Stop, Who Goes There?

Friday, October 1, 2010

In one violent motion she sat straight up in bed. Her body on full alert, her mind trailing slowly from behind, she felt the presence of another. Tension so taut it reminded her of evil, something horrible must be there. Her eyes slowly scanned the room with apprehension, “Who is there, what do you want?” she screamed.

The plea for knowledge fell silent; no words had crossed her mouth. In the silence of the darkness her head went straight to fear. The shadows are partners of the evil and with a chuckled took full advantage of her state of mind. Again she tried to speak, “Who is there and what do you want?”

The response was only silence; the shadows did not speak. With the evil, awkward feeling still hanging in the room she found the courage to stand. “I’m not afraid of you, I have a gun,” with quivering fear in her voice she shouted.

This time she heard her voice echo throughout the room but the shadows would not answer. They knew their time was near, in mere moments the sun would burn away this evilness. “To long,” she though and wandered to the chair.

Not sure of her surroundings she braced herself with the back of the chair, it moved. It moved just a small bit, but enough for her eyes to look down. There in the darkness she could see a wadded heap, “What is that?” she questioned. Not willing to allow this fear to paralyze her and with caution, she touched the wadded heap.

“Clothes, nothing but clothes,” she said feeling total relief; but the moment of security and relief was short lived. That moment opened up a weakness and only for an instant she let down her guard. That was all they needed and the shadows seized the opportunity, they pounced.

In one weakened moment the shadows revealed their evil, unleashed a wickedness she knew her firearm could not combat. The pain, the sorrow, the remorse all held deep within the shadows of the night. All evil emotions, that over took her with the dawning of the light.

With dawning of the light came the knowledge. The knowledge that all the evil tension, the dark shadows of the night, all resided in that heap of clothing. She had not paid attention the day before, spoke harshly, and said words she did not mean. She had spent the day hearing but not listening and tuned out the pleas for help. Her day full of criticism, she had not been grateful and complained of expecting more.

These are the seeds of evil, of shadows in the night. What she had perceived as an intruder were actually emotions come to life.

If we chose to wear heaps of clothing full of harshly spoken words, hearing but not listening and wear complaining criticism as if in style, then we will be awakened by evil tension and see shadows in the night. It is your conscience that will scare you.

The moral of the story; hang your clothes up.



13 comments:

Velvet Over Steel said, 

WOW! Great story and writing! I was on the edge of my seat & then the End.. 'Hang up your clothes'. LOL Oh my goosh..... I love this!!

Have a wonderful weekend, Jules!
HUGS,
Coreen

October 1, 2010 at 8:59 AM  
Mary@GigglesandGuns said, 

I will so get you for the ending! Talk about twists - from horror to social justice and finally to "Hangup you clothes."
Great job!

October 1, 2010 at 10:02 AM  
Olivia J. Herrell, writing as O.J. BarrĂ© said, 

Haha! Hang up your clothes. Yes maam. If it promises not evil, I will.

~ that rebel, Olivia

October 1, 2010 at 10:18 AM  
Arlee Bird said, 

That was a quite creative way to arrive at a very practical bit of advice. On another level it illustrates how our imagination is often fueled by the realities in our lives and the fears that come from those realities. Fun post.

Lee
Tossing It Out

October 1, 2010 at 10:29 AM  
Debbie said, 

How great! You know I love a good twist and you gave us one today.

October 1, 2010 at 10:36 AM  
Paula said, 

I love your stories and this one in particular! You are so gifted.

October 1, 2010 at 11:17 AM  
RHYTHM AND RHYME said, 

Wonderful Jules, had me gripped to the edge of my seat.
A real pleasure to read.
Yvonne.

October 1, 2010 at 12:04 PM  
Karen Jones Gowen said, 

LOL the same goes for putting toys away!

October 1, 2010 at 12:15 PM  
Carolyn Abiad said, 

I'm sending a heap of shirts out to the dry cleaner's right now! LOL :)

October 1, 2010 at 4:24 PM  
Unknown said, 

Wow, this is really good.

I was looking though my older emails and I saw that you wanted a critique on something from your blog. Well, based on this alone, your writing is wonderful. You had me from the first line. I thought you were relating a chapter from a novel, it was that good.

Whatever you're writing now, keep going at it because I know it'll be good.

CD

October 1, 2010 at 5:22 PM  
Alex J. Cavanaugh said, 

Oh, I'm going to clear off my dresser right now!

October 1, 2010 at 6:21 PM  
Unknown said, 

Well, now I feel a little guilty about those tufts of fur gathering in my entry (for some reason, the dog seems to shed there more than other places).

October 2, 2010 at 2:09 AM  
Paula said, 

Had to return and give my self another treat of your story! Have a wonderful blessed weekend

October 2, 2010 at 6:11 AM  
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