Below The Dark

Chapter 9: Sleep Paralysis

Eddie stood with his hands behind his back, staring at the black handprint on his wall. Even after Sadie and Lani had left, he had tried to erase it. And had failed. He edged forward, and gingerly touched the print with his bare hand. It felt as if burnt tar had been smeared on the wall. He exhaled sharply and stepped back, and rubbed his fingers on his pants.

Whoever it was, she was clearly unstable. This was a woman who dipped her hands in tar, who broke into apartments in the middle of the night, who lunged at people in elevators … all to scare them. And Owle knew something about her. Eddie could tell. But why was he lying? What was he hiding?

He kept thinking about that night. The sleepless night, when he had seen her flit across his room and had heard her laughter. His thoughts were broken when his phone rang. It was Sadie.

“The police are here,” she said quietly when he answered it. He hung up and went down to the ground floor. As he walked down the stairs, his eyes kept moving towards the elevator, and towards the darker corners of the stairs. He hoped she wasn’t lurking anywhere, waiting to pounce on someone …

When he had gone downstairs, he saw a police car parked in front of the building, and a police officer standing near it. He was a tall and heavy-built man, with a tanned face and a fierce moustache. Sadie and Alfie were talking to him, and they were surrounded by curious residents of Sunrise Towers. No sooner had Eddie approached them than he felt someone tug his arm and pull him aside.

It was Owle.

“What is this?!” Owle hissed at him. “Why have you called the cops? Are you serious?! I told you not to speak about that woman to anyone! Are you an idiot, or what?”

“I did what I had to,” Eddie said to him coldly. He pulled his arm free and walked over to the office. He looked at him and asked, “You Eddie? And you have seen this woman too?”

“Yes, sir,” Eddie said. Lowering his voice, he told the office about the woman and the experiences they had had with her. He made notes in his pad and said, “I am new here, and I don’t know much about the town. And I’m gunna be frank, man. The story seems very far-fetched. A tar-covered woman attacking people, and you three are the only ones who have seen her? Too fictional to buy, don’t you think? I need proper evidence. And only then can I–”

“I have evidence,” Eddie said. “There is a print of her hand in my apartment. She must have broken in when I wasn’t there, and she left that handprint on the wall.” The office looked at him over the top of his shades once and then shrugged. “Fine,” he said. “Show me the handprint.”

The office shooed away the onlookers and went into the building with Eddie, Sadie, Alfie and Lani. Mr Owle watched them leave, a tensed expression on his face.

The five of them went up to the seventh floor, and Eddie hurriedly opened his door and let them in. The police wanted evidence? He had the evidence. Once the policeman got convinced, he would begin investigation, and soon, he hoped, they would find that deranged woman and put an end to all the madness going on in the building.

But when he turned to show him the wall, the handprint wasn’t there.

“I – I swear,” he said shakily, his trembling finger pointing at the wall. “It was there. A while ago, it was there! I swear, officer –”

“That’s enough,” the policeman said. “Seriously, that’s enough. If you thought you could prank a policeman in uniform, you were wrong. I’m letting you go this time, but if I hear another prank of this sort from you, I’ll arrest all of you.”

“You don’t understand, officer,” Alfie said, moving in front of him. “She attacked me. She ATTACKED me! And I saw her handprint too, right over there!” He pointed crazily at the empty spot on the wall. “It was right there! She erased it! I am telling you, something strange is going on here, sir!”

The officer pushed past him and stormed out of the apartment, muttering about time-wasters. Alfie made to run after him, but Lani grabbed him and pulled him back. “There’s no use,” she said. “He doesn’t believe you. See, the only evidence we had is missing!”

“You do believe us, don’t you?!” Sadie asked her.

“Of course I do,” Lani said. “But you need to see how absurd this is! I believe you because I know you. But they don’t! The police doesn’t, and Mr Owle doesn’t! They have no reason to believe a story with no proof, right?!”

“It was right here,” Eddie shouted, and he banged on the wall with his fist. And as soon as he did, a soft laughter echoed around the room. That woman’s laughter.

Alfie crumbled into the corner, his hands grabbing fistfuls of his hair as he moaned. Eddie shouted out, “Come out here! Wherever you are, come on out! We’re not afraid of you!”

The laughter ceased, but the woman didn’t make an appearance. Eddie didn’t think she would. Sadie was shaking, and she grabbed the table to support herself. “Who is it?!” she cried in an agonising tone. “Who the hell is it? Why is she doing this?”

“Owle was lying when he said he didn’t know anything,” Eddie said. “Alfie, come with me. We’ll threaten the secret out of him if we have to.” Alfie had stood up now, and he was trying hard to compose himself. He rubbed his face, scratching his beard, and he said, “Yeah. Let’s … let’s go.”

Sadie and Lani returned to their apartment, telling them to call them if they learnt anything. Eddie and Alfie went down to Owle’s apartment. “Brace yourself,” Eddie said. “Owle’s apartment is a worse nightmare than any devilish woman.” He knocked on the door smartly; his doorbell didn’t work. He waited for Owle to answer, but he didn’t. They waited for a while, until Alfie said, “I guess he isn’t home. Let’s go now. We’ll come back later.”

Lani was glad she was not alone tonight. Sadie was sleeping on the twin bed next to hers. The strange events happening around her today was enough for her to feel shaken up. That mysterious handprint … the woman no one saw … at first she had felt that the three of them were playing a prank on her together. But when they called the cops, and when she heard that creepy laughter, all her doubts were cleared.

She drifted away to sleep at around midnight, and had a brief dreamless sleep. But when she woke up well past two, she knew at once that something was wrong.

She was unable to move. She didn’t know why, but as she tried to get up, to move her limbs, to turn her head, she found that she was completely immobile. Fright gripped her at once, and she tried to shout out to Sadie, but she couldn’t even do that. Her jaws wouldn’t move. For a few moments she made a soft groaning sound with her firmly closely mouth.

And then, in the dark, something loomed up over her. She didn’t register her at first, but then she saw that blackness, and the glowing eyes. It was her. That woman they were talking about. She was here! She was in their apartment!

Sadie, wake up! Lani tried to scream. She desperately wanted to scream. The woman was right above her, staring at her. In the darkness, Lani saw her mouth widen. It widened crazily, right up to those glowing eyes, but the woman made no noise.

Terror was taking over her. She couldn’t move, she couldn’t speak. She tried to close her eyes, hoping this was all a nightmare, but when she opened them again, the woman was still staring down at her, grinning that horrible grin. SADIE! SADIIIEEEE!

The woman moved. She walked around her bed and resumed her posture. Slowly, she raised her hands, and lightly touched Lani’s forehead. Her obscenely long finger, with that long fingernail, was as cold as ice. Lani screamed as hard as she could, but she was still unable to open her mouth.

And then that woman opened her mouth and gave out that nightmarish cackling laughter. Sadie woke up with a start, and as she looked their way and saw the woman, she screamed. Lani expected the woman to lunge at her, but she didn’t. She kept on laughing. Sadie jumped up, and switched on the lights. And as soon as she did, the woman disappeared. Vanished into thin air.

Sadie rushed to Lani, but by that time, Lani had fainted. Sadie kept shouting her name, and when she sprinkled some water on her face, and Lani woke up, she hissed, “She’s not human!”