The rapping on the front door turned into a pounding that made the door jump and knocked around the couch. I could hear it creaking. Or was that the door and frame? The pounding continued, making it harder for me to breathe. Was it the police? A neighbor? Someone… orsomethingelse?
“Shouldn’t have read that fucking book,” I whispered.
Logically a neighbor could have seen smoke or smelled it. Maybe they were checking on the property. The glow of the fire would be visible to anyone who peeked through the windows. Why hadn’t I tried to put the curtains back up?
The pounding got louder and I couldn’t take it. I ran up the stairs to hide. Whoever was trying to punch through the door didn’t sound friendly or neighborly. They sounded pissed off. The day must be close to gone, and the storm hadn’t let up, so when I snuck into the room with the rose petal wallpaper, it was nearly pitch-black. I scrunched myself into a small spot between the bookshelf I’d nearly overlooked and the corner of the room. If the door opened it would block me from sight, I decided, checking it out as the pounding continued. After all, I’d nearly missed the whole shelf.
I felt very rational and was congratulating myself on keeping my shit together, until I sat down on the floor and drew my knees to my chest. Panic began to eat at me. I had trouble breathing. My sweaty palms had me repeatedly wiping them on the legs of my dirty jeans. I rested my forehead on my knees. The hammering on the front door stopped, and I let out a shaky breath.
Gentle taps began again, and it sounded like the noise was coming from the back of the house now. My muscles tensed, and I huddled as small as I could against the wall. The rapping turned into pounding, just like it had on the front door. The assault went on for a long time, long enough that my arm would have gotten tired and fallen off if it had been me doing it, and then it stopped abruptly.
My body sagged against the bookshelf, and I leaned my head on the cold wood while I listened. Maybe whoever it was had given up? I didn’t want to see anyone, no matter what, so I’d wait for a while to be sure they were gone. The darkness settled in on me. My eyes had adjusted, and I could make out the edges of large pieces of furniture. A strange smell caught my nose as I sat in my hiding spot, though, sweet and awful like the last wisps of a dead rat decomposing in a wall. That happened sometimes in my apartment building because it was older and there was no stopping the occasional rodent.
The longer I sat, the more certain I was there was something dead in the room. My nose twitched, but I couldn’t see very well. Creeping dread smacked me, but on the other hand, if something was dead it couldn’t bother me—unlike whoever had been beating on the door.
So, I stayed hidden. My eyes were closed and I was drifting off to sleep, in spite of my worry, when a loud crash from downstairs that sounded like it came from the kitchen had me sitting bolt upright. It sounded like a bomb had hit the house, and I had no doubt if I went down there, the back door would be smashed in somehow. A trickle of frigid air swept across my face and I shivered.
Clutching at my knees, I wished I had a weapon of some kind. I knocked my head against the bookshelf. I could have armed myself somehow if I’d considered it earlier in the day, but why the hell would I have suspected something weird like this would happen? Tyler had been acting so odd, but I’d thought it was about the police. Were they down there? I pressed my mouth to my knees.
“I can smell you, pretty little thing. No use hiding.” A man nearly sang the words, and they carried through downstairs.
I held my breath. That was Tyler… but he soundedwrong. Maybe like he was drunk or something? Fear slithered through me. Nothing about this house was right. Crazy as it felt to imagine it, I didn’t think that voice belonged to Tyler. I’d read scary stories of creatures imitating people when they camped in the woods, then dragging unsuspecting friends of theirs off to… gnaw their bones or something.
Fuck, this wasn’t a scary story,but he doesn’t sound right. Was there something wrong with him, like Mr. English? Had I missed it somehow?
Thud. Thud. Thud.Heavy footsteps came up the stairs.
Tears slipped out of my eyes.
“I fucked you in the middle of the night. You liked that, didn’t you? He gave you the blindfold. The bastard thought he tricked me. I got him good. I’m going to break you and leave you for him to find. He thinks he can control me, but I’m not a dog to be chained. I’m not his beast!” Tyler screamed.
My heart hammered. Did Tyler have a personality disorder? Why was he talking about himself that way? I’d seen enough cop shows to know that sometimes people had a psychotic break from reality. Was that what was happening? Was the pressure from his job too much?
“Motherfucker, you leave him alone,” came a snarled reply from someone else.
I sat up straighter and flinched. Thatdidsound like Tyler. Was he out there with another man? Was he in trouble?
There was deep laughter, and I got a crawling sensation over my skin like a thousand bugs were wriggling there as I listened to it.
Okay, Tyler was… unstable? I hated that word, but he definitely needed help, and I was scared. I knocked my chin on my knee. Should I go out there? Try to talk to him? He’d told me not to let him in, though, so maybe he’d had an idea something like this was coming. People didn’t know when they were going to go off the deep end when they had a mental health issue, did they? Confusion combined with the fear in my chest until I was sweating and hyperventilating.
Silence filled the air, and I held my breath, straining to hear or see anything in the room.
After several minutes, nothing happened, and I felt silly. Okay, facts—Tyler was having a meltdown of some kind and had… maybe killed Mr. Enoch. I thought long and hard about that last thing and decided it didn’t make me care less about him, and maybe it made me feel like… I loved him. He cared enough to protect me, misguided as it was to hurt someone else. So, he’d maybe done that? But he was also huge and not in his right mind. I closed my eyes tight.
What should I do?
I leaned my head back and jumped when the door swung and there was a face within an inch of mine. A hand shot out and grabbed me around the throat, which hurt the second the fingers closed tight around the sides. He drew me slowly up to standing, giving me time to get my feet underneath myself, but he kept going until I had to go on tiptoe or choke. It had to be Tyler. The hulking shadow was too big to be anyone else.
“What are you doing? I love you,” I said desperately, grabbing at his arm.
“Did Tyler tell you his secret? I don’t always notice everything he does.” The fingers around my throat tightened.
I gagged as my head swam. “No,” I gasped out.
“He’s a demon.” He spun and tossed me to the floor. I tried to catch myself with my unhelpful hand and cracked my elbow on the floor instead. Pain had my head swimming.
“YouareTyler,” I huffed out, trying to crawl away in spite of the pain. “Don’t hurt me.”
