Don't Let Him In

Don't Let Him In : Part 5

When J opened the front door later that afternoon his ears were assaulted by the squeals and screams of hyper little girls from his sister's class. The party was in full swing and everywhere he looked there were princesses in pastel coloured party clothes. His Dad had laid on spread of cakes and crisps, biscuits and sweet treats, the party-girls had emptied the plates and crushed food on the laminate floor. Now they were dancing around the family room and taking it in turns to use the karaoke machine. He couldn't handle the noise and frantic activity, so he snagged some sandwiches, crisps and a couple of fairy cakes and made his way up to his room, with the dog close on his heels.

He fired up his laptop and spent an hour or so on his homework, with a few YouTube tabs open in the background. He was still surfing the hypnotism topic, but  was struggling to understand the motivation for controlling the willpower of children. The noise levels downstairs had reduced considerably, just a few cheers and whoops of excitement, so the clown was evidently keeping the girls spellbound. J was racking his brains to find a link between arty, drama loving Katie and brainy top-set for everything guy Laurie, he was pretty sure their schedules didn't overlap for any classes and they hadn't been to the same primary school. He decided to let his subconscious run through the possibilities while he got on with his maths homework.

J suddenly jolted awake, the blue digital read-out said 2.58 am and, as on previous occasions, he could tell something menacing was nearby. He opened his bedroom door and stepped onto the landing, pale silvery light streaming through the hall window making it easy to pad downstairs silently. He scanned around the kitchen, but saw nothing amiss there, the dog was breathing heavily and twitching his paws, yet J could still feel a creepy vibe. He moved along the hall and that's when he heard sniffing and whimpering, coming from the family room. J peered around the door to see a hunched shape amongst the floor cushions. He crept further into the room and was distressed to see that it was his little sister Lulu, sobbing into the fabric. He crouched down cautiously, not wanting to startle her.

"Lulu ... what's the matter Lulu?" She continued crying and sniffing, but raised her head to look at him, her eyes as big as saucers.

"He scared me," she whimpered, "he wasn't nice."

"Who Lulu? Who was here?"

"He let him in." Lulu was wracked with sobs again and J sat there rubbing her back to console her, while wondering who could have come into the house without disturbing the dog.

"Did he hurt you sweetheart?" J felt very protective of his younger sister, who shook her head mutely. He reached forward to envelop her in a hug. Then his alarm started blurting and roused J from his dream.

This was bad, this was really bad! J swung his legs out of bed and hurtled down the stairs, but the only person in the kitchen was his Dad.

"Where's Lulu?" he asked in a panic.

"Not up yet," his Dad threw over his shoulder, concentrating on the eggs he was frying.

Dad  grabbed 2 pieces of toast and laid one on each plate, then used a spatula to place an egg on top. He put one in front of J and then went upstairs to call Lulu again.

J began his breakfast without much enthusiasm, and before long his Dad was downstairs again.

"She's not very well. I'm going to have to ring the school.  She's cold and clammy and I couldn't even wake her properly." Distractedly he stood at the counter and cut into the egg on toast he'd just put on a plate for Lulu.

J found his appetite completely vanished, the worst had happened, his little sister had joined the ranks of the zombies. And he had dreamed it! There was now no denying that appearing in his dreams was part of the pattern. Deep in thought J headed off to ready himself for school and get Alex's take on this development.

Alex was as shocked and upset as J, Lulu being like a little sister to him too, he'd known her since she was a toddler.

"But who was it who came IN your house?" both boys were struggling to imagine the intruder. "Who let HIM IN?"

"No idea mate. There has to be a  link to the other kids too, which makes it even harder to puzzle out."

The boys trudged down the hill in silence, their brains churning through the possibilities.