Lucky

“Carpets offer a continuity between now and the past.”
- Brian Murphy

“Perfect,” I said to myself. It was perfect. The red and gold carpet just brought so much life to the room. I laid it perfectly in the center where all visitors to my new home could admire it. I won it in an auction. They were auctioning off items from an old mansion long forgotten in the mountains.

Picking a piece of lint off the fringed edge, I stood back up and smiled. A meow from behind me caught my attention and I turned to see my cat Lucky yawning. “Bed time already, kitty? Well you better not sleep on the rug. I don’t want your fur all over this.”

I scooted her out of the room and closed the door, then headed over to the living room to watch TV. I watched the usual sitcoms that night as it grew darker and darker. The moon was full, but still it was too dim in my house.

I turned to switch on the lamp when I saw a glow coming from under the spare room door. “Did I forget to turn off the lamp?” I asked myself as I got up. I reached out to turn the handle but a cat screech startled me. “Lucky?” My poor cat continued to moan and meow as I heard her running around the room with things crashing. “How the hell did you get in there?”

I quickly opened the door. No sooner had I done so did my cat come rushing out. I gasped out of surprise. All I saw was a flash of fur flying past my legs and into the living room. She left behind her a trail of… blood? “Lucky?”

I turned and followed her, wondering what had happened. Maybe something fell on her and injured her. Oh my poor cat! Always getting into trouble. I sighed and chased her into the kitchen.

She stopped there. Her body was still. It laid quietly on the floor, covered in her own blood. I cried as I knelt beside her. I knew she was dead. What had caused this? I ran my hand over her smooth body and wiped away the bits of rug that had caught in her fur.

I walked back to the room where she had exited from. It was a mess. Tables were knocked over, vases and picture frames shattered, and the curtain torn. The only thing untouched -the only thing unearthly- was the carpet. I glared at it uneasily. I did not even see where it had lost threads that found their way onto my cat’s body.

The next day I buried Lucky. It was a quiet ceremony in my back yard. I placed her body between two rose bushes that were just starting to blossom. She would’ve liked that. She was more than a pet; she was my friend.

I thought about selling the carpet. Was it cursed? “Curses don’t exist,” I told myself.




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ID: 1063687   (Rated: 18+) A Flicker of Madness  Now open! Weekly supernatural flash fiction contest with a monthly grand prize winner! by AliceNgoreland