Short Story Collection

Nightmare

Words: 1249

He woke up at 3:33 AM exactly, at least that's what the alarm clock on his bedside table told him. He rubbed his eyes and ran his fingers through his hair, wondering why the hell he was up this early, and why the hell he had a horrible uneasy feeling welling inside of him. He put his head back down on his pillow and wished wholeheartedly for sleep to overcome his again, but to no avail. He tossed and turned, throwing his blanket off and then back on. He tried changing into a lighter pair of pyjamas and took off his socks, but that didn't work either. The feeling was still there, kind of haunting him in a way he couldn't quite explain.

He sat up and threw the covers off himself once more, before swinging his legs over the side of his bed and standing up. He walked over to the window closest to him and looked out; it was dark, obviously. But with the darkness came a new level of ominous that he didn't think should be there. The streetlights were dimmed down way more than usual, and the moon was barely visible behind the dark clouds in the sky. He shivered, but he didn't feel cold. Maybe he developed a fever?

He made his way over tohis bedroom door, an unusual hesitancy clouded his mind as he reached for the door handle. He ignored it and opened the door, stepping out into the hallway. His bare feet felt cool on the wooden floor, though he was sure he turned the floor heaters on before he went to bed. He walked down the hallway slowly. He couldn't explain it, but it felt as though he wasn't alone. It was silly, of course. His parents were dead asleep in their bedroom, and his baby sister was staying with his aunt for the week. Of course, he was alone.

As he made his way to the bathroom down the hall he looked at the family pictures and portraits on the walls. He stopped walking completely when he saw a family portrait taken only a month ago; he was missing from it. There were his dads, standing behind a chair. One had his arm around the other, and the other had his arm resting on the chair. His baby sister was sitting in the chair all by herself, instead of on the lap of her brother. Was this a prank? He didn't think it was April Fools day.

Shrugging this whole weird experience off he continued to make his way to the bathroom at the end of the hall. Once there he opened the door and walked through, ignoring the blatant squeak the old wooden door made. He went up to the medicine cabinet and opened it, taking out a thermometer and putting it into his mouth. And under his tongue. He looked into the medicine cabinet and decided he might as well take an Advil, just in case. Popping the cap off the Advil, he poured one tablet out into his hand. He put some water into the cup beside the sink leftover from rinsing his mouth the previous morning. He took the thermometer out of his mouth and looked at it.36.5 Celsius, not a fever. He put the thermometer on the side of the sink and put the Advil back in the cabinet. Then he put some water in his mouth, followed by the Advil tablet, and swallowed. Deciding that it'd be a good idea to just go back to bed, he grabbed the cabinet door and closed it.

He paused quickly when he saw the mirror on the other side of the cabinet door, gasping loudly at the sight of a creature standing behind him. He turned around as quickly as possible to find himself completely alone in the bathroom still. He looked back to the mirror to find that empty, too. Except for himself, that is. He began to breathe rapidly as he tried to decipher what just happened. Maybe he was hallucinating. Maybe he was developing early-onset schizophrenia or something, that could explain it. He'd have to mention something to his dads in the morning.

His new-found self-diagnosis calmed his breathing down enough to get his bearings and go out of the bathroom. He was walking past his parents' room when something caught his eye. It was the picture from before, but he wasn't missing anymore. Instead, his baby sister was missing. And so were his dads. He was the only one there, sitting alone in the chair in the middle of the photo. As he looked at the photo it began to change. His eyes in the photo began to turn blacker than the dark sky outside, and his smile became creepy and contorted. Freaked out, he backed up to the opposite wall of the hallway. But no matter what he tried, he couldn't look away. The more he stared, the more distorted the picture became. Portrait-him snapped his head to the side and his mouth began dripping a gross, black substance. It wasn't just dripping in the photo, though. The picture frame began to leak black liquid out of where his mouth is. It dripped down the frame in bulks, spewing out like the creature inside was vomiting.

It dripped down and onto the floor, where it began to slide along the floor toward the boy cowering on the opposite wall. He stared down at the floor where the black goop was coming towards him and tried to run, only to realize that he was stuck in place. He began hyperventilating again, and he could hear his heartbeat screaming in ears. The liquid gradually started dripping and moving faster, and the mouth of the creature in the picture opened wider to allow more to come out quicker. Just before it reached the boy's foot, the liquid stopped moving towards him. It instead began to build itself up, moving even more rapidly than before. It climbed up upon itself until a giant blob of black, gooey liquid stood three feet above the boy's head. The boy recognized the thing as the creature he saw in the mirror only moments ago as it developed a face and took form properly. Finally finding his voice, the boy screamed as loud as he could as the monster opened what he could only assume was its mouth, and everything went black.

He woke up in a cold sweat, sitting up quickly and shaking from head to toe as he gasped for air. He put his head in his hands and began to hyperventilate and cry in a state of shock. He put his hands over his ears as if to block the creature out of his head as he shook and cried.

"What?" he whispered to himself as he began to calm down. He placed his hand on his wrist and felt his pulse still going wild. He took some deep breaths as he began to realize that it was just a nightmare. He was okay. He looked over to his clock to see what time it was, knowing he probably won't be able to sleep after that. It was3:33 AM. He put his head onto his pillow and closed his eyes, pulling the covers over himself as much as possible as if to "will away" any more nightmares.



And as he somehow drifted into a lovely little sleep, he failed to notice the gooey black liquid seeping under his bedroom door.