There are some things that just cannot be explained. A wisp of darkness across a streetlight, a creak in the wall, a feeling like someone is watching you from the corner of your room. We rationalize these things of course; the streak of darkness is just a piece of your hair getting in the way, the creak is a mouse in the wall, and that presence behind you is just your paranoia of your dead father. Well, that’s what my psychologist told me once. He thought he had all the answers to what bothered me during the night, what followed me around in the day-- never giving me a moment’s peace. I didn’t really believe him then, it was just something my ex-wife made me do because she couldn’t stand my ramblings, and I couldn’t stand losing the Vette at that time. But none of that matters now and I believe--I know it was always something else. Something every one knows exists, but never gets the chance to see before it's too late. By chance or a cruel, unusual fate some of them succeed where the others fail, but they always win a little, they always get into our minds; they never truly leave. One stormy night in January, I met mine. I met my Bedevil.
I was ending my day like I ended most of my days in the ‘prime’ of my life on that January night. Every once in awhile the howling wind outside pushed against my little white-sided house that needed more repairs than I wished to do, or had the desire to do. There was no one to impress. I was a balding, middle-aged man with a middle growing to be the size of Rhode Island who never came out of his house but to go
sit in a cube in an office for eight hours. Whose wife left him late one night while he slept, not knowing his wife was speeding away in his convertible with his best friend, and who kids called Mr. Scrooge just because I had no desire to hang up that fancy, frilly Christmas crap. The lawn was pretty much beyond my interests too. It was just grass. And it was grass even if it wasn’t green, just a twisted, yellow mess with spiky weeds. I could care less what it really looked like. And like I said, I wasn’t willing to impress anyone anymore.
The inside of the house, much to the surprise of a visitor (and it would be a surprise to have a visitor), was spotless. I’m talking hospital spotless because basically, my wife took everything that would collect dust and interest. I had a few paintings and rugs that made an attempt to splash color into my mediocre life, but most everything was
white, or off white, or brown, or moldy, which can be considered a color in most houses. The only room that had more color than a mime’s face was my study, the one place my wife wasn’t allowed in to begin with. The side panels were a warm and comforting dark cherry wood, and a colorful Indian rug covered much of the floor up. They were a few idly draped end tables before my small, brown leather couch and a rocking chair. Both these luxurious items of comfort rested in front of my stone fireplace, big and ominous against the far wall. The room smelled of books and firewood, memories of a childhood marred by things I could not explain to young children. Not that I talked to children.
It was in this room where my last night began. The swirling storm outside, and the loud radio inside, had been just enough noise for me to calm down and get into a good book. I couldn’t tell you much more than it was of a man, a boat, and his dead wife in a casket in his room, but those things aren’t as horrible as my own story. In the back
of my mind I could hear all these things, plus the smooth creaking of my rocking chair. But there was always a part of me, even if I was involved deeply in something, that wasn’t watching or listening to what was going on. It was waiting for something else. The wait was always the worst. Knowing something was coming and nothing to be done
about it but to wait as it took its good old time making you miserable.
The moment you get comfortable, that’s when it hits you. I was comfortable in that old room with my good book and my crackling fireplace when I heard it. It was just a low sound, and if I hadn’t been listening like a crazed maniac, I would have missed it. It was different from the howling of the wind, the crackling of the fire, the shuffle of the pages of the book. It was a scratch, a slow, menacing scratch, like someone scrapping a pen down the side of a tiled hallway. But I knew it was something worse. It was the tip of a claw against my exposed hard wood floor. Like all the times before, my heart froze in
my throat till I swallowed it down. And then I waited once more, waited like the fool that I am. I waited for the noise again, hoping that it was just my imagination, hoping I wasn’t right. After a few seconds, there it was again, followed by a dragging sound, the sound of a hard tail sliding across the floor. This time, I could hear my heart beat above every other noise around me. It banged in my chest like a kid bangs on his first set of drums. But I had to remind myself; I was a professional at this game.
It was all just routine, I would tell myself. I would turn around, and there would be nothing there but an excuse to laugh at my pathetic, imaginative sad self. So I skipped this unnecessary step and laughed away, turning back to the pages of my book. The noise did not come again. Thinking my trial of the night was over, I finished that book, poked the fireplace till it was diminished, and put the book back on the shelf. Sighing with slumber on my mind, I stretched and turned to leave the room. I stopped mid-step and gazed at horrid and wonder at what was before me. There, in the middle of my rug, was a lump. Never did I know something so small could strike such terror into my person. I barely had reason enough at that time to think upon what it was but I knew, it was no mouse. It was the size of a cat now that I think back to it, and that small object kept
me frozen in place for a long time. I didn’t move, and neither did it. Had it been there before, I wondered? Did I stumble a little as I walked in as to make a bump in the rug? Suddenly it moved, just a twitch. But it was good enough for me. This was it. This was the moment in horror movies that everything goes wrong, and that everyone thinks can never happen to them. But I believed it, in the back of my mind, even if everyone thought I was insane. I became very angry at that thought, and I don't know what compelled me, but I grabbed the nearest weapon I could and ran to the lump and raised the heavy object above my head With a thunderous crash the chair came down upon the ground, and I didn’t wait.
I hit it again and again and again, years of this chaos every night welling up inside of me. I was tired of being afraid, tired of being crazy, tired of being the neighborhood freak. With all my passion I banged that chair against the ground more times than I remember, till the chair was just a toothpick in my hands when I was done. After taking
a few moments to catch my breath, I surveyed the damage. Pieces of my wooden chair lay scattered all over the room like a tornado had just gone through. Angrily I pushed them all aside and off the rug, till only splinters remained. The lump was gone. The rug was smooth underneath my hands as I got down to check for broken body parts or...whatever I expected to find. I stared at the rug and finally realized it was the ugliest thing I had ever seen. I sat down and laughed, just laughed at myself. I truly was insane. I just destroyed one of the only pieces of furniture my ex-wife had left me. Now I had to go, shopping. I hated shopping, with the lines and the sixteen-year-old girls more concentrated on their gum or of the picture of a hot soap opera star behind you to ring up your purchases right.
With these thoughts I rose from the floor and started for the door once more, intent on cleaning up my mess…sometime later. And like I said, they get you when you least expect. Suddenly the straight world became horribly vertical, and I watched the view go from my hallway to the floor very quickly. With a splat of pain I crashed upon my hard wood, and groaned at my stupidity. I had tripped over a piece of wood. I rolled over and looked down at my feet, but no disrupted timber lay there. I panned out and my breath froze in my throat once more. Against the couch, on the far side of the carpet, rested the lump. I lay there straightened out, my hands up towards my face and stared at it. I could not move, I could not flee, I could not do anything but lay there. Like a speeding train the lump rushed from the far side of the rug to the edge of the rug near me, and I barely had time to scream before a claw reached out and grabbed my right foot. All I remember is the heart wrenching scream from my own mouth and the strength the little claw pulled me under the rug with.
Red eyes flashed as a cackle echoed in my ears, before darkness overtook me, before finally, my Bedevil had won.
