For those that haven’t heard of helium.com, it is a writer’s wet dream. It is a very engaging site that is revolutionizing freelancing. It is a great place to share you thoughts and ideas with others, or a way to work on your conquest of the written word. There is an incredible amount of great content on the site, and is highly recommended to the avid reader and writer alike. I wrote this on the spot for a novel excerpt in the field of horror. 20 minutes and no revisions, more to come on this one.
I remember a time not too long ago when I didn’t feel this way. Things were going good for me and I really felt like I’d made a lot of steps in the right direction. For the first time in my life I had my head on straight and was slowly but surely becoming a part of normal society. I had a girlfriend, a good paying job and a dog named Freddie. I was on my way to the American Dream.
That dream, at last, turned into the American Nightmare.
The night was dragging. I couldn’t wait to get home. I firmly believe that a person can only make so many phone calls before losing it just a little bit. I’d been working at the Star Registry for about six months and just recently received a promotion to shift supervisor. The pay was good, the working environment was good, talking to people all day and night was not. If it were up to me, people would have to get a license to have children. That would eliminate some of the rejects that I have to talk to, thus making my job a hell of a lot easier.
I made my final phone call for the night, turned in my required reports and made my way out into the Chicago snow. This winter was brutally cold, and each step I took was accompanied by a slap in the face from the relentless wind. I put my head down and pushed forward towards my apartment, a man on a mission.
Jenny and I had been dating going on a year. It was a a remarkable relationship, the kind that makes the people around you a bit jealous. I really think that we had the intangibles that are required to have a flourishing, rewarding relationship. Tonight was our movie night, a night to cuddle and eat popcorn on the couch. I hurried my step as I inched closer to home, when I noticed an old man, hunched over underneath the frozen street light.
The purple rays bounced off the snow, creating a strange aura around the hunkering old man. As I went to pass him he whipped his head around, and snarled at me in a vicious voice.
“Boy, you face your maker this night”, he said, yellow eyes piercing my soul.
“You’ll fear him, oh you will. Your past is present”.
He quickly whipped back around as I hurried past him. I noticed out of the corner of my eye that the ground around him was red. I looked back for a split second, just long enough to see him gnash his teeth into a quivering, dead rat.
I was shaken up quite a bit. I’d seen some pretty strange things in my life, but that topped it all. I had a bad taste in my mouth, and although it had to be close to 5 below I was sweating like a pig. I made my way up the path to my apartment and couldn’t shake the man’s eyes from my head. I’m sure they were yellow. Just sure of it.
The shaking in my hand was making it pretty difficult for me to get the key into the building door. After a bit of struggling I slid the key in and made my push to exit the wicked cold air that burned my lungs. I pushed forward and ran my chest into the door with a thud.
My key wasn’t working.
I became frantic as I tried again and again to maneuver my useless key into the keyhole. I pounded on the door, expecting someone to let me in, when a woman poked her head out the door from the neighboring building.
“What’s with all the commotion over there?”, she asked pointedly.
“My damn key won’t work”, I answered through and uncontrollable shiver.
“Karen, do you still have the key that Jenny gave you?
Something is up with this key, and I’m freezing to death out here.”
I’m not sure when I noticed it, but I soon realized that this woman was looking at me, through the terrified eyes of a worried stranger. Her demeanor quickly shifted and she started to close the door, surely to never set eyes on me again.
“Hey wait, come on”, I exclaimed. “You still have it, don’t you?”
“Listen guy, I don’t know who you are, but if you don’t get out of here, I’m calling the cops.”
She shut the door with a sudden bang and left me standing in the frigid, unforgiving night.
I sat there for second, dumbfounded. That second felt like an eternity. I ran through my head every possible explanation, every possible scenario. What the hell was going on?
I stumbled around to the back of the building. The wind was blocked a bit, giving me a sweet release from the barrage of icy rain that started to fall while I was playing things over in my mind. I went through the back utility door and made my way up to my apartment.
The light in the hallway was out. A flickering, broken halogen lamp cast shadows across the walls. I couldn’t be certain, but I though for sure I heard the drip drop dripping of water leaking from the walls. The darting shadows were playing tricks on my mind, as I reached for the knob to enter my apartment.
The doorknob was cold, too cold. I turned it with and eerie creak and pushed my door open with caution. The smell hit me like a punch to the stomach, and I gagged a retched heave, covering my mouth and nose with a quickness. The light switch clicked uselessly, so I pulled my lighter of out of my pocket.
Lighting that lighter, seeing what I saw, sent me tumbling forward, catching myself on the hallway banister. There was blood everywhere, it coated everything like a blanket of red madness. My mind was spinning, spiraling out of control. I tried to scream, but couldn’t seem to force the air out of my lungs. I fell to the floor, head in hand, and rocked myself back and forth. Back and forth. I could still see that old man’s wicked yellow eyes in my head. I shook uncontrollably, closed my eyes, and tried to get him out of my head.
………………………………..
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