The Bad Little Brothers

“Run!!” he cried out.

Both boys threw open the door to their house and fled on foot down the street into the evening fog. Behind them, they could see the light shining through the front door as the silhouette of a maddening creature roared violently into the blackening sky.

“She’s coming,” shouted one of the brothers.

“Why did you have to make me do that?!” panted the other through his tears.

The resounding slam of the house door echoed behind them like a gavel crashing against a judgment stand. The boys looked behind them and saw a darkened shadow racing in the night hot on their trail. Blinding anger glowed yellow in her eyes, while heavy breaths fumed out of her nostrils like mist in the cool of the evening.

“Run through the park!” shouted one of the brothers.

The street upon which they ran dead-ended into a park designed with playground equipment, a lake where playful ducks swam, and beyond that, the woods. Dashing onto the pebbled gravel of the playground, the boys ran up the tub of the nearest slide and took shelter in the dome canapé resting at its top. Trying to quiet their breathing, they peaked around the edge of their fortress for the shadow hunting them down.

Lightning flashed across the scene, illuminating the park for brief seconds, only to be shrouded by darkness and the deadening tremble of thunder.

Scanning the field, one brother spotted a figure standing out in the grass in the passing crash of lightning. He quickly pulled his head back, recomposed himself, and peered around the corner again.

Lightning quickly flashed over the field, but the figure was gone.

“Sh-sh-sh-She was th-there!” he stammered.

“What?” whispered the other brother. “Where?!”

He didn’t have time to reply as a familiar growl breathed right beside them. Slowly, carefully, both boys turned their heads and looked into the darkened tunnel of the slide that lay inches beside them. Lightning flashed overhead, briefly revealing a set of eyes glaring at them from within the tunnel.

Both boys screamed and fell backward. A hand reached out of the tunnel’s depths and grabbed the ankle of one of the boys.

“She’s got me!!” he squealed in terror.

The hand began to drag him down the slide. The boy turned over on his stomach and tried to grip the floor with his fingers, but it was of no use. The raging strength of this monster far surpassed his own weak childish arms. His knees rolled over into the tunnel, followed by is waste.

Quickly, his other brother reached out and grabbed him by his hands. Planting his feet on either side of the slide, he pushed with his legs and pulled with his hands. The monster down in the tunnel shrieked and cursed in a stammering, roaring furry at his resistance. He felt his brother’s sweaty hands beginning to slip out of his own.

“Run!” begged his brother, nearly halfway into the darkness of the tunnel.

Suddenly, his hands slipped out of his grasp.

“Save yourself!” echoed his voice as he was pulled out of sight into the darkness.

The lightning flashed, and no one was seen in the tunnel. All faded into darkness as thunder and the cries of his brother pleading for mercy blasted into the night.

The only surviving brother dashed off of the fortress, leaping through the raining night air, and landing on the wet pebbles of the playground.

He didn’t look back but charged as fast as he could along the side of the lake before vanishing into the woods on the other side. Tree branches swatted against his face like boney hands. The flashing lights in the sky illuminated the trees of the forest like monsters all around him.

It was not long before he tumbled out on the other side of the woods and onto a street. He looked up and saw towering in the distance the rising spire of a nearby cathedral. Running up to its stairs, he repeatedly pounded upon the locked doors, where he cried out for forgiveness, confessed his sins, and prayed that his life might be spared.

The sound of monstrous breathing huffed and puffed behind him. It was at that moment that he knew his judgment had arrived. Turning around, he saw a dark figure standing in the middle of the street in the rain, clenching her fists and gnashing her teeth. She approached him. As she drew closer to the porch light of the cathedral doors, his crime returned to visit him as he saw his mistake smeared across her face.

There standing at the top of the stairs, visible by the church lantern and the lightning overhead stood his older sister, her face and hair dripping with white, wet powder that oozed down her snarling lips.

“Did you put flour in my hairdryer?” she snarled.

Oddly enough, the boy’s face turned from pale terror into a smirk. His lips began to quiver as he tried to control a burst of untamable laughter rising inside his mouth.

“Yes!” he laughed out loud.

“I had a date tonight,” she roared. “You and your brother are going to get it!”

Snagging him by the shirt collar, she pulled her brother off of the steps. Lightning broke the sky in strobing flashes, but the laughing boy and his older sister were nowhere to be seen.

Yet, for those of us who have been somewhere close to this situation, it is safe to assume that both boys are alive, but far from comfortable...