A Scary Story - Part III

Scary Story Part III... now this is great fun! I was going to continue with 'The Grim Reaper' but found this one very enticing. Here's the link to the first two:

Scary Story - Parts I & II

Enjoy!

My hands started to shake as he took the phone from me, “And that’s not my phone.” Rod pulled his phone from the pocket of his jeans. It was the exact same model and style, but he pulled unlocked it and it showed the twin selfie of the two of us at Brunswick Heads at Harry’s Hill on New Year’s Day.

I remembered that day… it was so tranquil and beautiful and pretty. But right now, our lives were none of that. I looked up at Rod and started to cry uncontrollably, stuttering through my tears, “If that’s not your phone…”

He looked down at its shattered, bloody screen, “I don’t know. But I could see why you were fooled into thinking it was mine.”

I looked over at the neighbour’s house – the same place I was hoping to visit in the morning to talk to the young boy’s parents – and saw it was in complete darkness, “It’s too late to ring them.”

“Yeah, let’s leave it until morning.” Rod nodded, “First, though, let’s get you showered, you’re covered in blood… and you’re not bleeding.”

The morning’s light showed a more gruesome light to what had occurred the night before. We had held onto the destroyed mobile phone – putting it into a ziplock bag for safe-keeping. But I hadn’t slept very well for the rest of the night, because the noises in the roof had kept me awake for most of the night; and Rod and I ended up sleeping in the spare room.

I woke on the double bed with Rod next to me. He was already awake and looking at me with an expression of worry, “Hi.”

“Hey babe.” He whispered, “I haven’t slept… I stayed awake all night. Those noises in the ceiling haven’t stopped all night. Dunno how you slept through the racket.”

“At first I didn't, but in the end I was exhausted.”

He sighed, “I’m going to call the pest guy and get him out here. I was sure he told us that the place was clean before we moved in.” Looking around the small room, he scrubbed his hands over his stubbled face, yawning, “I’ll find the receipt from the sale of the house.”

“Okay.”

“First, I’ll get us some clothes from the master bedroom; and you stay here.” He pushed himself out of the bed and dragged himself to our room where I heard him moving around, collecting things together, and he returned with our clothes; but he seemed different somehow as he sat down on the bed, “Let’s get dressed. Here’s your handbag.”

“Why would I need my bag for?”

When my husband’s eyes met mine, I knew he’d seen something horrendous, “Because, we’re leaving this house.”

As I shouldered my bag, after dressing, I noticed our bedroom door was closed, “What happened in there?”

Rodney grabbed my hand, “Come on, we’re going on foot.”

“But the car…”

“Nope… we’re walking.”

We walked out the front door, down the cracked concrete path and turned right at the footpath. My normally chatty husband had turned into the strong silent type overnight. I noticed that on the way out, he locked up the house and took up the destroyed mobile phone, “Where are we going?”

“It’s best if we just walk for a bit … okay?” he couldn’t look at me as we passed house after house of the old-fashioned neighbourhood, “We’ll …” he stopped suddenly, let go of my hand, turned from the path and threw up, collapsing to his knees as he started to cry and another spasm of sickness threatened to overtake him, “Oh, fuckin’ hell, Meg… I can’t tell you… they there in there…”

“Who?” I asked.

Wiping his mouth on his sleeve, he gave me the look of dread, “Our next door neighbours were in the ceiling last night… they were slowly… oh god… their kid was waiting for us to go to bed so he could pull them out of the house and …” Rodney turned from me to be sick again.

I pulled back shaking my head, “Oh god no… not those sweet people… but what about all that blood in the shed?”

He groaned as he sat down, exhausted and pale, “That young kid you were so worried about, he’s been killing the dogs around the area and stringing them up in the shed… just for kicks.” He blinked, fighting off another bout of being sick (trying not to visualise what was really in the shed) and succeeded this time, “And when I came in to get our clothes in our bedroom, I found the kid in our bed with the bodies of his parents. He had killed them, honey… there was something wrong with that kid – or that family – and when I opened the drawers, to get our clothes, he woke up and saw me. I grabbed the only clothes I could get my hands on.”

I looked down, “You got clothes out of the dirty clothes basket and my handbag.”

“Your bag was by the door and the clothes were in the hallway… I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.” I said, “We’re alive.”

“For now.” He said looking over his shoulder where the seven-year-old had just turned the corner, “He’s been tailing us for the last half hour.”

I looked up, my gut cooling at the blood-covered child, whose eyes were empty, “Oh my god… did he say anything to you?”

“He told me his name was Damien. And he told me I was going to be punished for what I did.” He looked over at me, “I have no idea what he was talking about.”

“Get up… we have to run.” I helped Rodney up and we ran as fast as our legs would carry us in the early morning.

At the police station, they were wondering how we could make up such a strange story. But they arrived at our place anyway to find the place was neat and tidy.

There was no blood.

The neighbours were very much alive.

Damien was a sweet and charming little boy.

The police thought we were nuts.

After they left, Rodney and I looked at the bloodied phone and wondered exactly whose phone it was. I looked for my phone but couldn’t find it. Rod called my mobile number and it rang. With it still in the plastic, I put it onto loud-speaker and answered, “Hello?”

Through the plastic bag, a little boy’s voice said, “Hi, my name is Damien. You will be punished for what you did.”

“Honey… my phone is still ringing, how could that voice come through?” Rod asked.

“We’re selling this dump.” I said.

“Now.” We both said together.