Older Than Time

Chapter 2 of “Spooks”

For this week’s tale, I am continuing the story I started from a previous prompt. So, this is Chapter 2 of “Spooks”.

You can read Chapter 1 here, if you like: https://gregoryblairentertains.substack.com/p/spooks

“Fibrous tendrils sprouted from her blackened hands, as the metamorphosis commenced.”

I stopped and lifted my eyes from the page to regard wide-eyed Killian who grinned like a creepy six-year-old human Cheshire Cat.

“Go on,” he prodded.

I felt bad. This was the second story I’d cut off in the middle.

“This is your favorite bedtime story book?” I just couldn’t believe it.

“Yes! It’s the one we always read!”

I looked into his azure eyes, and I knew he spoke the truth. But why would anyone read a book of horror stories to a small child before bed? Surely that invited night terrors. I’d have to ask the boy’s father; I couldn’t believe Mr. Castigroff would read this sort of thing to his son before bed. Or any of my predecessors, for that matter.

“Well,” I told Killian. “These stories are too scary for me. And I’ve now read you two halves of two different stories and that’s the same amount of story time as reading one whole story all the way through. So, it’s time for bed.”

“But you barely got to all the good parts!”

I rose, taking the book with me. “Well, you know how they end, anyway. You can finish them both in your dreams, if you like.” I hated the words as soon as they came out of my mouth, but I was not going to read any more horror stories to him. At least not tonight.

I got up and set the book back into its place on the shelf with the other books I hadn’t paid much attention to previously but now nevertheless eyed with suspicion.

“They’re just stories,” Killian said. “They just tell you what happened. You shouldn’t be afraid.”

I looked at my little perspicacious pupil.

“All stories, all words have power. Fiction or not, you can be affected by what you read. So, it’s a good idea to choose wisely. And I choose, when I can, not to put disturbing images in my head. Especially right before bed. And I think you should do the same.”

“But these stories aren’t scary to me!”

I regarded him, realizing his argument was sound. But I was not going to relent. So, I tried appealing to his generous nature.

“Well, they’re scary to me, so let’s find some reading we can both enjoy, tomorrow night, all right?”

He got a winsome grin. I wasn’t sure if he was amused at seeing through my ruse or if he was amused at being braver than I. But he settled into his pillow a bit more and said, “All right.”

I went to the door. “Door open or closed?”

“Closed, of course.”

I smiled at his befuddled sincerity, as if no one ever slept with their door open—even though I remembered I had for years as a child. I closed the door and made my way down the hall to my room.

Once inside, I leaned against the door, sifting through the previous scene in my head. Those awful stories. Was it simply their content that bothered me? Or their appropriateness for a six-year-old? Or that any father could possibly think they made good reading material for a child at bedtime?

I realized I was staring across the room, my eyes focused on the window, where the dark night swirled with the diaphanous glow of mist and moonlight. It prompted an instant recall of this morning’s fright with those horrible yellow eyes in the fog.

I sighed, turned and lumbered to the mirrored vanity which I’d made my writing desk. I thought I’d brush away my current, confounding cobwebs with some poetry. I sat and opened my friend’s book to see where I left off. As I turned the pages, I came to realize the drawings affected me differently than before. I had previously been mildly amused at the gothic depictions of ghostly carriages, oddly clawed hands, dripping fangs. But now I found myself somewhat disturbed by them: an uncomfortable feeling for a man who grew up in and, frankly, grew scornful of a culture mired in mythology. Vampires. Creatures of the night.

Spooks.

Could all these things be seeping into my subconscious? Slowly, insidiously making me more suspectable to their lurid seduction? To begin to believe such things might in fact have some basis in truth? Was I becoming aware of a crack in the very foundation of my belief system?

I flipped another page and found my last entry. Below a drawing of the silhouette of a man dwarfed by strange shapes that defied classification but seemed to be surrounding and closing in on him, I had written:

My heartbeat whispers
A language older than time
Begging me to burst

I didn’t remember writing it. Or, rather, I didn’t remember exactly what it meant. What was the “language older than time”? I looked at the drawing. The man caught by impending, unknown elements.

Fear.

Of course. Fear has surrounded us since the beginning of time. And it never needed words for us to know it. To feel it. It’s instinctual. It’s part of us. Inside us. Just waiting to be let out.

So, was it fear with which this man was about “to burst”? Or was fear merely the whisper in our universal heartbeat, stoking us to burst with something else? Our fight or flight response? To become the bigger monster to destroy the rest, or to escape through mental or physical prowess? Or, perhaps, to escape by retreating into the fabricated comfort of madness?

That last thought prompted me to look up and I gazed at my reflection in the mirror. I looked the same. Same unremarkable, if well-groomed, features. Clear eyes. Sturdy chin. Not the face of a man who was losing his grip on reality. I was just tired. Over stimulated. New surroundings, and so on. This uneasiness would pass. Everything would be fine. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

In the mirror I saw the hideous, yellow eyes appear in the window behind me!

I whipped around, gasping.

The window now framed nothing but mist and moonlight.

But heart pounded in my chest and my breath fought for control.

I rose, swallowed a lump, and walked to the window. I leaned forward and peered out, my own eyes scanning.

Darkness, moonlight and mist.

And my own breath, fogging the glass in bursts of momentary ghosts.

I felt worse than before. I turned back and, once more, caught my reflection in the mirror. Only now I appeared as a much smaller figure, dwarfed by everything around me.

How was I ever going to sleep tonight?

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This was created as part of the Sunday Scaries series event, brought to you by Labyrinthia Mythweaver, Mat, and Conor MacCormack.