Killer

A little girl and a mother sat on a sofa in front of an open window that gave a view to a neighborhood street covered in darkness from the night sky. The two were both mesmerized by the television, not even realizing that the show they had been watching for an hour finally ended. The little girl, about nine, couldn't hold still on the sofa to save her life.

Rain began to come crashing down to the Earth from the sky, letting the sound of thunder and the flashes of lightning begin. The mother picked up the remote and began flipping through the channels. She ignored the channel playing The Golden Girls, the channel playing a country music video, the channel playing Who Wants to be a Millionaire and the channel playing The 700 Club before stopping on The Channel 9 News. The topic of the night seemed to be the floods that have taken place in north Illinois due to the heavy rain all week.

"Mommy, when's daddy coming home?" the little girl asked, trying to start a conversation. It's weird how at such a young age children feel awkward with silence.

"He'll be home tomorrow night, remember?" her mother began, "He's on that business trip."

The little girl nodded, as if her mother was looking at her when really she was still hooked on the television screen. The news reporters took their few minutes to talk amongst themselves on camera, like the viewers watching were interested, and then finally brought up some important information. The mother turned down the volume and got up from the sofa to go to the kitchen. The little girl turned around, observing the happenings outside in the rain. Not that anything was happening; it was around nine o'clock at night, dark and quiet. A car hadn't gone by in hours.

The mother returned to the living room, sitting on the couch next to her daughter. She picked up the remote, and turned off the television that displayed a picture of a creepy man's face.

"What are you doing, Casey?" she asked, turning to her daughter while sipping the drink in her hand.

"Just looking outside..." her daughter replied, keeping her eyes on the street.

"Well how about we get you to bed? It's getting late."

"I'm not sleepy."

"Well we've got a big day tomorrow. You need to go to bed."

The little girl turned around, and sat forward on the sofa to pout.

"Give me a hug and a kiss. You can stay up late tomorrow."

The little girl did as her mother asked, and took off for the stairs to go to bed. Without turning on any light to see if there were any "monsters" in the hallway, she went straight to her room and climbed into bed.

She lay still in her bed, staring off into the darkness that surrounded the window that let in a little bit of the moonlight. Her eyes growing heavy, but her determination to stay awake kept her blinking them. Her mind raced with thoughts about today, and the plans for tomorrow. She thought of homework assignments coming up, and gave herself estimations on when she would need to start them to have them finished on time. She liked doing things at last minute, and for a nine year old, that wasn't too good of a sign for her high school career.

Lightning flashed, revealing things that couldn't be seen in the room otherwise; in front of the window sat a rocking chair, occupied by a clown puppet with the happiest face ever. The chair and the clown faced the little girl.

The little girl's eyes began to close. Suddenly she didn't feel that staying awake was as important as she did when she laid down for bed. She opened them again, trying to fight her eyes one more time, but gave up once they closed right after.

The first sound of thunder broke out, and she opened her eyes again. At the same time, a swift movement in the room broke out, too. She focused on it for a moment, making guesses as to what it could be, and then stuck to the idea that it could've been outside, but again, a movement in the room was heard.

The little girl sat straight up, staring at the rocking chair, and then at the other side of the room that was too difficult to see anything in because it was so dark. She jumped out of bed and ran out into the hall.

She stood at the top of the stairs, looking down at the light that pressed up against the wooden floor from the living room and listened to the sound of the television and her mother eating chips. She waited, debating on going downstairs and sounding like an idiot to her mother, or going back into her room and realizing it wasn't anything to worry about. Taking the "I'm brave" rout, she turned back and went back to her room, shutting the door behind her like normal. She casually made it to her bed, and got under the blankets.

The room was silent. She began to focus on the rain, and eventually fell into a light sleep.

Breaking the silence, and making her heart skip a beat, a glass fell off a table somewhere in the darkness of the room. The little girl's eyes sprung open, and she waited for any further movements. It wasn't long before she was hearing what she thought was footsteps.

Her heart pounded in her chest, and her ears began to get hot. She tried to examine every inch of the room through the thick blackness. It was hard to tell if she was really hearing quiet footsteps underneath the loud sound of the rain against the roof and walls outside. Her neck formed goose bumps.

The rain stopped, and so did the mysterious footsteps in the room. She looked around, sitting up just slightly. She tried to believe every conclusion she came up with in her head. The footsteps were coming from outside my room, she thought. The movement in my room was just my imagination. It was really the wind outside that sounded so close to me, but there was always that gut feeling in her stomach that told her otherwise.

The room was silent. For a second she thought it was her breathing she heard.

Lightning flashed outside, and her heart sank. The light filled the room for a quick few seconds, showing a man sitting in the rocking chair with the clown puppet on his lap. His eyes fixed on her, and widened with evil filled in them.

The girl gasped, sitting up in her bed and holding her eyes on his. The man sat motionless. She lifted her blankets to get out of bed. Before she could blink twice, the man was out of the chair, throwing the clown puppet against the window and cutting off any view she had to the room.

The little girl's mother knocked on the door.

"Casey?" she waited for a response. Nothing. She cautiously opened the bedroom door. The room was black. Mysteriously, window had been covered. She heard nothing in the room. She turned around to the light switch, and froze. The light from the hall she turned on peaked through the cracked door just enough to shine on the blood that ran down the wall by the door. Before she could lift the light switch, she was tackled to the ground.

THE END

Bio: Mr. Sherry is currently a student at Full Sail University for his BFA in creative writing. His most recent published piece was The Smiths.

E-mail: Nicholas Sherry

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