Fear of the Dark

I was nearing the kitchen at a semi-run, two feet left before I reached the comforting warmth of the kitchen's gentle, yellow light. I stopped a foot short of achieving this hour's moment of salvation from suffocating darkness—darkness that undoubtedly breeds monsters and evil creatures of the night every hour on the hour.

The sight of a dark figure amongst the shadows was what stopped me in my tracks. Black against blacker, it hid in the far corner of the room adjacent to the kitchen—our living room—lying in wait, crouching legs set to spring.

Every particle of my being slowed down, feeling as if it had been dipped in an inescapable goo of terror. It seemed my heart and my sweat glands were the only functioning parts of my body. In fact, they seemed to be working much faster than usual.

I turned in the viscous, entrapping, molasses air—turned bittersweet by sandwiching me between beloved light and loathsome darkness. On the balls of my feet, I gradually rotated in a slow, shaky pivot to—probably stupidly—get a better view of the creature cloaked by shadow.

My breath stopped midway down my throat when I saw it in its entirety. The air in my lungs went cold—cold as the temperature in the freezer I had been so horrifyingly interrupted from opening. The cold was inside me now.

I took the creature's image in installments: first, its gaping tunnel of a mouth (no doubt hiding rows and rows of sharp, shiny, saliva-coated teeth); then, its perfectly rounded eyes, two deep holes in its forehead (its face reminded me of the murder mask from Scream); its scraggly hair cascaded in greasy black waterfalls flowing down both cheeks; its big shoulders were hunched and huge; its feet even huger.

Cautiously, I approached, cursing myself for diving back deep into the dark. Cursing my family for existing so I could love them, feel that I had to protect them.

I fingered the living room switch, almost sure that I could kill the night creature by exposing it to light, but terrified that it might take the sudden brightness as a cue to attack.

I swallowed. My spit passed like a hard lump down my throat. I heard Scream Face give a low, coarse growl that made my stomach turn and tighten. My hand trembled crazily on the switch, pressing down on it and casting the room in soothing golden light.

I saw my monster: my brother's band poster. Eyes wide, tongue lolling, platform boots big as his broad shoulders, a lifeless picture of Gene Simmons was my creature of the night.

My heart slowed, the sweat on my palms dried. My fear slipped away and hunger once again took its rightful place at my core. I knew because my stomach grumbled loud enough for me to hear. It sounded like a hungry animal growling in the wild.