"We won't be back until late, but you should think about going to bed soon anyway," my mother said, picking up her purse on her way to the door.
"You have our numbers," said my father. "Just call if you need anything."
I nodded, hardly paying attention to what was being said. Parents leaving only meant one thing to a ten year old—staying up late.
"Your sister should be coming home soon," my father told me. "Do you want to wait for her and unlock the door yourself, or should I unlock it now so you can go to bed?"
"I'm sleepy, I might go to bed soon," I said, trying to bring up a yawn.
"Alright, well I'll leave the door unlocked then," said my father.
"Be good," said my mother, at the threshold. "Oh, and I'm waking you up early tomorrow so please make sure to—"
"I'm going to bed right now, mom," I said, walking towards the stairs.
And then they were gone. I smiled. Everything the artificial light touched was my kingdom. Popcorn, root beer, chocolate, potato chips, I grabbed all the best food in the house, turned out the lights, getting ready for a long night of movies, and jumped onto the couch in the living room, right in front of the TV. A sharp crack from my pop tab left a millisecond of reverb racing through the empty house to my ears. I slurped the first sip, testing the pool, then jumped in, draining half the can. Now multitasking, I started rustling my hand through the chips, tearing at the corner of a chocolate bar wrapper, and trying to figure out the remote with some other appendage; I somehow found myself in the middle of When A Stranger Calls on the television.
The liquid sugar in my pop can and a coco-flavored stimulant bar somehow disappeared from sight, eaten so fast I didn't really taste them, leaving my stomach churning in revolt. Suddenly, I heard a phone ring.
I got up from the couch and walked across the carpet in my bare feet, almost tripping on an extra blanket, before reaching the colorless telephone. If someone was calling the phone would have lit up. The noise echoed. I turned to look at the TV and realized that the noises were from the movie, which I hadn't been watching. On the screen, a woman was talking on the phone, answered by the heavy breathing of a man. She was in a wide-open room, but the lighting of the scene directed the view to her face. The girl's eyebrows were wavy, like the lays chips on the couch. Her mouth made violent shapes, opening and closing faster than the shutter of a camera. The man on the other line only replied with unhurried breaths. Then the man hung up.
"That was creepy," I said to myself out loud, cautiously looking back at the telephone.
The phone's face lit up, immediately followed by a ring.
"No way," I whispered, turning flushed. Instead of going to the phone, I hustled to the remote on the couch and turned the TV off, leaving myself in a stark gloom.
The phone lit up again, the warm colors of a summer sunset fading into an absolute darkness. Studying the room, I noted the windows were far less friendly, compared to viewing them in daylight. Instead of four strips of glass, I saw four rectangular, pitch black eyes staring at me, lifeless. Anorexic arms scratched the glass, trying to get in. Pointy, stick fingers swept the windows clean with their constant swishing from the windy night. They were like dull bloodshot veins in a demon's eyes.
By this time the phone had given up on an answer. The silence that followed was almost worse than the phone. Usually there are bumps and creeks, but this silence was impenetrable. My bones tensed to the point of numbness. My ears turned into deep sea instruments.
The beep signaling a message finally chimed.
"I'm at the door. Can you—"
I unconsciously dropped the phone and raced the darkness up the stairs. The shadows overwhelmed me for a moment, threatening to drag me back down with them, but I burst through to the landing before their shackles could tighten.
The front door opened smoothly over the carpeted front entry, but with my ears primed for the occasion I was cursed in knowing someone was in the house.
I ran to my room and pulled the covers tight.