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Bump in the NightBy Kevin Bacon |
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Before he was awoken by the terror, which now haunts 34 Maple Grove, Henry was having an exceptionally fitful sleep. His body shifted with every second breath; it fell asleep in such positions that assured another Saturday-night-palsy, as the doctors had called it. At only 35 years of age, Henry sometimes had trouble walking, but he rolled around his bed with ease that night. Of course, there is a lot of room to roll when you're the sole user of a double bed. It hadn't always been that way. There was a time when he had a wife to wake him when he snored, or to steal the covers. Sometimes Kristen would call him ‘starfish’ for the way he would fall asleep which was always his favorite. When the sounds first started, Henry had his good ear to the mattress. A gun could have fired in the room and left him still snoring. First there was the pattering of footsteps around the house; Henry continued sleeping. Once the footsteps stopped, various drawers around the kitchen could be heard opening. The utensils shuffled around in their slots before the footsteps continued, quicker this time. Finally, at 3:30 in the morning, Henry rolled over onto his back. It didn't take long for him to awake from the unmistakable sound of breaking glass. The frightened man opened his eyes and stared up at the ceiling. Henry had kept the thought out of his mind for too long, and now the truth was rearing its ugly head. How does one prepare for such things as spirits returning from the dead? How could Henry even look down and face what was most definitely standing in the doorway? Or worse... at the foot of his bed. Why did she come back now? After all these years? Because her soul was restless until the killer who strangled her was finally caught? But even the police had closed that case two years ago! What did she want from her poor husband? Henry slowly lowered his eyes and saw what he had expected to see: The shape of Kristen's ghostly-white nightgown, standing in the hall, framed in the middle of the doorway. Once the shock had ended, Henry flicked on the lamp above his bed. Of course! It was just the ironing board he had left out. However, the burning question remained: Who in god's name was breaking glass at this hour? Without even putting on a shirt, Henry got out of bed. The floor was too cold for bare feet, so Henry slid into his slippers; this also eased the creaking of the floorboards, which were creepy enough by themselves. Henry didn't step but slid across the bedroom floor. He peeked around the door and saw down the hall, expecting the great window in his living room to be shattered. It wasn't, and he released his breath. Next he glided down the long cold hall to check the window in the kitchen. When he peeked around that corner, something was definitely out of place, but it wasn't the glass. One of the drawers was open. It had always been a pet-peeve of Henry's whenever Kristen had left the drawers open; was it a sign that she had come back? A chill ran down his spine. He shuffled over to the drawer, deciding that he was frightened enough to need a weapon. He found spoons, forks, and a plastic knife with the teeth all ground down. Of course! All the knives were in the dishwasher and were dirty. He closed the drawer and continued his investigation. When Henry actually set foot into the living room, he made a startling discovery. As he walked past the old piano, there was a crunch under his foot. By the light of the fish tank, he could see the reflection from a shard of glass. Close inspection showed that a picture frame had fallen off the top of the piano and shattered. This was proved by a mark in the dust where the picture of Henry and his ex-wife had stood for years. Henry’s heart began to beat at an incredible rate; he spun around expecting to catch a fleeting glimpse of the specter. Seeing nothing, Henry bent down to pick up the glass; he kept a large triangle of it to be used as a weapon if needed. SLING! It cut into his palm and he released it on instinct. What a foolish idea to use glass as a weapon! Against a ghost nonetheless! A strip of blood now coated one edge of the glass; he hoped none had gotten under his skin. Feeling rather embarrassed, he swept the glass onto the photograph to throw it all in the trash. Had there been enough light, Henry would have seen something that may have sent him screaming shirtless into the night. There was a second shard of glass with an identical strip of blood coating one of its edges; however, in a second it was all buried. Henry washed his hand in the sink and found that the cut wasn't deep enough for the blood to really flow. He staggered back to his bedroom to catch his final hours of sleep. The investigation had calmed Henry quite a lot. It would be daylight soon and he couldn't wait to laugh at the whole thing. He had tried to force a laugh right then, but wasn't comfortable enough to make sounds just yet. Just as his mind was succumbing to unconsciousness, something woke him for the second time that night. Not many sounds can beat the fear from glass breaking in the night, but this one was almost enough to give Henry a heart attack. He shook in his bed, gripping his sheets until the cut in his hand opened up again. He stared out into the hallway with eyes wide open, for this was a sound he hadn't heard in years, and it could not have been made by accident! The low key of the piano had just been struck! The sound repeated in his head over and over. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! Could something else have fallen onto the keys? Perhaps the house was shifting and another picture frame had fallen and struck that one horribly deep key? But the cover had been placed over the keys! It hadn't moved since... since Kristen used to use it. This time motivated by pure curiosity, Henry jumped off the bed and stomped to the hallway in his bare feet. There was a large stone, which was used to hold his bedroom door open; Henry lifted it and held it over his head. Arriving at the piano, however, only brought more questions. The cover was still closed over the keys, but the lid on the top of the piano had a handprint in the dust. It had been recently lifted; the evidence was clear as day! Henry sat down at the piano and opened it up. He began to play the only song she had ever taught him. As he worked his way down the keys, lower and lower, he grew more afraid of that one note which he had heard in the night. Which one was it? He was sure to remember its deathly sound. But what was this? That key was dead! It made no sound at all! He hit it harder, but it remained mute. He lowered his head to see if any of the pedals were pressed, although nothing could cause such a thing. With his head bowed down and his attention somewhere else, something thin swung past his eyes. He looked up in shock to feel it tighten tight around his neck. The wire dug into his skin while closing off his throat; it was impossible to scream. He grabbed at the thin cord with his fingernails, but he only pinched the skin. When he forced his head to the side, the wire cut and embedded itself in him for good. The assailant's big hands, one of which bore a cut like Henry's, tightened the cord harder and harder. Henry's parting thought pieced it all together: It's him! He was looking for a weapon himself! The hands went limp when Henry did, and then the big man escaped out the front door from which he had entered. Henry's heavy head hit the piano, sending a crash echoing through the house and down into the hall. It traveled outside and was distinctly heard by the killer; a little something to help him remember the house he had entered two times now, but would never come back to. |
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| ABOUT THE AUTHOR Kevin Bacon grew up in Winnipeg, Manitoba watching Godzilla and any other horror/sci-fi movies he was old enough to rent. After graduating, he enrolled at the University of Winnipeg as a theatre student with a specialty in filmmaking, where he is currently attending his third year. He won an award/scholarship for his creative writing and his main goal is to direct some of the films he has spend his time compulsively writing. As for his name, he didn't know there was another Kevin Bacon until he saw and became obsessed with Tremors. | |