Afraid of the Dark

She had made a mistake.

Katie knew it as soon as her eyes flicked around the room for the first time in hours.  Night had fallen outside, a long time ago. All the other lights in the house had been turned out. The only light left came from the living room and the TV rolling the credits for the movie that had just ended.  She vaguely remembered her mother’s voice telling her to go to bed, but more vividly remembered the flashes of light and sound coming from the climax of the movie. Now she was the only soul awake in the quiet house. And soon she would have to turn out the light. 

Inwardly, Katie sighed at herself; ten years old and she was still jumping at shadows and running from the dark. 

Her mom and dad told her a long time ago that there was nothing to be afraid of.  But, then Katie thought, there are things adults don’t understand. One of them was the dark.   Still, she didn’t want to frustrate them, or worse, let them think she was a total fraidy-cat. So she pretended to be over her fear.

 She wasn’t over it.

Not at all.                                                             

But they didn’t need to know that.

She had been afraid of the dark for as long as she could remember. There had been no explanation for it, no accidental exposure to slasher movies or horror stories told by friends in the middle of the night, just the instinctual primal fear of the dark. In the dark, familiar corners and objects were turned into hiding places for her nightmares. Her house was old and made strange noises in the silence of the night. Sometimes her closet door creaked open all by itself.  When that happened, Katie would tuck her toes under her blanket and pull the sheets up all the way up to her chin. If her toes didn’t show, she reasoned, nothing would get her. Katie never went out after dark if she could help it, or stayed up late by herself. She hate, hate, hated the dark, but sometimes, like now, she couldn’t do anything about it. The light-switch was on the opposite wall from the stairs. She couldn’t leave them on, and her mom had turned off the hall lights already, and that switch was all the way upstairs.

Now, sitting on the couch alone, she contemplated her plan. She would get up, turn off the light, and head for the stairs. She wouldn’t stop or turn around, but go straight to her room and jump in her bed, and make sure her feet where tucked up under her blankets so that nothing could get her.  

Easy … right?

She got up and, bided her time turning off the TV, removing the DVD from the player and putting it away before going over to the light-switch.  She counted to three while she reviewed her plan.

One,

Two,

 Threee…

One little snap and all the light in the room was gone.

Chills raced up and down her spine.

Calm down, Calm down! Katie ordered herself, There’s nothing there… She flinched. She felt like she was being watched. This was why the shadows always frightened her:

To Katie they seemed thick, alive even. They moved. She wanted to run for the stairs so badly it made her knees tremble.

NO! I can’t run! She remembered reading that predators loved to chase things, and if you ran they attacked.  She held her breath, plastered and indifferent look on her face- she couldn’t let them see she was scared- and turned slowly around toward the stairs. She felt the shadows stirring, watching, and waiting to see if she would run. She let out a shaky breath, she would. Not. Run.