Category : Stories

Sub Category : Suspense/Mystery

This story that I am about to tell you took place almost four years ago.
My disease's squirming on the floor to reach my feet, to climb my body, to make it it's own. And finally, I am writing again. It feels nice, like being alcohol clean and, after years of not having it, now a bit feels better than a bottle. It's so sweet.
 I can taste it properly.
 I can savor it.
For me, to be able to imagine something in every possible detail is beyond extraordinary. However, on that particular night, I didn't need to do it.
 He was standing right in front of me. Alive and real.
Writing has some special tools, one tool to be exact.
 It has something unusual with no limits. It doesn't require skills or training, and it's only yours.
It's something else despite that, not everyone has it or can access it.
 It's like a disease you're born and learn to live drained by it.
But what happens when something disturbing reveals itself right in front of you? and you have the skill to write about it, every single thing you saw, feel and think?
What happened to me on that day made me feel even sicker of this disease.
I knew that I should close the window and return to my kitchen chores. But my body moved without any anticipation of what was about to come.
I can remember it like it happened yesterday.
Everything started on a Friday evening. It was an ordinary evening.
I was consuming a good, hot meal by myself when I heard outside what sounded like a street cat. I like eating in comfortable silence. I can easily catch sounds from outside my window.
I don't ignore a hungry animal so, most of the time, I get up to open my window to see what's outside. Hopefully, I can help.
That's how I met that beautiful cat. Its yellow eyes fascinated me. The black fur was shining from the lightbulb that extended on the street at a small right angle.
When the cat acknowledges my stare, she froze for a bit, waiting to see what I want. I'll assume she's a female because male cats often have a substantial, rounded face. Meanwhile, female cats have a look with a longer snout.
I stare at her for a bit. Then, I snapped my fingers to make her come closer. It did work and, in a matter of seconds, I finished my food faster so I can give her some too. She was still there, waiting whenever I checked.
I throw my leftovers to her, looking patiently at how she slowly approach it, smells it, and takes her first bite. I watched until she finished all of it to make sure that my neighbors don't scare her.
The next night I didn't believe she'll show up at all. I finished my dinner hours ago, but I keep them anyway.
I was studying to become a graphic designer so, late nights working were usual and often.
It was almost midnight when I got the urge to take a small break and reward myself with a dose of cold soda. I turned on the light, and in an instant, I heard cries from outside. It was standing in the shadow until I snapped my fingers again. 
Her silent steps reached the light spot, waiting again. She was tapping her tail softly on the cold street in an odd manner. It gives me the feeling of someone's hitting his fingers on the table, bored but gentle.
I feed her, close the window, and get back to work. I wasn't thinking much about it, but that night she seemed a little different.
Like she understands too much, in a way, only a child would.
I didn't sleep that night.
I think two weeks passed were this nightly routine got a comfy spot in my life. Sitting on the best chair, that I keep it for something else.
I find myself thinking if someday, she'll let me pet her, or at least meet when we're both on the ground.
Yet, things turned upside down in one chilled, humid night.
That evening when I opened the window, a new creepy cracking sound echoed in the pitch-black winter night. It was a light noise, but sharp at the same time. It made me shiver a bit, but I shook off the uneasiness.
It was only the window's yawn.
December 2nd is humid and hidden in a thin fog. Colder, but endurable.
I made an omelet with mushrooms, cheese, tomatoes, and chicken breast. I read the day before that human food isn't that good for domestic animals, so I head for a run at the closest store to buy some cat food. 
She better appreciate this.
After my dinner was ready, I take a look outside to see if I can spot her, but no such luck. She only reveals herself when I snap my fingers. A tiny sound that gets heavy, enormous in the silence every night carries and that moment was no different.
As I opened the bag with cat food, I could hear something heavy taking slow steps on the snow, carefully approaching my window. An unusual heat rises in my chest, and I lift my head to look. 
What I saw made me drop the bag moreover, to forget everything I thought I was sure it's not there was now real.
The view from my window includes a parking lot large enough to fit two cars next to each other, and then everybody else garage. Nobody lets their car at night because you might block someone's garage.
It was so empty everything seems to expand every time.
On the left side of the street, it was the back of the building, a swing for children, some trees, a small garden, and a grapevine. Big enough to make a nice shadow spot in summer. There is also my back door after five stairs.
Now, on the right side, the line of garages seems endless until you hit the new pavement some workers build. Shortly, other buildings on the right again, with new apartments I couldn't afford and a big parking lot where everybody's car is there less mine because I don't have one yet.
It's only an ordinary place. It shouldn't be happening something like this here. It just shouldn't, not at the place I called home.
 I guess you never know what's coming out of this crowded space to take a breath. You might never know when you're unlucky enough to see it.
That's what I am facing right now, something different.
The cat food was forgotten on the floor, scattered like tiny beads.
I couldn't stop staring, and the longer I stare, the less I understood. I couldn't see its form yet because of the darkness, but its eyes told me exactly where it was. The big yellow eyes like the black cat froze my skin on my bones. Could it be?
On the left side of my window, in the darkest corner, he was hiding.
I could tell for sure this thing was massive. It gives me a sense of oldness and patience. It was waiting for me like always.
My omelet was still hot, and in my shock, I didn't notice how the smell sneaked out in the thin air until it reached this atrocity nostril.
With so much tension and disbelief, I felt how my feet couldn't support my weight anymore.
It made a sound as if it took the smell in its lungs, letting out a satisfied moan like it was enjoying the scent of my food.
It was like a voice, deep but somehow soft and old voice of a human. From what I could see now that I got used to the night, its body was a pile of rotten meat. The smell hit me in the face out of nowhere, awakening me from my numb state. He was waiting, and I needed to do something. Should I close the window?
Then, an idea comes to my mind. I wanted to see if this is the black cat so, I did the only thing that could prove it.
I snapped my fingers.
His eyes got wide with excitement and, I could sense happiness from him. He moved with difficulties, almost struggling to reach the light spot or my window.
I gazed at my plate of food. It feels like too much only for me and, it won't hurt anyone.
I slice it in half, place one of it on another plate next to another fork, and as I lower my body to look for him, one pair of thin hands with long dark-grey fingers reach for mines. He didn't have nails.
 I was so close he was standing now on two feet and, I come along with the feeling of dread as I understand how tall he is. He was standing in front of my window but, I couldn't place his feet, only the pair of hands oddly coming from beneath the sill, not above.
I let the plate go from my trembling hands in his steady ones. I turned just once to look at my dinner and, the next thing I saw was him back in the corner. He looked confused as to what to do with the fork.
It was a sense of fear and pity for a monster that I never felt or understood completely.
I snapped my fingers to get his attention. He looked at me weirdly warm, in a way, a friend will. I placed my food on the window and slowly eating to show it to him. He did what I did in the exact rhythm. Cutting small pieces, stab them slowly with the fork, taking it into the mouth, and chewing nine times.
As I come to some sense of what was happening, my body started to react.
My heart sends desperately in my veins blood boiled in pure fear. It doesn't know what else to do in front of danger, just sent blood, sent terror. 
I felt drowned in the anxiety of not knowing anything. I watched the scene outside my window with curiosity, but I felt how my eyes start to water. The food bites got harder and harder to swallow. I felt myself trembling so hard I couldn't use the fork anymore.
From the freak out zone where I landed, my mind took a turn into logic and rational thoughts.
I am having dinner with the thing outside my window.
How something that large can be so silent, he didn't make any sound, not even chewing sounds.
What if someone looking at him like I do now? 
My tears reached my chin, tickling me a bit. I wanted to wipe them off, but I was scared to move.
That's what got his attention.
 My tears.
His expression changed radically. He showed me a smile, so forced and wide that the corner of his mouth almost reached his eyes, stretching the old skin up in his cheeks. I couldn't understand if I am in danger or not. I was still with my plate on the window, with my neck stretching out to try to look better, mortified, but at the same time, my mind wanted to process what it was seeing. 
Then, I saw how he tried to get up, to get closer. I snapped out of my intention to understand so brutally you'd say he pointed a gun at me.
Only at that moment, I wanted to close the window. I wanted so much to reach for the handle, to shut the window close and be safe again. 
But he was getting close faster than the first time. My mind wanted to run while my body wanted to wait. I couldn't let my hand past the window outside in the dark out of terror. I was afraid. I wanted to do something, but my eyes remained on the thing, how he moved, how for a fraction of second I will see more legs, more hands, searching for my window, searching for me.
I never felt so frustrated at myself. I didn't move an inch. 
I dropped my fork on the cold kitchen floor but, I couldn't hear the sound when it hits. I could feel only my panic rising in my cheeks, emptying my stomach, and bothering my neck. 
I couldn't bring myself to do something. I just stared at how tall it's becoming, how the sound of a massive thing finally moves in the air. The sick sensation of having your heart sinking in fear caught my breath.
Then, it got quiet. I couldn't spot anything in the darkness. 
The light from my kitchen was too bright. I need to take a closer look if  I want to see something again. I almost made myself take the first step when something so usual disturbed me in ways I never experienced before.
I heard how bones crack as if he's stretching his back, and then, he yawns. The air felt lifted to his mouth. It got me. I wanted to see, so I dive my head into the night again. His voice was deep, but soft, relaxed, sleepy somehow. It didn't put me at ease. It was waking my heart more, a silent emotion wrapping itself around my body. Silent fear feeds my pulse.
The noise shook me entirely. My body felt on fire, burning with anticipation.
He was a giant. His body reached the stars while his arms expanded entire streets. His mouth was wide open, taking in oxygen, making me feel almost sucked in, lifted from my safe home, almost, when he stopped.
I froze. 
He was bending down for my window. 
My body didn't work anymore, and I couldn't feel my limbs.
 I forgot I have them. The only thing I could do was watch, watch with wide eyes, the scene that's about to happen.
The first thing that appeared was his hands. They were holding the plate with the fork that I give him. He was pointing them at me, so out of habit, I took them. I didn't realize how bad my body was shaking until I saw how the fork was vibrating on the empty plate, making a sound so distracting I place my eyes there for a bit.
Out of nowhere, I felt a warm breath hitting my face as if someone was breathing through their mouth right in front of me. My eyes head for the window in a second. I was gazing at a cracked open mouth, breathing in and out slowly. 
His smile was so large my window frame was in the way of seeing it all. Yellow sharp teeth were staring back at me, way too much, crooked and crowded. It looked painful. He didn't have a nouse, just the skeleton. His skin was black, with numerous cuts and dry blood. The trail that was invading my lungs was of a room that was closed for years. It was such a suffocating scent that I couldn't take a deep breath.
I am not sure how many minutes I stayed stuck, unable to move or make a sound. I memorize that haunting smile over and over again.
"Thank you."
His voice woke me up. I blinked, confused, and astonished that he can talk. I just waited for him to leave. His footsteps were soundless. I couldn't hear a thing, and after moments of getting some bravery, I reach for the window handle to close it.
After I shut it close, I saw that he drew a smiling face on the cold and steamy surface.