3am

Chapter 1

The jarring ring of the phone jerks me out of a sound sleep. I shove myself up off the pillow and fumble in the darkness for the receiver. I slap it off of the cradle and mutter a curse as it crashes to the floor. I reach down and grab the receiver, drawing it up to my ear as I allow my head to sink back into the pillow. "Hello?" I grumble. I stare into the glow of the alarm clock, trying to force my brain to comprehend what I was seeing. As I stare, the glowing numbers flip over to 3:00. It's 3 o'clock in the fuckin' morning...

"Hello?" I say louder into the phone. I try to keep the anger out of my voice. "Hello? Is someone there?" I ask. There is a soft sound, like a sigh, then CLICK! I pull the phone away from my ear and glare at it as the dial tone whines. I slam the receiver back down onto the cradle, before dropping my head back into the pillow with a groan. I lay there in the darkness for what seems like an eternity, waiting for what I know is coming next. Sure enough, the phone rings again, the noise loud and grating against my ears. I snatch the receiver up and growl. "What the hell do you want?"

"Little boy dressed in blue..." whispers the voice on the other end. I growl again in frustration. "Do you know the man in the moon...?"

I am so tempted to hang up, but if I do, whoever it is calls right back. So I just bite my tongue and wait. "When are you going to save me and bring me home...? I'm sorry I ever chose to roam."

"Listen, you twisted freak!" I shout into the phone. "I don't know who the hell you think you are, but I'm getting real tired of your shit! You think this is a joke?! You think it's funny calling random people up in the middle of the night reciting stupid song lyrics?!" I slam the phone back onto the base. I throw the covers off of me and sit up, my legs swinging over the edge of the bed. I run a hand over my face with a sigh before getting up and shuffling to the kitchen.

I open the fridge and stare into its depths. I reach for the milk sitting on the top-shelf, but change my mind and grab the Fireball Whiskey on the bottom instead. I pull my shot glass from the freezer and pour out a shot. I gulp it down fast, feeling the tingly burn of the cinnamon and liquor in the back of my throat. My lips involuntarily quirk at the taste, but I measure out another shot and down it as well. As the liquor settles into my stomach and a feeling of warmth spreads throughout my body, I feel myself begin to calm down again. I pull a chair out at the table and sink into it as my mind replays the set of strange phone calls. It is the fourth one I have gotten in as many days. Each set starts the same way, with a phone call at exactly 3am. The caller never speaks, only sighs once right before he or she hangs up. It is a sad sigh, like the caller wishes I hadn't answered. Then whoever it is hangs up and the really freaky call starts.

Exactly five minutes later, at precisely 3:05, the phone rings a second time. When I answer it, the caller, a man by the sound of it, begins reciting the same song lyrics. After the first time, I looked up the lyrics and realized it was from a song called "Lost". I had never heard of the song before, but it apparently tells the story of a young boy who only wanders off and finds himself lost in the forest. He is crying out for his family to save him, but they're all too involved in their own lives to even know he is gone.

No matter what I said or didn't say, the caller would recite the same lines from the song. If I hung up the phone before he finished, he would immediately call back and start back over. I learned the hard way the second time he called to just let him say his piece. I kept hanging up, and he kept calling back until I gave up and let him finish. It took me about an hour and a half to realize it. Once he is done, he waits for my response. I'd usually cuss him out and slam the phone down, but once I tried to get him to talk to me. To no avail, though. He says nothing else, nothing to clue me into who he is or why he is targeting me.