The R Word (On Hold)

Chapter 13 - Good Times

Having washed and dried the dishes after dinner, Jane made her way upstairs to find her parents in the second floor living room; her mum resting her bare feet in her father’s lap and him massaging them affectionately. They were watching a re-run of CSI: Miami.

Jane leaned on the door frame, watching it for a few minutes before realising it was the episode her favourite character called Speed got shot and killed. She turned to her parents.

“I’m off to bed” she announced. Momentarily, they glanced over at her and smiled.

"Sleep well" wished her dad, turning the television down, his attention back on the show.

"Goodnight honey" bid her mother with a smile, "Love you!"

“Yeah, love you too” Jane yawned, looking at the television briefly before turning away, just as Speed got shot and headed upstairs to her bedroom. The first time she’d watched it, she cried her eyes out.

Jane changed quickly into her pyjamas, before slipping into bed. Her long hair was in a loose ponytail, her arms and legs smelled of coconut lotion and her teeth were minty fresh. With her bedside lamp switch on, Jane sat up in her bed; listening to the silence around her. Her bedroom door, having been replaced sometime during the day, blocked out all noise from the television downstairs. Her window was closed. Her room was deadly silent.

Throughout the summer, Jane occupied her evenings with long conversations with Alfie by text or she would read by lamplight or play Fruit Ninja on her phone. It was 9:47pm, far earlier than what she was used to. During the summer, the latest she’d ever been to bed had been three o’clock!

But tonight…Jane did none of those things. No book rested on her bedside table, waiting to be read. Her phone was on charge. She could do nothing, but think. And thinking was a dangerous thing.

Without thinking, Jane looked across the room to her dressing table mirror. She’d covered it with her black hoodie, hoping to keep away the visions and terrors of her imagination.

Without meaning to, Jane thought back to her encounter with Steven; a hallucination, she now accepted. Somehow by some way, Steven had been in her bedroom. His hold on her had felt so real. The terror was real. Everything about it felt impossibly real. He’d locked the door with those ghost-like hands. If he wasn’t real, how did the door remain locked? She hadn’t locked it…or so she thought. All these unanswered questions clung to her heart, like a cancer and squeezed with anxiety and fright.

Her hands to her head in frustration, Jane growled; her knees close to her chest.

There’s no point in getting yourself worked up, she scolded herself, dropping her hands into her lap heavily, “No point what so ever”

Sighing, Jane reached over to her bedside lamp and switched it off; darkness dominating her room. She snuggled down into the safety of her bed, her covers pulled up tightly to her neck. As her eyes adjusted, Jane could just about make out the faint outlines of the dressing table, her wardrobe doors, the mirror, her hoodie, and the spotlights overhead. Jane lay in the darkness for several minutes, convinced shadows and objects were walking about her room. She felt as if she were six years old again, watching and fearing the bogey man in her wardrobe and the fearsome octopus under her bed, with its eight arms wanting to drag her under and eat her whole. 

It was a childish thing, to fear the dark and imaginary creatures. Nowadays, parents discourage their children from believing in such things. Jane’s parents did exactly the same, but somehow the shadows and terrifying figures conjured themselves into her thoughts and sight like a wish gone bad. Jane hadn’t thought of the bogey man or the octopus under her bed since she was ten. She laughed quietly to herself, amazed at what the darkness had brought to her mind. She turned onto her stomach, stuffing her face in her pillow and closing her eyes. To her surprise and joy, her pillow smelled like Alfie.