Nightmare Ink Presents Issue 4

Welcome, once again, to Nightmare Ink Presents.

This chapter comes with a bit of a trigger warning. In all honesty, I debated with myself if I should refer to it or not as it might spoil some of the story but I ended up deciding to do it.

So here it goes.

Trigger Warning: scenes referring to or mentioning suicide please be advised. If you feel uncomfortable going on at some point in the story, contact me and I’ll do a non-triggering summary of this chapter for you and tell you what part to skip.

Good reading.

The Haunting of Blackwood Manor Chapter V: Sleepless

Mark and Alex's ride home had become a quiet one after some time.

They had talked a bit about their trip into town but when Mark tried to turn the conversation to what his son had thought about Lily, Alex had just mumbled a few disconnected words like “nice” and “geeky”, but after his father had been poking at him for what seemed too long with something along the lines of what he really thought of her Alex simply asked back what his father’s friend had meant with his “it’s not rats”. After that, they just rode in silence until they reached home.

“Dad…” Alex said as he closed the car door. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to be… It’s just that after Addie’s… It’s…” his voice started to tremble.

His father had circled the car while Alex spoke and was now pulling closer to him in a side hug.

“Hey, hey! My bad, kiddo. I should have known better than to barge in like that. Say, why don’t you go for a walk while I get everything inside and see if those two slackers have started prepping dinner?”

Alex shrugged.

“I’m okay,” he said composing himself. “And I have to give this to that pain in the…” He cut himself short and looked at his father while he raised the brown paper bag where Pete had put the book.

They walked inside together, side by side and laughing.

“If I didn’t know better, which I don’t, I would say that those two are finally warming up to each other,” Mark said leaning into the door frame between the kitchen and the living room.

“Yeah, and it only took them seventeen years to do that. Amazing right?” Sarah said appearing behind him.

Emily was once again at the old chair reading the comic her brother who was propped with his elbows in the chair’s arm and peeking over her shoulder, had bought her. She had been hyped at the prospect of having a completely new thing to read, something she didn’t know anything about, not what it was about, not the author. Nothing. This book her brother had brought was a blank slate and she was loving it. Only…

“Will you be there all night?” She twisted her neck to be able to look at her brother. “Next time buy yourself a copy,” she got up from her place and made her way to the stairs. “Going to my room so I can read in peace.”

“Guess I spoke too soon,” Sarah said to her husband. But as she spoke, Emily returned to the chair she had left seconds before and hugged her brother, who was still trying to understand what had just happened, and quickly made the stairs to her room for good this time.

“Well, I wouldn’t be so sure,” Mark replied.

The sun was just rising as Alex walked down the path that led to Blackwood Forest when he heard the rustling of leaves behind him. He didn’t give it much attention, just an animal or something of the sort. He continued his way down the earthen path. The rustling came again, stronger, closer. This time Alex looked at the place from where the noise was coming. A word formed in his lips. He wet his lips as if that would make speaking easier.

“Addie,” he whispered lowly. “What are you doing here? You… How?” Addie stopped him before he could continue.

“Can’t I visit you, silly?” Addie’s raven black hair seemed to shine under the first light of the morning. “Your parents told me where to find you. I just arrived,” she looked at him with a serious expression on her face, even as she smiled. “I’ve been thinking, and I know it’s been a long time. But I thought that I could make a new start here with you,” she moved closer and put a hand on his chest, over his heart. It was a crisp morning and Alex could sense the cold on Addie’s hand, almost too cold. “And yes, I know I hurt you. Bad. But…” She started walking down the path, her head bowed as if inspecting the dust that rose as she walked. “I really think we should give it another try; I think this time it would work. I talked to my parents and they let me stay in town for the summer, maybe I can’t get a job or something. We could see how things go. Please, Alex?” She was looking back at him.

“Addie, you can’t be here. You can’t…” Alex was now on the verge of tears. “Addie, how are you here?”

“I told you, silly. I arrived late last night and stayed in town. Came here as soon as I could.”

“No, Addie. You can’t. It’s not…”

“Yes, I can. I can do whatever I want, silly. You don’t want me to be here?”

“I…”

“Is there someone else already? Is that it?” She motioned to move closer to him and Alex backed up a step. “Is that why we can’t be together?”

“No, there’s no one else. But Addie, you…” Once again Addie cut him off.

“Or is it because of this?” She presented her arms to him, palms upward, revealing a gash in each of them. Blood started dripping from the wounds.

“No, no, no…”

“Oh yes, silly.” A straight razor with a nacre handle had come out of nowhere and its blade shine reflected the sun as she lunged at him.

Alex opened his eyes, beads of sweat dripping down his forehead. From his side position, still in his bed, through the open window, he could see that it was still the middle of the night. He thought about rolling in bed to get his cell phone from the bedside table on the other side, but he stopped himself from doing that and instead remained still. He could sense someone at the edge of the bed. He could feel a body sitting there by the pressure it made on the mattress and the way his covers were stretched. He didn’t dare to move but whoever it was that was sitting on his bed did. Alex felt a hand touching his shoulder, just a gentle caress nothing more. Whoever it was whispered something into his ear. Alex didn’t know if she, because it was a woman’s voice, knew he was awake, but he did his best to pretend he was asleep.

“It was just a nightmare, my baby,” the voice had said. “No need to be afraid.”

Two doors down, in the master bedroom, Sarah had awakened to a strange sound. A sound she hadn’t heard in years. Crying. And not just any crying, a baby’s cry. At first, she had thought it was some kind of dream but now that she was awakened, she could still hear it. By her side, Mark lay peacefully. She got up and went to the bathroom to pour herself a cup of water. She entered the bathroom across the hall and the crying subsided a little bit. “Didn’t I hear somewhere that foxes sometimes sounded like babies crying?” She thought to herself. Since she was awake, she decided to check the children’s room. “How strange to think of them as children.” She was at the door to Alex’s room. He was lying on his side, his breath making the covers go up and down. He twitched as if something, a mosquito, or bug was flying next to his ear. The cry was louder here. Noticing the open window, she understood why the noise was louder here. “Foxes, that’s what it is.” She made her way back to her room, passing Emily’s without even glancing at it.

Mark had watched his wife get out of the room and had heard the faucet turn on as she got some water. He had waited. Counting. She didn’t take long to return to bed, so everything was ok. It was not as the old man had told him. He knew it wasn’t, but the man was so sure in his warning about Sarah. What had been his words? “Keep your eyes open. It might not happen today, but it will happen.”

Mark shrugged the feeling and the conversation he remembered having with the man, because what could it have been but a dream?

As Sarah got into bed, he turned and embraced, and not long after they were both asleep again.

Emily had seen her mother pass her room. She thought of calling her but what would she tell her? That she had awake and saw thin pieces of wallpaper being torn from the wall? Wallpaper that didn’t exist, mind you, as the room had been stripped of its previous, and rather garish, wall decoration the day before.

But Emily was sure of what she had seen, eight or so scraps of paper becoming loose as if something was ripping them out with a rake. A rake or... Nails. That was what she had first thought as she opened her eyes and saw the paper curling under some unseen force.

So, she kept quiet, as if she was sleeping even when she saw her mother returning to her room.

It was as she lay there that she noticed something that she had overlooked. Something that had bothered her since the first night at the house.

The scratching noise she had heard hadn´t come from inside the walls. It came from whatever was peeling the unexciting paper off the wall.

That’s it for today’s chapter.

I hope you enjoyed it and I can’t wait to hear from you in the comments.

See you in a week! Take care.

M.