Lights Out

Written for:

"The Writer's Cramp - Poetry Week"  13+: Write the best POEM in 24 hours or less and win 10K GPs!

~~~

As soon as the light went out, the whispering started. Kristy pressed her hands tightly over her ears trying to drown out the noise. It had only started recently, the past two months, after her grandmother had died. The young girl was only nine years old. The family had attended the closed casket funeral, Kristy put on a brave face for her mother, after all it was her mother that had passed away. She hadn’t told her family about the whispering, thinking they would think she were crazy. She reached over and hit the power button of her CD player. The display lit up and music filled the room.

She sat up in bed, bringing her knees to her chest as she hugged them. “You’re not real, you’re not real, you’re not real.” She began the chant her grandmother had told her to say when she was scared and by herself in her room at night. She had told her that it would keep the monsters at bay. She saw a shadow move in the doorway of her closet, she tried to scream, to call out for her mother but only managed a small squeak like a mouse.

Pulling the sheets up to her nose she held them there, only her eyes visible in the darkness of the room. Her chanting had stopped, she was too afraid to move or speak. She realized that she had been holding her breath, letting it out she looked away from the door and around the rest of the room. She wanted to move, to call out to her parents, but fear kept her in place and quiet.

She heard a noise like a soft growl and her eyes darted back to the closet, two pin pricks reflected the light of the CD player back at her and she gasped, the sheet slipping from her fingers and landing in her lap. She stared at the floating orbs as they grew larger. Kristy pressed herself as far into the corner as she could, feeling the cold of the wall behind her seeping through her pajamas.

The unknown thing grew closer to her, the smell of rotten bread filled her room, her eyes were straining to see what it was. She pinched her nose trying to block out the smell before she was ill. “You’re not real.” She whispered at the thing. It seemed to pause as it heard her speak. She didn’t know if it was from her actually speaking or what she had said. “You’re not real.” She repeated.

Almost instantly the creature was at the foot of her bed. Kristy could see the outline of the creature now. It was small, the head only reaching over the edge of the mattress. The head was large, a lumpy mushroom with a thick tuft of course hair sticking out of the middle of the top; the eyes as big as oranges, she could see no nose and the mouth was beak like.

The smell was horrid, Kristy gagged. She saw the creature extend a hand towards her. “YOU’RE NOT REAL!” she screeched and leapt up to her feet. She still stood on the bed, her fingers groped in the darkness for something, anything she could find to get the creature away from her. She touched the lamp on her bed head, her fingers curled around the base as she picked it up, aiming it towards the creature.

The thing hesitated. Kristy felt the on/off switch, she closed her eyes and pressed the button aiming the stream of light from the lamp shade towards it. “YOU’RE NOT REAL!” she yelled. A loud pop resounded around the room, she opened her eyes and looked towards where the thing was. It was gone.

“Kristy, what on earth?” she turned to see her mother standing in the doorway of her bedroom, the main light flashed on temporarily blinding her. “Why are you standing on your bed? What are you doing with your lamp? Get in your bed and go to sleep.” She said as she crossed the room to take the lamp and place it on the bed head again. “I know you miss Gammy sweety but you need to sleep.”

Her mother tucked her into bed again and kissed her on the forehead. “Now go to sleep.” Kristy watched her mother retreat from her room, pausing to look at her daughter in bed then she turned and left. As soon as the light went out, the whispering started.