For The Night Is Dark

by Mynhardt, Joe

  He leaned forward. Something was in the bottom of the bath. He picked it up, turning it slowly in his hand.

  It was a crudely made puppet, fashioned from lolly sticks. Two arms, at right angles to the body, were covered by a blue felt T-shirt, the exposed wood coloured a pale red as if the child making it didn’t have pink. The T-shirt, a cut-out that was stuck to the wood, was coupled with lime green shorts that didn’t even had a middle, just two strips of felt glued to legs that seemed too long and had the same pale red markings on them, though less here as if the puppet had run through mud. The head was clearly a template, the outline of it clear—cheeks, ears, rolling mounds of hair. The creator had adorned the blank face with a single eye—positioned as if it was once part of a couple—coloured green and the mouth, taking up the whole lower half of the face, was all sickly looking yellow teeth.

  He had no idea where it had come from. Janey wouldn’t have made it—it was too crude a design for a discerning seven-year-old and even when she had made puppets they’d all been fairies and princesses, with carefully cut-out dresses, long hair and tiaras. But it hadn’t been in the bathroom earlier, he was sure of that and it certainly wasn’t there when he’d showered. It didn’t make sense.

  Keeping hold of the puppet, Sam went back to bed and cuddled up to Janey. She moved and murmured something but its intelligibility was lost to sleep.

  “Sweet dreams,” he said and closed his eyes.

  ***

  “What the fuck is that?”

  Sam opened his eyes. Emily stood over him, her dark hair a cascade around her face. Her eyes were narrowed and there was colour in her cheeks.

  “What, who’s . . . Where’s Janey?”

  “Back in her bed.”

  “What time’s it?”

  “Almost six. Now what the fuck is that?”

  She was pointing at the lolly stick puppet on his bedside table. In the more diffused light of the bedroom it looked darker, the edges singed.

  “I don’t know, I assume Janey made it. I found it in the bath.”

  “In the bath?” Emily shook her head. “Janey wouldn’t make anything like that and you know it.”

  “What do you want me to say, I got up last night and it was in the bath. I don’t know who made it, I don’t even know who put it there because it wasn’t there when I had my shower.”

  “Get rid of it, get it out of the fucking house.”

  “Okay, okay, calm down.”

  She squatted in front of him, her teeth clenched together. “Get it out of the house and I’ll calm down.”

  ***

  By the time Sam had put the puppet in the wheelie bin, Emily had boiled the kettle and made them both a drink. They sat across from each other in the kitchen.

  “What was that all about?” he said finally.

  Emily shook her head, took a sip of coffee, looked at him then looked away. She bit her lip. “You’ll laugh at me.”

  “After getting woken up like that?”

  “That thing, that bloody awful puppet, I’ve seen something like it before.” She looked into her coffee cup but, apparently not seeing what she wanted to, she looked back at Sam. “I saw it when I was about seven.”

  “Well that doesn’t make any sense.”

  “It was Kevin’s fault. We’d been playing in the garden and I did something to his Action Man, I can’t even remember what and he told me he was going to get me.”

  Kevin was Emily’s brother. Sam glanced at the clock, saw that he was cutting it fine to catch the train. He rubbed his neck which was starting to feel stiff.

  “You remember you asked me once, why I was so afraid of the dark and I didn’t tell you, I said it was just something that affected me.”

  “Uh huh.”

  “Well I didn’t exactly tell you the truth, I’ve never really told anyone the truth. Kevin decided the best way to get his revenge was to torment me and he did a great job. He told me about this monster called Mr Topsy, who liked young girls, especially those he woke up in the middle of the night when it was dark. Once he decided that you were going to be his next victim, there was absolutely nothing you could do but he’d taunt you, he’d come into your bedroom and talk to you and tell you things and then, when he’d had enough, he’d kill you.”

  “And you fell for it?”

  “I was seven, Kevin was almost eleven, I believed most things he said. He made tapes of himself whispering, leaving big empty pauses so he could set the machine and it’d go off and he’d be downstairs with Mum and Dad. This went on for two or three days, saying that Mr Topsy was coming for me and I was getting more and more scared.”

  “What did your parents say?”

  “I never told, Mr Topsy told me not too.” She paused, corrected herself. “Kevin told me not to. Then one night, after everyone was in bed and the lights were all off, I heard him calling to me again. Then I felt him, walking up my body. I could feel his spindly legs through the blankets and hear the sound of his sticks tapping together. He came up to my neck, leaned on my chin and tried to climb into my mouth. I went mental, kicking and screaming and doing everything I could and Mum and Dad and Kevin all came rushing in.”

  “What happened?”

  “I was wound up in the blankets, apart from my right arm and my pillow was over my face. When Dad got that off, he managed to pull this little fucking thing out of my mouth.”

  “What was it?”

  “A lolly stick puppet but not like the princesses Janey used to make, this was dirty and disgusting, as crude as the one that you found. Mum and Dad blamed Kevin but he denied all knowledge and he’d clearly been asleep whilst I was getting attacked.”

  “Holy shit.”

  Emily took a deep breath and examined her coffee cup. She bit her lip. “And that’s why I’m afraid of the dark and that’s why I don’t want that thing in my house now.”

  “But Mr Stix isn’t any more real than Mr Topsy was.” He didn’t want to state the obvious, but it couldn’t be helped. “It’s just lolly sticks and fabric, it can’t walk.”

  Emily’s voice rose in pitch. “So how come you found it in the bath last night?”

  “I . . .” said Sam and shrugged.

  Emily stood up, her face suddenly empty. “I don’t know how Janey knows about this, I don’t know who made it and I don’t know how you came to find it in the bath. The whole thing makes me feel sick. Look, just go to work and try to forget about it.”

  “And what about you, how are you going to forget about it?”

  Emily walked away but stopped in the kitchen doorway. “I’ve lived with this for over thirty years, I’m sure I’ll cope.”

  Before he left for the station, Sam retrieved the puppet from the wheelie bin and put it into his briefcase. On the journey down all he could think about was how the damned thing had got into the bath.

  As he left the tube station for the short walk to his office, he dropped the puppet into a bin.

  ***

  Emily was distant that evening. In contrast, Janey was full of life, trying to explain to him everything that had happened to her that day but between a sports lesson, practise for the class assembly and various shenanigans in the playground with her friends, he was having trouble keeping up.

  They ate together in silence, whilst Janey watched The Big Bang Theory and after her bath, they sat on her bed and read some Fantastic Mr Fox.

  “Did you and Mummy have a fight, because she’s not very happy today.”

  “No, I think it might be something at work.”

  “I think it might be because of my dreams.”

  Sam looked at his daughter. “You think too many big thoughts,” he said.

  “But is it?”

  “Of course not. Now come on, lay down and give Apple a cuddle and I’ll see you in the morning.” He stood up, straightened her duvet and walked out, pausing in the doorway. “Sleep tight, Munchkin, love you.”

  “Love you too, Daddy.”

  ***

>   That evening, Emily and Sam watched television in almost silence, beyond a few cursory questions about how the others day had gone. At ten, she declared she was going to have a shower and when she was finished, she came and knelt beside Sam’s chair.

  “I’m going to bed.”

  “It’s going to be alright, Emily.”

  “I know, I’m sorry if it seems like I’m being a stupid cow about all of this but it’s thrown me a bit. You will wake me up if Janey wakes up, won’t you?”

  “Yes, don’t worry.”

  Emily went to bed and Sam watched TV until eleven, then went up himself. Emily was already asleep when he got into bed, her back to him, her breathing easy and deep.

  Propped up on two pillows, he read until he couldn’t focus, then turned off the lamp, laid down and went to sleep.

  ***

  The scream woke him up and he was moving before he was even properly awake. It was dark, too dark and that disorientated him. Were his eyes open? Was he dreaming?

  He looked at the clock, glowing in the gloom. It was just after four thirty. His thoughts were a jumble, had he dreamed the scream, what was going on, why was the light off? He reached out with his left hand and felt the reassuring contours of Emily. Should he wake her?

  “Daddy! Where are you?”

  The shrill tone jarred him into action and he jumped off the bed, his limbs tingling as though electricity was being pumped into them directly from the mains. He was halfway along the landing before he realised he was running blind. He groped along the wall for the light switch and flicked it but nothing happened.

  “Daddy!”

  He felt his way to her door and turned her light on. It worked and the sudden burst of light was blinding. As he blinked, coronas of light flashed across his eyelids.

  “Daddy, help me!”

  Rubbing his eyes, Sam staggered into the room. Janey was sitting on her pillow, pressed as far back on the bed as the headboard would allow, knees drawn up to her chin and her eyes wide. Apple was mashed between her hands.

  Sam sat on her bed, wrapping her in his arms. She was still against him, not yielding her position.

  “Janey, it’s Daddy, you’re dreaming, you have to wake up.”

  She shook her head so violently her left temple connected with his forehead and the pain was a sudden, bright starburst. He shook his head and saw that the impact had broken the spell with her too.

  “Daddy?” she yelled, “you have to help me.” She wasn’t sleeping, she wasn’t dreaming, that much was clear.

  He embraced her tighter, kissing her head. A red mark was already forming on her temple. “What’s wrong?”

  “It’s Mr Stix, he’s still telling me horrible things.”

  “Mr Stix isn’t here, love, he’s gone.”

  “He isn’t, he talks to me when I’m asleep and I can hear him when I wake up.” Her voice hitched but no sob came. “He tells me bad things, Dad, that I’ll cry and be hurt and it makes me sad. Why does he say such horrible things?”

  “I don’t know sweetheart.”

  “Make him stop, please.”

  “I will.”

  Janey gasped, held her breath. Sam kissed her cheek. She started to shake her head again, not so violently this time, saying “no” repeatedly. She clutched at the neckline of her nightie. “Mr Stix says he’s angry at you.”

  “Well when I see him, I’ll tell him that I’m really angry with him.”

  “He knows, he can hear you.”

  “What?” Sam looked at her. She was staring at the drawers. “Janey?” She didn’t look at him, so he glanced over his left shoulder.

  There was something on top of the drawers, a small pile of what looked like strips of card stacked on each other. For the briefest of moments, he thought he saw it move. He went to stand, but Janey held him back, her fearful grip on him tight.

  “Mr Stix says you’re horrible, that you’re trying to hurt him.”

  The pile moved again, as if someone was rocking the drawers. “I am trying to hurt him, because he’s scaring you.”

  “He said he’s going to make you cry.”

  The pile was now rocking from side to side gently, as if in time with a lullaby. Something about the movement spiked a memory but he couldn’t quite recall it.

  “He can’t make me cry, I’m going to get him to shut up.”

  “But he will make you cry, he says that when he sees you in the cemetery he’s going to laugh.”

  Sam looked at Janey. Her eyes were rimmed with red, tears caught in her eyelashes. There was nothing in her face but fear. “That’s not going to happen,” he told her.

  “He said you’d say that.”

  Sam looked back at the drawers. The movement was becoming more frantic now.

  “Janey, there’s no such thing as Mr Stix.”

  He remembered what Emily had said: Mr Topsy liked young girls.

  The sticks were still moving side to side and it suddenly hit Sam that it looked like a person with stiff joints trying to stand up. “No,” he said, “no I don’t believe it.”

  The sticks moved as one and managed to roll over. There was a tap-tap-tapping noise, as if hands and feet were put to the wooden surface. Another moment and Sam saw the head look up and glance around the room, as if to figure out where it was.

  Mr Topsy liked young girls.

  Janey screamed. Sam felt frozen to the spot. The stick puppet he’d taken to London and disposed of was now standing on the chest of drawers in his daughter’s bedroom. How could that be? Was he dreaming again? Was all of this a dream, starting from when he found the damned thing in the bath?

  The puppet managed to stand up on its oversized legs, its upper body and head jerking wildly. The single green eye seemed to bore right through Sam and the toothy yellowed mouth moved from one side of the face to the other.

  “No,” said Janey, “not my daddy.”

  Sam got up and the puppet lurched back a step or two. His complete disbelief at what he was seeing fed his desire to protect his daughter and all he wanted to do was smash this thing apart. If this was Mr Stix it wasn’t going to be in any shape to do anything.

  “No, Daddy, he wants you to touch him, don’t go near him.”

  Sam ignored her. The puppet now had a little stability, but still rocked backwards and forwards, struggling to stay upright on the thin sticks of its legs. Sam reached for it and the puppet lurched away, tap-tapping across the top of the drawers towards the wardrobe.

  Sam slapped a hand down, meaning to trap the thing under his palm but the puppet rocked sideways. He tried again but it managed to just keep out of reach. It came to the edge of the drawers, where there was a gap of a couple of inches before the wardrobe and kept moving, disappearing out of sight.

  “Daddy?”

  Breathing deeply, Sam stepped back. With the thing out of sight now, the impossibility of the situation hit him and he sat on the edge of the bed. Janey scuttled down so that she could hug him.

  “Thank you, Daddy, thank you.”

  “But I didn’t do anything.” And he hadn’t, the puppet had moved of its own volition and chosen the route, he’d not steered it at all.

  “Has he gone?”

  Sam looked into the gap between the drawers and the wardrobe. “I don’t know.” He upended the tub of Lego and tapped his fingers on the bottom of it.

  “When it comes back out I’ll trap it with this then we can get rid of it.”

  “But not in a bin?”

  “No,” he said and thought, ‘I’m going to burn the fucker’.

  Mr Topsy liked young girls.

  “Have you seen it before, the puppet?”

  “No.”

  “Did it say what it was going to do?”

  “No.”

  There was a faint tap-tapping noise that seemed to be coming from the landing. “So why was I going to be crying in the cemetery?” The tap-tapping got fainter as it moved further away. “Janey? Why was I crying?”

&nb
sp; Mr Topsy liked young girls.

  “I was too,” said Janey and before she’d even finished talking Sam was on his feet and heading for the door. It wasn’t Mr Stix, he saw that now, it never had been. The bathroom and landing lights were still dark but the illumination from Janey’s room was enough for him to see the shape writhing on his bed, his duvet covered wife whipping from side to side. He ran, covering the landing in a few paces. He could hear Emily gagging and choking, could see the movements getting less violent.

  He pulled the duvet back and away, dumping it on the floor behind him. Emily’s back was arched, her heels dug into the mattress, her nightshirt halfway up her belly.

  Maybe Mr Topsy did like young girls, but maybe he never gave up the pursuit.

  Emily was clawing at her throat, her mouth and eyes wide open. In the gloom, Sam thought he saw a lolly stick disappear over her lips but couldn’t be sure. He jumped onto the bed, pushing her down and straddling her middle. He reached into her mouth and she instinctively closed it, snapping her teeth on his fingers and he cried out, trying to prise them apart with his other hand. She gagged again, coughed, her mouth opening. Sam felt something brush his fingers and grabbed for it even as he pulled his hand free.

  Emily began to convulse, her eyes rolling, her chest moving though she wasn’t breathing. He looked at his hand and the piece of green fabric that he held.

  “Daddy.” It was Janey, standing at the door, watching him with tears in her eyes.

  Emily coughed once more and then was still.

  Janey started to cry. “Daddy, Mr Stix says you’ve been very naughty.”

  A SNITCH IN TIME

  —ROBERT W. WALKER—

  Now sits here a man mirroring me. The man is in fear just across from me, but I too sit on this plane in abject fear. Mirroring me, it seems he is; perhaps mocking me? His plane about to take off, and he should be relaxed, but no, he is fidgeting, this fellow. Is he mimicking me? More importantly, is this the guy they put on the plane to kill me?

  But then here is another fellow fast asleep with the plane still at the terminal. Yet he can sleep in this stifling air inside the belly of the beast thrumming with its own life. How does one sleep at a time like this? Hung over perhaps? Maybe it’s pills? Maybe a fear of flying? Maybe he can sleep because he knows he has a long way to go before he has to kill me. He has a slow plan but a sure plan; one in which he takes his sweet time. Perhaps Romero’s orders call for making me sweat.