Static

Written for a Halloween prompt contest on Figment.

The sound of the static was overwhelming. It hissed and popped, crackled violently and refused to die down. It obscured the noise from the street, the droning of the television, the voices of the couple next door as they argued into the night.

Doubled over on the floor I held my fingers to my ears – rocked and hummed loudly; still nothing chased the noise away. Lights danced, of purple and green, flickering in spots before my eyes – shifting from one shape to another, fading into nothing as my attention tried to discern what I was seeing.

Suddenly she was there. Emmeline. Her voice cut through the static, clear as a bell – beautiful as summer rain. Sit up, she said. I did.

I put out a hand to touch her, my mouth open – the words lying helplessly on my tongue. She deftly avoided my hand, stood and stared down at me. The static returned, from behind me now. Not a rush anymore, but a clearly defined clicking. The swarm was upon me, figures of ten or more tiny legs, crawling across my every limb.

‘I’m sorry.’ I whispered, the words garbled with creatures as they flooded inside my mouth. My clothes billowed and rippled as the swarm found its way to every nook and cranny of my body, vision disappearing as they crawled under my eyelids.

You will be.

Through ears full of insects, I heard her voice, pure and clean, as clearly as I had when she was alive.

Innocent

Written for a Halloween prompt contest on Figment.

The boy stood quickly, entranced by the light that flooded out the open door of Mother’s forbidden room. It was the first time he’d ever seen the door unlocked, not once had he been inside. Sunlight poured through the gap and into the nursery, promising a wonderful world of treasure inside.

‘I’m going in.’ he said to his younger sister, and didn’t stop to hear her response.

The room was not the haven he expected. There was no furniture; the cream plaster walls were bare. Light brown shag carpet sent clouds of dust through the sunlit room as he scuffed his feet across the floor to the only thing of interest in the room: a plain, innocent cupboard door. Aching for treasure, he pulled it open and stared inside.

A glowing light shone from a distance much further back than the cupboard could ever be deep. Growing larger, it came forward, reached inside the boy and drew his soul roughly from his unwilling body. Coldness filled him; his eyes stopped shining. Numbly he moved away from the cupboard to the nursery. His sister, still playing with her blocks, turned to him with curiosity.

‘Did you see?’ she asked eagerly, her own eyes glittering with life.

‘Yes.’ said the soulless boy. ‘It’s where mother keeps the Christmas presents.’

Slowly he descended the stairs as his sister too toddled towards the open room, to the innocent cupboard, her eyes wide with wonder as she opened the door.