The Void

Illusions

Oh where did she go?
Nobody knows.

A crippled heart is all he had left.
On his left, a beer in hand and on his right his son slouching over on the couch.

Not even a year after his wife was murdered his daughter goes missing. He couldn't do anything about it. He couldn't even process it. While Mark lied asleep on the couch, he thought about only how he would tell him.
Go to the police maybe, call a friend, see if they have her. He thought of all these options but couldn't bring himself to do any. He could only assume the worst has happened. Some monster had taken his wife and had come back for the children. Maybe his son was next.
This wasn't fair was it?

He stood up.

Leaving the beer in it's place, he slowly walked over to her room. Alice's room. The house was so quiet that his own footsteps would disturb the peace of bitter silence.
Every noise was harsh.
The light of the sun felt so gray shining across the room, even though the curtains were previously thrown elegantly open.

Dolls splattered across the floor and a small blue table in the middle covered in so many drawings. These things made her so happy and entertained her for days. Now it's like they were judging him for not paying enough attention as to let her get away.

One picture was more clear than the rest. As if it were placed in a spot directly for him to see above all others, but for nobody else.
This drawing wasn't like all her created characters no.
It was just an arrow.
Pointing down.
There was something it was pointing at, but he wouldn't even know how to describe it.

The paper was taped up above a cardboard box.
She begged to keep that box in her room instead of throwing it out. She vowed to make it beautiful with glitter and paint.
It had been painted all black and then forgotten about.
Just so she could make more characters.
But she'd like to sit in it when doing that.

Oh memories, they're the root of evil for him right now.
Mark is going to wake up soon. Maybe he'd start them off with a nice breakfast, it's been awhile since they've enjoyed that.
He crept back into the living room avoiding to make loud steps again.
He was asleep.
Or was he?
In his absence he managed to pull a small light blue blanket over himself.

He wasn't thinking straight, it's not unusual though. Why hasn't he done anything for his daughter yet? What if she was just hiding?

it seemed unlikely for someone so bouncy and full of energy to want to hide for so long. What a cruel joke that would be though.

He opened the cabinets to find nothing but a single can of opened beans. Ones his son thought he wanted but really didn't and put them back as soon as he tasted them. It's been there for months now.
Did he even remember how to cook? After him and his wife had their children she took over that. Mark was almost sixteen now. So many years.

So he would have to go to the store. A mild annoyance for the currently lazy man but still doable. He wasted no time grabbing the car keys and on his way to the door he paused in front of a mirror. Who has time making themselves look nice anymore? Who cares if you get judged by people you don't even know.

His wife cared. She loved dressing up for any occasion even if it was just getting the mail. She would wave to the neighbors in her beautiful blue dress and they would be jealous she was having more fun than them in her adult life. It was like every day was a party for her.
And her daughter picked up on this trait, girl's day was horribly long.

He needed to stop thinking about them.
Food.
He had to get food.

He put his hand on the doorknob but paused. In the distance there was crying. Somewhere in his house. It was clear it was from an adult woman, not his missing child.

It was often he'd hallucinate the return of his beloved wife, he knew everytime it wasn't real.

But he always checked. Just in case.

He ran after the noise, it lead him to his daughter's room. He just left there. He sighed out both sadly and annoyed. Of course nobody was there.

The silence was loud again. No more crying. Wait. That was wrong. It wasn't quiet. He heard something, what was it?

A pulsating vibration. Like something science-like or whatever. Maybe alien noises. Movies predicted it to be pretty similar to this one. The noise was getting louder.

He quickly found out it was emerging from the black box.
Run.
Run.
Run.

A voice in his head whispered soon to yelling at him.

Get out.
Call the police.
This is going to kill you.

Death was a little dramatic right? He crept towards the sound and ducked down to peer inside the box.

The sound stopped just like the crying did when he entered the room. The box looked all normal except for a folded up paper sitting down in it. He picked up this paper and unfolded it.

You shouldn't have done that
It read.

His vision was dimming. It was all going black. Was he passing out? No. It was just getting dark. At least he thinks so.

He felt fur. It was soft, the only comfort he's felt in the past year. It was calming. The fur surrounded him like a hug from a big warm blanket.

Yeah. A blanket. He thought while now drifting to sleep.

He has all the time in the world, why rush through life when he could just lay down.

So he did.

And then the world faded away.