346 Prompts

Number 12

"Write about a brief but scary encounter with one of your old professors."

- Note: Names have been changed for privacy's sake; remember that this is fictitious -

I had been going door to door fundraising for hours. The sun was hot on my skin and it was so humid, the air was oppressive. the last thing I wanted to do was fund-raise for another three blocks. I walked reluctantly to the next door and knocked. There was a moment of silence, then there was the hollow steps on the floor inside. The door opened a crack and a male voice asked from within:

"What do you want?"

"Hi," I said cordially, "I'm fundraising... Is that you, Mr. Creek?"

The door opened further.

"Oh, Kat. Its nice to see you," the blue beady eyes gazed out from a sea of blonde-red hair and beard that I could recognize from miles away.

"How are you doing?" it felt nice to talk to somebody from high school that I hadn't seen in a while. But then something felt strange too. The smell from the house was stale, possibly moldy. The air coming out of the house was dusty. There were small brown and red stains on his shirt, and bigger ones on his pants. He looked ragged. Something was off.

"I'm all right," Mr. Creek, "I've been pretty busy."

"Yeah," I tried not to sound suspicious, "Me too."

We both stood at the door awkwardly for a moment. I tried to look past him into the house to see what he had been doing.

"What are you so busy with?" I asked.

"Umm..." he looked uncomfortable, strange, "Skinning... an animal." he held out a large knife, dripping with blood. Fear gripped me and I froze. He had said in class that he was a vegetarian. He didn't eat animals. What kind of animal was large enough to bleed so much? What animal that large lived here, in the middle of a city? I looked into his eyes and I found a fearsome killer there. I had to get out. My mouth was dry and my heart was beating three times as hard.

"I got to go," I said hurriedly.

"Yeah, me too," he said monotonously.

I practically ran down the driveway and onto the street, his glare burning into the skin on my back.

I never came close to that block; my former teacher was a murderer.