A Dark and Stormy Night

“It was…a dark and…stormy night,” Lydia muttered under her breath as she meticulously pressed each letter on the clunky keyboard. She reveled in the satisfying click clacks the sound of her typing made, proud that it sounded more and more like her mom’s did—a quick, confident staccato—and less like the clumsy measured pace she first kept when she started to learn at seven. Lydia was eight now, and infinitely more capable.

She adjusted the frames of her lensless glasses—an old pair of her dad’s and much too large—and typed up the rest of her story with a focused furrow of her brow. Once satisfied, she hit print and watched with ballooning excitement as each crisp page shot out, warm and studded with fresh black ink curved in Comic Sans. She grabbed her hole puncher and a robin’s egg ribbon she had saved from a fancy cookie package and bound her book, careful to make each little bow perfect.

“What’s that?” Rough hands snatched the book from her grasp as she was just tying the knot on the last bow, causing the ribbon to quickly unravel.

“Give it back,” she huffed at her older brother, jumping up to grab it back from him. Five inches taller, three years older, and ten times more obnoxious than anyone Lydia had come across yet in all her eight years, her brother’s main objective in life seemed to be making hers miserable.

He put his palm over her face and easily held her in place, holding the book up high. “The Mysterious Shadow Man,” he read aloud in a mock-serious tone, then let out an unpleasant cackle. Lydia frowned. Her brother flipped through the first couple pages, his narrowed eyes scanning its contents.

“The Shadow Man smiled a wicked grin underneath his cloak as he began his hunt like an owl chasing a mouse…” He let out one last laugh, then dropped the book on the ground at her feet. “Oh I can’t read anymore, it’s much too sca-wwy,” he said, adopting a baby voice accompanied by an exaggerated pout.

Lydia bent down and snatched the book off the floor, eyes hot. A thousand angry words buzzed through her head like a swarm of seething hornets but her throat was thick and closed up from holding back the wave of other emotions she refused to show. She knew if she opened her mouth the sting of her furious retort would be dampened by an embarrassing flood of tears that was threatening to spill out any second. So she didn’t say a word. She shot him a freezing glare, then spun on her heel and stomped the way to her room, slamming the door shut on the sound of her brother’s fading laughter.

• • •

Lydia’s brother groggily woke up to the pitter-patter of raindrops hitting the roof. A barn owl outside let out a screech like a midnight alarm. He looked out the window, eyes still half-shut from sleep, and saw it was still dark out. Though his tired body felt like lead in his comfortable bed, his dry, thirsty mouth pushed himself out of it and towards the kitchen.

He stumbled down the hallway, yawning, when his eyes caught on something his sleep-addled brain couldn’t quite register. He blinked slowly.

Once.

Twice.

Three times, then stopped blinking, his eyes fixed wide.

The hazy warmth of lingering sleep dissipated like a cold wind dousing a candle flame as he struggled to grasp the sight before his eyes. A dark figure, easily seven feet tall, stood towering over him. Seemingly made from the shadows of night itself, the only thing delineating it from the darkness was the faint outline of light provided by the waning crescent moon that traced the cloaked figure. Every part of his body froze except for his heart, which was frantically threatening to escape from his chest as it beat faster and faster, blood roaring in his ears.

He was certain this was the end.

A montage of some of his most cherished memories, as well as regrets, began to play before his eyes, interrupted by flashes of white–the pages with the words from his stupid little sister’s stupid little book.

“Shadow Man,” he whispered softly, almost reverently. He then let out a high-pitched scream, turned around, and sprinted back down the hall as fast as he could, past the kitchen, past his room, and to the bedroom at the opposite end—his parents’.

And balancing on a step stool and several stacked books, face shadowed by the hooded cover of the dark blue Little Mermaid blanket she had wrapped herself in, Lydia smiled a wicked grin.