Knock Knock Knock
at first, the rap at the door came softly, startling Jeff awake. He looked down at his fiancé’s peaceful expression. She could sleep through anything.
KNOCK knock knock
It echoed more urgently between the front door and the bedroom. Jeff swung his feet over the edge of the bed. Slipping his cooling toes into slippers. He leaned up and shuffled to the hallway, still half asleep and confused over the rude awakening.
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK
Either the repetition had grown more violent or the walls in their room were more insulated than he’d first assumed.
“I’m coming, I’m coming.” He grumbled.
The neon glow of the stove’s digital clock caught his eye as he passed, stopping him in his tracks. A sudden chill woke him into alertness.
It was 2:31 AM… who could possibly be knocking?
Jeff sifted through a litany of unlikely options, finally settling in on one of his neighbors running into an emergency. Just in case, he made a beeline to the hall closet, retrieving the walking dead inspired bat he’d used for a previous Halloween costume and had kept as more of a joke than for home defense.
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK
The repetition was strangely consistent. Like each rap was precisely placed on a pointed spot he could almost pin… to the top of the door frame?
It didn’t make sense. The tiny hairs at the back of his neck lifted away from his skin.
“who’s out there!” He called, winding his fingers around the neck of the bat and squeezing until through the dark, his white knuckles were the most visible highlight in the milky moonrays.
Silence.
There was no answer.
The bat sagged at the lack of response. Stupid kids…
Jeff glanced down at his watch, 2:33 AM.
He didn’t have time for this, he had to be up in two hours. He turned toward the bedroom…
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK.
Jeff spun on his heel, now pissed. “That’s it who’s out there! I swear if you make me come out there, it’s gonna be a bad fuckin’ day!”
The laugh that slithered through the seams in the door curdled his blood.
“It’s night time silly… Can’t you see it?” Jeff felt his eyes drawn toward the half-circle of glass at the top of the door. Resisting he pinned them to the slowly turning doorknob.
He watched it with eagle eyes, fully awake now. It didn’t move as if whoever was on the other side was testing it,in fact, it didn’t feel like they were trying to break in at all.
What kind of robber knocks on your door in the middle of the night?…
Not to mention most deranged psychopaths he’d met didn’t sound like the creepy children from any horror flick he’d ever seen…
Jeff’s eyes darted to the window directly next to the front door. His eyes searched through the mesh curtains for a shadow, anything, indicating who his current enemy might be.
A piece of his lawyer mind had already convinced him he’d made it all up, he’d been caught in a waking dream cause by the extra stress lately…
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK…
The repetition broke the building delusion.
A growing part of him wanted to fling the door and smack the shit out of whoever was on the other side messing with him in the middle of the night. Again, his inner lawyer intervened and held Jeff at bay.
“Hey knock it off! You’re going to wake up the rest of the house. Get out of here before I call the cops.”
Again… the eerie laugh, only this time, it was deeper.
“Oh yeah? Is this funny to you?” He snarled, “You have no idea the week I’ve had buddy, Just give me one more reason and I swear…”
“Just let me in…” It hissed.
Jeff’s eyes darted to the dark half circle of window at the top of the door.
“Why, would I do that?” He asked, confused at the simple request.
The porch creaked. Jeff waited for the floodlight to come to life and cast a shadow, but it remained dark.
“That’s what I thought. Knock again and I’m calling the cops.”
“Good idea.” The voice jeered with an dark, audible smile.
“Yeah, you’re right, for me.” Jeff beat back his surprise with a dose of anger. The fire rose to his chest.
He’d had enough of this little shit. “Not good for you buddy.”
“We’ll see…” The voice taunted from further away.
It had dimension now, like, a voice inside a voice. The adolescent tone was more of a shell now. Like the chocolate coat drizzled over his favorite nut-covered desert cone.
Unlike the treat, this trick was filled with a gravelly promise much less sweet than vanilla ice cream.
“I’m not going to ask again, who are you and what do you want?” Jeff’s voice steadied as it fell into a pause.
When no response came he began again, “Do you need help?” He crept closer to the edge of the door frame, eyes on the bay window beside it.
“If you need help I can call someone for you. But I need you to stop making so much noise and pounding on shit. I have neighbors and my fiancé is sleeping.”
Jeff leaned in and placed his ear against the cold door.
After an uneventful moment Jeff’s eyes bugged in the dim moonlit entry. He picked up a deep guttural growl radiating inside rasping, wet breathes…
Up until this moment, he’d been toying with the idea of peeping from the curtains to catch his strange unwelcome guest off guard but the noise tearing into his ear and pouring through him drained the color from his face.
The hand that had been posed and ready to fling back the curtains withdrew and withered in on itself. The shriveled boldness sent Jeff into a crouch. His exposing hand quickly laced itself around the neck of the modified baseball bat.
The growl disappeared into a giggle.
“Do they know?” It croaked while the giggle extended into an overarching hiss.
There’s no way that’s just one person. The logic bubbled up with a fresh dose of rage. Jeff didn’t like being messed with. Especially not in his own sanctuary. This is my house. His thoughts built on each other like wood and gas stacking and squirting into an already over extended furnace.
It had been a rough weak, can’t a guy catch a break. Two hours until I have to be up again. Better get used to it, babies come with no sleep.
Suddenly his thoughts opened up like a flood gate. His mental immunity dimmed under the surge of dark thoughts coursing through him.
“Know what?” He roared back all care for quiet thrown to the wind for a moment. He continued with steady vigor.
“You come to my door in the middle of the night asking stupid cryptic questions. I’m giving you about ten seconds to get off my porch and then I’m coming out swinging!” His whisper yell radiated the pulsing hatred he felt. His peripherals filled with red.
Silence spoke back. A single creak from the porch suggested movement. He moved in slowly, closing the gap he pressed his ear to the door once more.
He could hear gurgled breathing directly on the other side. and then, “That’s okay, just let me in first…” The voice slithering in had taken on yet another dimension. Not only was the once prominent child’s voice was muted, like the writing beneath the highlighter spread over its surface, the one speaking sounded more like a rockslide.
It vibrated the door against his face in a way that made no sense to him. The strangest thing was that… part of him felt inclined to listen. He stepped from the door blankly, eyes pinned to his hand as he watched it move fluidly toward the glistening knob.
Just before he twisted the lockbolt out of place his hand froze. Why would I let a total stranger into my house… Especially one that sounds like THAT. The inkling shot through him like a spark of reason. His hand flung itself to the neck of the bat.
Whatever was behind the door was fucking with him and he was making it too easy.
“You know what I know?” Jeff piped more boldly. He didn’t like the idea of being so open to suggestions. Naturally, he brushed it off, explaining it away as a late-night half-awake hiccup.
His pause was met with thick silence. Probably a couple of teenagers with a sound machine or an app or something…
Jeff pumped himself up, he took a few deep breaths and flung the curtain back exposing…. an empty porch… He rubbed his eyes before scanning the milky darkness for movement.
“Hello? Who’s out there!” He called, looking as far to the left and right as the bay window would allow. To each edge of each side of the house all seemed quiet.
Jeff was testy now, He walked rigidly to the bedroom window.. This is just practice. The thought slithered in. This is what it’s going to be like every night. This is why you tried so hard to avoid this…
He shook the thought loose and wrestled back to the window he’d reached, he turned the curtain rod, the blinds shifted to reveal another empty stretch of porch deck, and lawn all the way to the fence. But this was new. Rob’s kitchen light was on.
Had someone been messing with their house too? Jeff wondered. His eyes remained on the matching bay window but no one came into view for long enough that he lost interest, he glanced at the digital screen on his watch.
2:45 AM, it taunted. Old Loraine had drooped in his hand again. The hollows of his eyes dazzled in the moonlight as he gave the window a final sweep. Why would anyone ever choose this…. He scanned the room he’d entered. His home office… soon to be nursery.
His heart fell. He thought of his fiance’s face, once beautiful but now… all he could think of was the baby weight. He hadn’t signed up for this.
He picked up a snow globe absently, turning it on a pendulum in his fingers.
The full moon made him think of his nights out with buddies from the office. He’d never wanted this. He reminded himself as he set the globe down finally. Neither of them had, that was the agreement. Now, one of them was lying, one of them was going against that unspoken agreement.
His inner lawyer kicked in, negotiating between the sides battling in the darkness.
And then this… like a creepy… bad omen. Some little kid magically appears at the door, telling me to ‘let it in’… He followed the thoughts back toward the open door.
Maybe that was some bad apple juice I had before bed. Maybe… Or maybe it was the half handle of whiskey he’d added and somehow neglected to revisit as he made his way from the office.
In the hallway he stopped again, tapping the end of the bat that sat more naturally in his hands than it had when he’d first picked it up.
Stupid kids… and I’m about to have one. The statement felt foreign as he glanced at the door leading to the spare bedroom. If I turned that into a baby room, I could keep my office and the inlaws would have to stay at a hotel.
Tick. Tick. Tick.
If there’d been a fly on the wall watching Jeff it might have told you it could hear the wheels in his brain turning and clicking together at this point. Internally deciding it wasn’t worth his time to check the second bedroom window. Whatever it was had clearly left.
He took the time to glance toward the front door. There hadn’t been a knock since, five minutes before so. Fuck it.
He turned toward the hallway, ready to get the last hour and a half of sleep he desperately needed.
He was closing in on the final stretch when a new noise tripped his internal trigger.
shhhhreeee shreeee *scratch scratch scratch*
The hairs on the back of his neck stood up and did a jig this time, less for rage and more for the million mental images it brought to mind. past scary stories he’d heard or read, scary movies, personal experiences he’d never found a way to explain. They all exploded to the surface as he cautiously made his way to the back door. Whoever was out there. Was clearly deranged.
Normal people don’t do this… his thoughts confirmed.
Another inkling stood out while he walked outside the milky rays reach.
Normal people don’t sound like demonic children or have nails that sound like claws digging into screen and metal.
The closer Jeff crept to the back door the harder his heart thumped against it’s cage.
It can’t affect you if you don’t engage… starve it! Don’t go toward the light little moth! It’s a trap.
Abort! Abort!
The final instinct came in like an out-of-tune radio picking up fragments of some talk show. He shook his head it was the whiskey talking. He thought. Acknowledging its portion for the first time.
He stopped to listen. Tick tick tick.
He could almost imagine the sound attached to a raptors claw from some movie he’d watched way back when.
The adrenaline coursing through him spoke louder than the idea of crawling back into bed. Like a dream, the word of wisdom faded as he stepped out of the shadows into the moonlight.
Jeff was going to deal with this once and for all.
There was no way he’d be sleeping now, the flood gates had opened, all his anxieties, all the worries, insecurities, what ifs he’d stuffed into each their own closets had let themselves out at once. All deciding to come in on him at once.
All the hounds he’d neatly stuffed into their separate cages, had been awakened by the chaos pouring into his veins. The scent of his uncertainty and confusion sent them into a frenzy, each baying and howling and growling in on him at once.
No fear… The thought washed in with a wave of clarity and then pulled back just as quickly. They are still in their cages for now… don’t open that door… for any reason.
Jeff had never been a pussy and he wasn’t going to start now… He wasn’t going to let this thing exacerbate all the other shit he’d already sorted through… This was home base. Nothing came through those doors unless he allowed it. He raised and ground his fingers into the grooves in the bat.
A cackle rang through the silence. “Oh really? Did you invite the new soon to be nursery occupant? Did you?” It was the child’s voice but the deep rumble rested comfortably beneath like a verbal shadow to underline how not human this thing was.
Voice app. The thought tugged him back to reality. There was some delinquent in the making behind that door and it was his civil duty to educate and handle the situation in a way where someone was learning an important lesson they wouldn’t soon forget… even if it only showed up in doctor bills.
He tapped the bat on the floor as his only immediate response.
This was home base… He kicked the head of the bat without thinking, catching his slipper on the barbed wire he’d laced excessively around the top half.
And not just for him… He pictured her face. This could be different than it was for me. He let the thought sink in. His heart slowed, his head cleared, but only for a moment.
Jeff looked both ways beyond the curtain, searching the frame for some kind of life. All the while his mind continued to churn.
Nothing that had happened over the last few weeks had been expected. He shook his head, fighting the thought. Everything in his life had been unexpected, really…
He always just… dealt with each new day as it came.
So… Why did this feel so extremely different?
Jeff tapped Loraine in his left hand, almost enjoying the prickly pressure where the barbs dug in just enough to be noticed. He swung it to life. He drew it to shoulder level, ready to swing for the fence line.
“You’re messing with the wrong guy buddy.” He muttered, reaching for the knob. His fingers froze around the brass knob as a cackle reached inside him and slapped the building boldness from his heart.
Again, Jeff shrank back.
Let me in… The prompting danced between Jeff and his decision to fling back the door and tear whatever was behind the barrier to pieces.
He took a step back and the rabidly gleeful noise fell silent.
Jeff watched the blinds like a hawk until a low vibrating growl penetrated the playing field between them.
Jeff smiled, immensely satisfied that he’d pissed his adversary off.
“HA! That’s what I thought. I called the cops.”
“No you didn’t…” It sneered back.
This time the voice was dark and thick. An extension of the guttural snarl. It’s losing patience, don’t engage…
The warning flashed and retreated in the blink of an eye.
Jeff appeared to have missed it because, he didn’t move. His eyes remained pinned to the window pane, challenging his adversary to show itself.
The knob began violently rattling and still jeff held his ground, ready to swing Loraine into whatever intruder might come through the opening.
All at once everything fell quiet again.
Jeff didn’t say another word. He stood like a mad batter in the middle of the hallway, ready to knock a home run. Eyes trained to the still knob he waited for his adversary to make the next move.
“Do they know?” It hissed.
Jeff didn’t break his sealed lips. He watched the moon’s pale rays leaking through the otherwise empty blinds.
There was no shadow… none at all.
No physical proof of anything that might have been scratching, cackle, or talking to him.
For the first time his mind was clear enough for the strangeness of the situation to alarm him. Again the image of the half empty whiskey bottle he’d handled before passing out next to his already sleeping fiancé…
“Does she know?” It provoked.
How did it know what he was thinking? Jeff wondered, the musing sent a chill through his spine.
He suddenly understood the appeal of tinfoil hats and akin to the people who wore them…
“Does she know what?” He took the bait, edging forward again.
The tone had a certain appeal he couldn’t quite put his finger on.
It hissed what might have been a laugh. “Let me in and I’ll show you…”
“Show me what?” Jeff asked, again, he felt inclined to listen to the subtle command.
Jeff watched his hand lift from the bat and extend obediently toward the shimmering lock.
Click.
The metallic latch disengaged, the echo of it over the the empty hall behind him snapped Jeff from his daze.
“Hey!” He leapt away with renewed vigor, clutching the weapon in both hands as he stepped toward the house phone perched on the entry table. He snatched it from its stand, Loraine still propped resolutely on his shoulder.
“I don’t know who you think you are but I’m calling the cops and then I’m going to come out there and beat your ass before they get here.”
The silhouette of a man around his own height drifted across the otherwise empty door pane leaving Jeff with a rekindled determination… He could take him… whoever it was it was just some guy… Jeff’s earlier intuition solidified in his mind.
This whole situation was just some poorly timed joke played out by some punk ass hole trying out some stupid voice changer app or something they thought might get them likes. He’d seen it a thousand times in the courtroom. And now he was going to look like a total douche to afraid to put his money where his mouth was.
The tossed the house phone to clatter across the floor.
He tapped his smart watch twice. “Call 911.” He demanded, noticing the shadow of tears in the screen door.
They’d messed with the wrong Lawyer.
Jeff waited for the line to engage before turning his focus to the target. “I warned you to leave. I have a pregnant fiancé and I will defend my home!” He roared.
This random event had become personal.
The first signs of dawn were crawling into the darkness, casting a navy hue over each surface. The entire world seemed to slow as Jeff rushed toward the door, just as he reached and twisted the knob to life a sweet, slightly scratchy voice broke through his rage.
“Jeff?” He almost jumped out of his skin as the spell broke. Jeff looked back in time to see Fiona standing in the center of the hall. Her sleepy eyes shone in the open moonlight, her bedhead locks billowed in the chilled open air. She lifted her hands to wipe away at the sleep “Babe who are you talking too?”
He watched the haze melt away from her face. It was replaced by a look of sheer terror when her eyes focused on something behind him. Her mouth opened in a scream that never left her throat as she desperately flung herself toward the man she loved.
…………….
“You’re sure that’s all you can tell me?” The smartly dressed detective asked as he scratched the last of his notes.
“Yeah, I’m telling you, they were great. Always seemed to get along, but the last few weeks it was like, something shifted. I never would have pictured him the type. What a cryin’ shame.”
The older man in a bathrobe looked to the asphalt and shook his head. His eyes shot back to the front door as two gurneys passed over the threshold and down the front steps. The long black bags resting on top of each glistened in the morning sun.
“That’s why I called,” The man started up again. “They’d had they’re spats in the past but… this one was different.” The detective nodded absently breathing out a long sigh. They always say the same things… Always. He slapped his notebook closed before pausing and flipping it back to the prior page. “You said you didn’t hear anything until around 2:30?”
“Well I can’t say for sure, I think so, Nancy made spicy gumbo last night so I had to get up and grab some heart burn medicine. I noticed Jeff had his lights on. I thought I saw him messing with the curtains at the front window but I didn’t want to be nosey so I went on back to bed.” The detectives blank face gave nothing away.
“mmmhmmm, and just to be clear, once the commotion started you didn’t see anyone enter or leave the house…” He added a checkmark to the page as the man nodded.
“As far as I know no one had been over at all yesterday. I usually keep track of any new vehicles or suspicious people I see. I’m part of the neighborhood watch so I like to make sure I’m doing my part.” He glanced back at the ambulances, now pulling away, lights off and disappearing around the first corner.
“Thank you Mr. Baker.” The detective slapped his notes shut again and stuffed the little black book into his jacket pocket.
“I appreciate your time and cooperation.” He withdrew his hand with a small card and reached it toward Mr. Baker..
“If you think of anything else just call me.” He turned and walked back toward the squad car and his waiting partner.
“So, anything useful?” He took the coffee cup she extended and walked to the other side of the black unmarked vehicle and opened the door with a sharply sarcastic laugh.
He sat down and started the engine before answering. “Nothing that could explain the mess we found.”
His partner watched his face for any sign of what he might be thinking. “Still think there was someone else involved?”
“Had to be.”
“But the fingerprint dusts only turned up one set of fingerprints on the bat. Still have to get the conclusive report from the coroner but… pretty sure they belong to the man. There’s no way a 120 pound pregnant lady could have done that kind of damage…”
Her lip pulled into a grimace she shook off before sipping on of her coffee.
“tell me how anyone beats themself to death with a spikey bat?” He laughed
“Makes no fuckin’ sense.” The detective could already see this case file being dumped down the cold case shoot. Not one witness… and unless the final reports could pull something, they had nothing to run with.
…………………………………….
No one ever found out what happened that night. The case did go cold in the lack of evidence no one was ever implicated. The community doesn’t talk about it much because it’s safer not to think of things no one understands…
If only there had been a fly on the wall willing to speak up and tell the horrors of what happened that night. Between the hours of three and four in the morning. They might have summarized it in a single phrase.
“Jeff opened the door.”
Moral of the story: Be aware of what you invite home with you…
Wow I did not expect that, what got them!?