Unsettling Tales

Faceless

We had shifted to a new town. Dad had got a transfer. Both mom and dad were hardworking people. Dad was a man of discipline. But he was soft on the inside kind of guy. Mom on the other hand, was quite fun loving. Not as strict as my dad. Both were very dear to me. And I was dear to them. After all I was their only child, a 12-year-old boy named Isaac.

I wish I had a brother. We could have played together. I didn't have many friends back in our old town. They thought I was weird or something, I think. There were none who would play with me. None.

I struggled to make friends there. But here, I did have someone to play with. My new friend Jake.

Since the time I had come here, Jake was my only friend. I didn't know anybody else. I was the new kid in the neighborhood. Jake was the same age as me. He was a maniac who couldn't sit still in one place. He was just full of energy. He always wanted to get into thrilling stuff. From what I had seen of him, the only thing he got into was trouble. He enjoyed it though.

I first met him at the town playground. We didn't talk much initially. But once we did, we became good buddies.

I studied the places as we walked down the street. The sun was going down behind the houses. A cool evening breeze swept across my face. I got a shiver. Wow, it gets really cold out here this early in the evening, I thought as I rubbed my palms to generate heat. We kept walking.

"And this is the local club where people come to play games... all kind of games," Jake said.

"Board games, ball games whichever type you play. They're mostly here," he continued. Pointing his finger at a building in the distance.

"Oh, cool," I said looking around the club entrance from the street.

The building looked new. It had good lighting. The gates were still open. There weren't many people outside. "I'll visit it, not today though," I told him.

"Well, no problem," he said. "...Because this is not the most interesting thing about this town you know...," he added, looking at me. I noticed his eyes. They lit up with excitement as soon as he mentioned that.

A smirk started to gradually form on his face.

"What?" I asked.

It was getting dark now.

In the distance, I could see the street lights coming to life as they illuminated the darkening streets. In just a few minutes, the whole street we were standing on, was lit brightly. The town looked quite beautiful at night. It wasn't too populated. People lived not too close to each other like jammed houses, but neither too far from each other. We hadn't met all of our neighbors yet. I only knew Jake from this town. But he wasn't my neighbor.

"There is a rumor about the forest that's near the edge of this town," Jake said in a low voice. He looked towards me as he said it. His gaze fixed on my eyes. I listened intently to his next words.

"There is a tree" he said. "And a house, near that tree," he added.

"What house and what tree?" I questioned him.

Silence.

He had paused.

I couldn't make out if he was scared to say the next thing, or whether he was messing with me.

The street was empty except for the occasional bikers speeding past us.

"I have an idea" he said. I realized he was thinking, not messing with me.

"Tomorrow, at about 8 pm meet me here. I will show you that house," he said calmly.

"I know where it is," he added.