dad?”

  “Where’s your mother?” Alan’s Dad asked.

  “Downstairs,” Alan flung the curtain open so happy to see his father in the darkness.

  “No she’s not.”

  “What?”

  “What happened? Why is the floor covered in sand from the sandbox?”

  “Just the kitchen.”

  “No, it is everywhere. The whole upstairs is like your damned sandbox. You think this is what I want to come home to? I want dinner and a clean house, that’s all I ask. Did you make this mess?”

  “No,” Alan shook his head a different fear came over him.

  “Did you?” His father asked.

  “No.”

  “Where’s your mother?”

  “Making dinner.”

  “I’ve been in the kitchen and there’s no dinner being made.”

  “She was. Power went out.”

  “No, kidding.” His father slammed the bathroom door, shouting back. “Finish your shower.”

  His father started to call for Alan’s mother. But when each call went unanswered Alan’s father grew angrier. Doors began to slam. Something glass fell and shattered.

  Alan crept out of the bathroom, he ran to his bedroom and started to get dressed but more things began to break downstairs. The jealous storm outside tried to be heard again. But Alan’s father could yell louder than thunder.

  Finally, Alan’s mother spoke up. The sliding glass door to outside closed. “What is it?”

  “Look at this mess!” Alan’s father yelled.

  “That was your son.”

  “Yeah well he’s lying, telling nothing but lies.”

  “Relax, honey. He’s just a little boy the storm is spooking him he was outside thought he saw something. I just went out there because I’m starting to think there was someone out there.”

  “This your excuse? I come home to a filthy sandy beach for a house and no dinner.”

  Alan crept to his bedroom door to hear his mother’s answer.

  “It was cooking and the power went out.”

  “Microwave? I’m only good enough for microwaveable, I don’t make enough for you.”

  Alan’s mother said something but all Alan could hear was the smacking of flesh.

  Adam’s voice returned like the chuckling of the steps, “is this what you wanted? You won’t have to eat your mother’s dinner now, I guarantee it.”

  “Go away.” Alan said still trying to hear what was happening. His heart was racing as his mother grunted in pain.

  “You wished for all this, and a friend too.”

  “No.”

  Alan’s father yelled for him, “Alan! Get down here now!”

  “Don’t rat out your friends, Alan, otherwise you won’t have no body on your side, got it?”

  Alan ran downstairs as fast as he could, hoping not to make his father any angrier.

  “Yes, sir?”

  “You made me do this, boy.” The father cursed him. “You did.” It was still dark, but somehow the night provided enough light to show Alan his mother sitting on the couch sobbing.

  “No.”

  “Yes, you did. You made me do this to your mother. Can’t you behave for her? Did you have to track in all this dirt?”

  Alan’s mother whimpered in the corner of the room covering her mouth. She couldn’t keep the blood from dripping through her fingers.

  “If it wasn’t you then who did it, Alan?”

  “The dirt boy!” Alan shrieked.

  It was the first time Alan’s father struck him.

  Alan
wished it would be the last. If all his other wishes had come true why couldn’t this one?

  Because there was no Adam. There was no dirt boy. There was just scared Alan and his scared mother and an unending storm.

  THE END

  THE ONE NO ONE FEARS by Sara Green

  Was I the silent type?

  No.

  Not when you got a hold of me and were with in earshot. I usually talked anyone’s ear off who dared to have me speak.

  Today’s victim was a young boy who’d been staring at my front door for quite some time. He just sat on his tricycle rolling back and forth on the sidewalk. No, he couldn’t see through my thick shades and never would’ve noticed the small eyepiece I had to the left of my front door.

  I did this so that I didn’t have to get out of the recliner to see who was a knocking. I’d found it useful for other things as well.

  People weren’t afraid of me. Teenagers loved to prove it.

  At least every Halloween or April Fool’s Day.

  Of course I had to let them have their fun. It created an odd bit of sympathy among the community. And my weary form only had them hoping so hard that I would pass soon and the deed to my home would go to auction.

  They all knew I had no children, no heirs.

  I was the last of my line, which was a pathetic story in its own right. But today it was the little boy on the tricycle who had me on his mind.

  I called him to the porch with the promise of cookies and he came in and found a seat he preferred to all the others and placed his hands under his buttocks and waited for me to bring him a glass of milk and a plate of cookies.

  I laid the plate down between us.

  “Are you afraid of me?” I asked the little boy. Watching as his eyes shifted about the room as if someone had held the answer up for him on a queue card.

  “No, Ma’am.” He replied. And then cleverly began to speak as he filled his mouth with a chocolate chip cookie.

  “Why not? Isn’t my nose long and hookish?”

  The boy shrugged a cookie crumbs rained down on the plate.

  “Well look at my back, do I not lurch around like a tiny Tyrannosaurus Rex?”

  “Oh no!” He squeezed out between bites and shook his head to show he really believed it. I lurched over to the fridge and pulled out the milk again. At his rate he’d need plenty more to wash down those cookies. I wasn’t sure if the milk will help him fit the plate down his little throat though.