It was a warm day so Sally decided to sit in her Grandmother’s garden. As she lay down she couldn’t help but notice the garden gnomes scattered around. She had asked her grandmother about them and had simply been told ”Oh those old things? They were here when I moved in and my dear girl I will tell you the same thing I was told. They must never be moved from where they are under any circumstances.” Her grandmother never gave a reason why so she never asked again.
As she lay in the sun Sally couldn’t help but feel like she was being watched, but it was just her and the gnomes in the garden. Sally got up and walked to the nearest gnome and turned it around so it was no longer looking at her. She did this to the rest of them and then went back to sunbathing. She was woken up by her grandmothers screams. ”Sally what have you done?” her grandmother cried out as she frantically looked at each gnome. ”Turn them back around at once and apologize to each one as you do so.” Sally looked at her grandmother like she was crazy and with a sigh got up and went to turn the gnomes back around. ”This is stupid I’m not going to say I’m sorry to some stupid, ugly garden gnomes who can’t hear me anyway” She said as she turned the first one back.
That night Sally went to bed and quickly fell into a deep sleep but woke up at 3 AM feeling like she was being watched, as she went to turn on the bedside lamp she let out a gasp as her hand touched something that hadn’t been there before. She quickly turned on the lamp and saw that the object was the first gnome she had moved. It seemed to be staring at her and she couldn’t help but feel uneasy. She got out of bed and took it back to the garden. As she got into bed she wondered how it had got there but decided that it must have been her younger brother Ethan pulling one of his pranks again.
The next morning as she was eating breakfast with Ethan she told him that she didn’t find his prank very funny to which he looked confused and replied ”I didn’t do that”. Sally thought he was lying but decided to leave it as it would upset her grandmother if she argued with him. She didn’t think any more about the incident as she spent the day shopping with her grandmother and watching DVDs with Ethan.
She went to bed and again fell asleep quickly.
As she dreamt the feeling of being watched grew deeper and deeper and caused her to wake with a start. She woke up and gingerly moved her hand to the lamp and was relieved to find nothing there but soon as she turned the light on she yelped. There at the end of the bed was the gnome facing her as if it had been watching her sleep. This time all the gnomes were scattered around her room all facing her with the same stare. She jumped out of bed and stormed into Ethan’s room expecting him to be awake celebrating the prank he pulled but found him sound asleep. She sighed and went back to her room.
The gnomes were still there but seemed to be in slightly different positions, she could have sworn the one currently by the foot of her bed had previously been by her wardrobe, with a shudder Sally picked the gnomes up and went to the garden to put them back.
Tired from not sleeping for the rest of the night Sally dragged herself to the breakfast table. Her grandmother looked concerned and asked what was wrong. Sally didn’t want to tell her what had been going on so said ” I had a bad dream last night and couldn’t go back to sleep, that’s all”. Her grandmother gave a disapproving look but then went back to cooking.
The day seemed to end too quickly for Sally and it was soon time for her to go to bed. She was scared about what would happen but then told herself to grow up and stop being so silly. She locked her bedroom door and went to sleep. Sally woke to the sound of something slowly scraping along the floor but it stopped when she opened her eyes. After not seeing anything that could have made the sound she closed her eyes. The scraping sound started again, slower this time and seemed closer, then she felt something moving on the bed. She kept her eyes closed to terrified to open them and see what was making the noise. Suddenly she felt something on her chest, her eyes flew open and the last thing she ever saw was a knife plunging towards her heart.
Her grandmother woke up to Ethan screaming and ran to see what was wrong. He was standing in the doorway of Sally’s room crying. As she got closer she saw sally propped up in her bed with a knife sticking out of her chest. Above her head were the words YOU SHOULD HAVE SAID YOU WERE SORRY written in her blood and on the night stand stood a garden gnome smeared with blood and a huge smile on its face.
Copyright © 2014 Pip Sessions. All rights reserved.
