The Closet Door

 I'm sure I close the closet door alot more than I ever open it.

This thought perplexed me as I reversed my car, headed to another monotonous day of work. I was a single 24 year old, who lived alone, didn't have any pets and very few friends. Strangely enough though, the closet door wasn't the only odd thing that had been happening over the last couple of weeks. I found many a thing not where I left it. The TV was on and on mute when I came back home the other day. My chicken sandwich had disappeared from the fridge this morning.

 What could possibly be causing this?

I dwelled on it as I continued my drive to work, and then  suddenly a solution came to mind.

 Screw it. I'm gona find out once and for all.

I slammed on my brakes, bringing the car to  a screeching halt. I did quick U turn and start heading back home. A few minutes later I pulled into my driveway, stopped my car and quickly walked to the door. Unlocking it and closing it behind me, I walked upstairs and into my bedroom only to be greeted by a familiar sight.

It had happened again.

The closet door was open.

I decided to put my plan into action. Closing the closet door first, I hurried over to my bedside drawers and opened the top draw, pulling out a black small bag. Unzipping it, I pulled out my video camera. I turned it on and positioned it on my bed, making sure that it can see the closet. I pressed the record button and then carefully positioned some dirty clothes over it, obscuring it from view, yet making sure that the lens wasn't blocked either.

My plan accomplished, I headed back downstairs, locked the door and hopped back into my car. Sure I was going to be late for work, but this was worth it.

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The day passed like any other day at work.

Paperwork, paperwork, and more paperwork. Boss comes by to check on my progress, and starts asking questions. Yes Sir. No Sir. Three bags full sir.

Toilet.

Coffee break.

Repeat.

But what really was on my mind the whole day, was that video camera lying on my bed.

What will the video camera catch on film?

The thought plagued me as the hours slowly and painfully inched by. The hands of clock finally struck five, after what seemed like an eternity, and my day at work was finished. I walked very quickly through the office, needing to get home as soon as possible. I could see out of the corner of my eye that some of my co-workers were raising their eyebrows in amusement at the hurriedness of my pace, but I didnt care. I needed to see what that video camera recorded.

Workcard punched.

Crowded elevator.

Underground carpark.

Car keys in my hand.

Unlock my car.

Engine started.

Pedal to the metal.

My car shot out of the underground carpark and onto the road. I was probably speeding now that I think of it, but at the time, speeding was the least of my worries.

What will the video camera catch on film?

I pulled onto the onramp for the motorway, it usually being the fastest way home.

Fuck.

I had forgotten about the traffic. Cars lined the motorway, slowly inching along every few seconds. Everyone was trying to do what I was doing... Trying to get home.

                                  

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The sun had set by the time I finally pulled onto the street that I lived on. It had taken me a good hour and a half to get home through that congested motorway, and to make things even worse, it seemed like the power was out for the whole suburb.

Stupid electricity companies doing work at the worst times. Typical.

I pulled into my drive, hopped out and almost ran to my front door. Unlocking it and closing it behind me,  I flicked on the light switch. Nothing happened. I let out a heavy sigh, as I remembered that the power is down. Stumbling in the dark, my hands outstretched feeling for the walls, I finally make it to my kitchen cupboards. My hand grasped blindly in the dark, trying to feel for the box of matches and  candles that I knew was there in the top shelf. Or at least, was meant to be in there.

Please. Please, still be here...Aah, got them.

Finally feeling them, I grabed them both and after a few minutes managed to start lighting candles. Leaving one candle flickering by the front door, I lit another one and my way upstairs. To my bedroom. Stepping through the doorframe, I squinted trying to see in the low light whether the closet door was open or closed.

Thank God.

The closet door was closed. Just as I left it. This, at least was a good sign. Heading over to the bed, I pulled of the clothes and looked for my video camera. It was also just where I left it. It was still even recording. I stopped and then saved the recording, and then I hit play.

I was glued to the screen, expecting to see some ghost to appear on the video recording.  A minute passed. Nothing happened. Then two, then three. I started fast forwarding it. Still nothing.

Maybe there was nothing after all.

Then suddenly something flashed across the screen in the video recording. I held my breath in anticipation , but  the fast forwarding was too fast and I couldn't see anything but a blur. I immediately rewound it and pressed play, and what I saw made my body freeze in terror.

A man had walked into my bedroom, opened the closet door, got inside, and closed the closet door.

HOLY FUCK!

Screw ringing the police! I have to get out of my house.. NOW!

Still holding the video camera, my legs lept into action. I raced out of my bedroom and down the stairs. Almost skidding on the floor, I turned while running, heading for the front door.  And then I froze.

There was a man blocking the door.

In his hands lay my metal baseball bat. A grin escaped his lips as he uttered but a single sentence.

"Did you think you were alone in the dark?"

The Mansion [Part 3]

We all stood there, staring at the bloody handprints.

Shocked.

Dumbfounded.

Matt was the first to break the silence. "That's it guys. We are getting out of here first, then we're gona call the police."

"Wait, we can't just leave that little girl.... She needs our help!" exclaimed Aroha, as she hurried over to Maria, enveloping the now crying beauty in her arms.

"Did you see a little girl, though? 'Cause I sure didn't. So let's just go now, okay!" spat out Randy.

"You bastard! Are you a calling me a liar?" shouted Maria, her shock quickly turning to anger. "I know what I saw!"

"Calm down guys!" I shouted over the top of everyone. "Let's just sort this out, and a make a decision. Together."

Surprisingly everyone stopped bickering, and looked my way, waiting for what I had to say next. I slowly rubbed my temple with my fingers, desperately trying to collect my thoughts and say something that would help.

"Look guys.." I continued "IF there is a little girl in there, and we leave now to go back to my place and call the police, it might be too late for her by the time the police arrive." I paused, then resumed. "How about we try get inside the Mansion, find the landline phone while keeping an eye out for this girl, and then call the police from the landline? Or does someone have a better idea?"

We discussed back and forth for a few minutes every option. Some accused others of being spineless cowards, others of being delusional drunkards, but at the end everyone agreed, some grudgingly, that we would go with my plan.

We split up initially, everyone circling the Mansion trying to find some open window or unlocked door that would allow us to sneak in, without having to forcefully break in. We soon found though that there was no such door or window. We reconvened and decided to smash a window, climb through it, and find the phone from there. Tane managed to find a nice rock that did the trick, and a few minutes later, we were all inside.

We all took in our surroundings. We were in a large library, bookshelves covering every part of the wall. We had a look around, but there was no phone. We checked the next room, and the one after that and still, there was no telephone. So we decided to split into two groups as to find the phone faster. One group, comprised of me, Kate, Randy, Aroha and Hayato, was going to keep checking the downstairs rooms, while the other group, comprised of Matt, Tane, Maria, Patricia, were going to check upstairs.

Minutes dragged by as we frantically looked around, hoping and praying to see that telephone, or some sign of that little girl. We entered the next room, a large lounge by the looks of it. And then we saw it. On a small coffee table in the corner of the room.

A phone.

Randy raced over to it, picked it up, put the phone to his ear. He reached down to dial, and then froze.

"What's wrong Randy?" Kate called out. Randy didn't reply. I followed Randy's gaze. The rotary dial of the telephone was covered in blood. And below it, lying on the carpet was a hand.

A mangled sawn off hand.

At the sight of so much blood, Randy wavered and fell to the floor, causing a loud bang to echo around the large lounge. He had fainted.

Before any of us could get to him though, we suddenly heard a noise. A noise that was coming from behind one of the couches. We had awoken something.... And now it was coming for us. I don't remember what the others did, but I stood motionless, my whole body frozen in fear. My eyes glued to that couch. The noise continued. It was coming closer. A hand emerged from behind the couch, the palm pushing hard against the carpet floor, as if holding someone up. The fingers on the hand extended out in opposing and unnatural angles. Someone had gone through the struggle to break every single finger in a different direction. An elbow soon followed the arm, and then a shoulder. And then a face...

It was a little girl.

Or what was left of a little girl.

Her nose had been cut off... Her earlobes, bitten off... Both of her eyes were almost completely swollen over by massive bruising that surrounded them. Parts of her scalp showed through, from where her long black hair and had been torn off. And I will not even describe to you what state the rest of her body was in, for such cruelty and malice has no place in the world of the living.

And even though it was the most horrific thing I'd ever seen, I yearned to run over to her side and pick her up. Comfort her, tell her everything was going to be okay. Tell her that she was still a beautiful little princess. Yet I did not move, nor did I speak, for the horror that my eyes beheld was paralyzing.

She must have looked at all of us, hurt by the looks of horror and disgust that we could not hide. But all I remember was locking eyes with her, those eyes brimming with pain and suffering that I could only begin to imagine. And as her bruised lips moved to utter something, I sank to my knees and began to weep.

"Help... Me...." the little girl gasped.

The Mansion [Part 2]

To be honest the trip there was quite uneventful. Sure some of us slipped over due to the slimey clay and got their arses dirty. Others somehow managed to find the deepest part of the bog, sinking past their knees into the dirty filthy water. Squeamish Maria even managed to convince Randy to piggy back her across the bog, though me and Matt were really hoping that Randy would trip, sending them both face first into the bog. I would have loved to have seen that. Anyways, we all crossed the bog eventually, and after a decent amount of hiking up the steep inclined hill, we made it. We all stood under the cover of the manuka trees that bordered the edge of the bush, drinking in the sight that lay before us.

Perfectly mown grass lawns stretched before us, intercepted by what looked like to be vegetable and flower gardens, and behind that - the Mansion. To be honest, it truly was a mansion in every sense. There was a massive tiled courtyard that surrounded the main entrance, decorated with tables, chairs  and even barbecues in a perfectly symmetrical design. All the doors and the frames of the windows and sliding doors appeared to be made out of solid mahogany wood, which in turn colour complemented both the tiled courtyard and the rest of the house's exterior walls. There seemed to be so many windows, that I never even tried to guess how many rooms lay within. All in all, I'd say that the Mansion covered at least 600 meters squared, if not more.

I remember it was Kate who made the first move. She must have stepped forth, her feet scrunching the perfectly trimmed grass, but to me it had always seemed like that girl glided on the air. The way she moved and turned...a dancing angel in our midst. The way that she flicked her long black curls, causing the sunlight to frame those deep blue eyes. Eyes that seemed to dance and smile whenever I saw them. She was my dream girl.

Kate turned around, surprised that no one had followed suit. "Come on guys" she giggled "Last one there buys next week's beer!" And with that, she raced off in a sprint towards the Mansion. That definitely did the trick. Within a matter of seconds we were all sprinting over the grass lawns, none of us wanting our wallets to be lighter next week.

Out of the eleven of us that sprinted across the imaginary finish line and onto the tiled courtyard,  it was Hayato and Patricia who tied for last place. "I guess that means we're having the double the amount of free beer next week!" I shouted to both of them, giving Matt a sneaky wink at the same time. Hayato immediately started cursing in Japanese, very unhappy at such a thought - which only caused us to break into fits of giggles and laughter.    

                                                                                 

"It's okay Hayato" I called back to him, struggling not to break in laughter again. "We don't drink that much...". That proved to be to be the last straw, as we all burst laughing again, the truth usually being far from that. Laughter is thankfully infectious and it was only a matter of seconds before Hayato was laughing alongside us, our lungs gasping for air.

"Well, I guess no one is home, or we would know by now I think" proclaimed Randy, pushing his ever slipping glasses back onto his nose. "He's got a point, guys" replied Tane " If there was, we would have been chased off by now by some guy with an air rifle, or some stupid freackin son of a-"

Tane was suddenly interrupted by a bloodcurdling scream that came from behind us. We all turned around, startled and freaked out by the terror that the scream had expressed.

 It was Maria.

She was standing rigidly still. Her body frozen in fear. Her mouth still open, as if her bloodcurdling scream had frozen in her throat. Her eyes leaking tears. Her right arm stretched out, pointing with a trembling hand. Pointing at one of the many sliding doors of the mansion.

Time slowed as my eyes followed her trembling pointing hand, hoping this was all some sick prank. But what I saw still haunts me to this very day. Leaking down the glass sliding door was two bloody handprints. Two long bloody handprints that seemed like they had been clawing at the glass.

"Girl...." Maria gasped "There was a little girl there."

The Mansion [Part 1]

When I was a teenager (which was only a few years ago, if you know what I mean) I used to chill the bush that surrounded my house with a bunch of my mates. You have to understand, this was Kiwi (aka New Zealand) bush. It's not nice open space between trees, with grass and pine needles covering the ground. Instead the trees are dense and close together, vines growing over the wet slippery clay - as there is virtually no top soil.

Anyways me and my mates would usually kick back a couple beers, and occasionally goof around in someone else's property while the owners were away. More than once we got chased off by some freackin mongrel mutt that fancied taking a bite out of our arses. But that never discouraged us, as we'd just go another property the next time. We were the lords of the land. At least that's we thought, until everything changed.

It was a sunny Sunday afternoon, and the end of our last year in high school was in sight. In celebration of this I bought a couple of extra packets of beer to our chillout that afternoon. Time started to pass quickly, as it  always does when you're having a good time, and before I knew it - it was almost time for everyone to go their seperate ways. Just as the first of us were getting ready to leave, someone yelled out "Hold up guys. Let's not leave yet. Let's go to someone's property."

The voice belonged to Maria, the hottest and at the time most intoxicated girl in our group. She was a straight up gorgeous platinum blonde that wore usually only tanks tops and short shorts, which fitted her curvaceous figure like a glove.

"We've done them all" replied my best friend and wingman, Matt Caerdon "It's just boring now."

Loud discussion broke out amongst the group, everyone wanting to voice their own opinion on the subject. But amongst all the noise and discussion, it was the quietest voice amongst the group that caused everyone to be silent. A quiet voice that uttered only five words.

"We haven't done the Mansion."

The silence hovered over us all for what seemed like an eternity as we all contemplated the idea. You see "the Mansion", as we called it, was a large mansion (who would have guessed) at the furtherest edge of the bush. Not only did it physically look daunting, but getting there was even more daunting as  you had to cross a small bog and then climb a very inclined slope that was crammed with trees reaching up to the sky above. Only a couple of us had ever bothered to do it before, but none of us had trespassed there before. Funnily enough, the Mansion had always seemed a too grand and proper of a place to goof around, or at least to me it did.

The silence was broken as Maria raised her beer bottle and let out a massive "Hellz yeah!". Not everyone was as keen on the idea though. Randy, the usually quiet nerd of the group, and the one who had originally suggested the idea too, was unusually vocal in his support for the idea. Maybe he's finally trying to get his chance with Maria, I thought. The Maori twins (as I called them), Aroha and Tane, were in favour of it  as well, along with Hayato (the foreign exchange student) and Matt Caerdon.

The rest of us, including me, were undecided on it - with a few completely against it. So in the end it was put to a vote, with the majority getting their way and the rest had to tag along. The votes were cast. Hands shot up and down in favour of the different options, but it soon became clear that only one option was ever going to win.

It was settled. We were going to the Mansion.

The Boy who fell asleep in the Woods

One afternoon, a boy went out to take a stroll through the woods that surrounded his house. He started to feel really tired, so he sat down in the shade of a large oak and closed his eyes, and he fell asleep.

He woke up a quite a few hours later. The sun had set, and it was dark. Very dark. He got up and started hurrying home, wondering if his parents had started worrying about him being out so late. He finally reached the edge of the woods, and there was his house. But something was strange. He couldn't quite put his finger on it until he realised that it was very dark, yet the house lights weren't on. He didn't think too much of it though, and just kept on running. He got to the front door and realised that it was already ajar. This was where he started to get worried. 

He slowly opened the door and looked inside. Not being able to see anything, he fumbled for the light switch. Finally he found it. He switched the lights on, and he gasped at what he saw. The lounge & kitchen was trashed. Chairs were broken, tables lying on their side. Practically everything was on the floor, broken into pieces. 

"Mum? Dad?" he called out, hoping that this was just some bad joke.

No answer. Silence remained. 

Deciding to check out the rest of the house, he tiptoed through the destroyed lounge, trying not to disturb anything. He reached his parents bedroom door. His hand reached out to twist the doorknob, but he froze. The doorknob had blood on it. Alot of it.

He turned the bloody doorknob and opened the door to his parents bedroom. He stood in the doorway. Frozen. Frozen in fear and shock by what he was seeing. Laying on the floor were his parents. At least if you could still recognise them, that is. Their bodies had been hewn apart, bit by bit, joint by joint, so that what remained was pieces. Half a finger here, another kneecap there. However the abhorence of this scene was that all the pieces had been place back in order. Some sick twisted thing had hewn their bodies into tiny pieces, and then tried to put them back into order. Like some disgusting version of puzzle.

The sight of it al was too much for him. He bent over in disgust, and emptied his stomach of his half digested lunch. Suddenly there was a noise from behind him. Someone must have heard him vomit. He turned around, ready to bolt, but he was too late. A fast moving wooden plank emerged out of the darkness behind and hit him square on the back of his head. He was knocked out cold. Completely unconcious.

He woke up with a gasp. He looked around, trying to see where he was. Suddenly, he realised. He was sitting in the shade of the great oak. The sun had set, and it was dark. Very dark. Just a dream he reassured himself.

It was just a dream.

He  He got up and started hurrying home, wondering if his parents had started worrying about him being out so late. How could I have slept for so long, he thought. Finally, he reached the edge of the woods, and there was his house. Something was wrong though. The lights were off.

No, it couldn't be, he thought. He was sure that it all had just been a very bad dream. A very bad nightmare. Realising that the last thing he remembered in his 'dream' was been hit in the back of the head, he slowly rose his hand. Time slowed as he raised his hand to feel for the bruise that prove whether it was just a dream or not.

It was just dream, he thought. Or wasn't it?

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