A Tear In Time

Lilith woke up to a world thrown into chaos. It started with her mother screaming from the living room downstairs; Lilith found herself hurrying to get dressed and get ready before she made her way downstairs to the source of the noise.

Her mother was wringing her hands. She had never seen her mother afraid. She was staring at the TV, where she was watching an equally distraught reporter standing in their local field, giving them an update on the daily events, his face ashen. But the camera wasn’t pointing at the reporter, it was pointing into the air above the reporter directly behind him. A crack had formed in the sky, a dark void. A tear so black that no light came from it or went in.

“Mummy, what’s that?”

Lilith’s mother inhaled sharply, realising her daughter was in the room and running to switch off the TV, not willing to risk her daughter’s innocent mind.

“It’s nothing sweetie. They’re just saying there’s something funny in the air today. They’ll be sending men in planes to fix it.”

Lilith wasn’t stupid. She knew it was far more than that. Her mother thought her innocent and quiet. Lilith was actually very intelligent and reserved. She listened and learned what was going on around her. She knew something big was happening. Lilith had those funny goosebumps she always got before something strange or exciting happened.

“You won’t be going to school for a while Lilith. The government and the people in charge are asking everyone to stay indoors while they sort whatever it is.”

“Can I go out in the garden and play?”

“No!” Lilith’s mother’s voice was sharp and shrill as she leaned forward and gripped her daughter’s shoulder, turning her to look into her daughter’s deep blue eyes. “You must promise me you’ll stay inside. I won’t lose you. I won’t!”

Lilith tilted her head up to look her mother directly in her wide eyes, glazed over with terror. “I’ll stay inside, mummy, don’t worry.”

Lilith turned and walked out into the kitchen, reaching for a banana and sitting on a bar stool by the kitchen island, swinging her legs on the too-high bar stool. She looked towards the patio doors which had the blinds drawn shut over. Looking to the other side of the open plan room to the windows in the living room, she noticed that they too were covered, a clear sign her mother didn’t want her looking outside. She wondered if anyone else had their curtains drawn and their blinds closed, wondered if anyone else had a mother trying to keep whatever the bad thing was out of sight.

As she ate, she quietly watched her mother playing with her ponytail, her fingers running nervously through the hair at the end. She knew her mother was nervous; she could see it in her body language.

“Mummy, come and have some breakfast with me. I need company while I eat.”

Liana looked to where her daughter sat, cool and collected. Those nerves of hers were never rattled. She was looking at her bright nine year old, devoid of any emotion other than hunger. She was just as she remembered Lilith’s father. Nothing had ever unsettled him. Not even when he had been lying in the hospital bed, breathing for the last time.

She moved to join her daughter and grabbed a fresh cup of coffee from the pot. She liked it black and without sugar. She needed it to settle down. She also grabbed a banana like Lilith and sat on the stool opposite her, peeling her banana.

The whole day was devoted to Lilith finding ways to keep her mother occupied with little things so she wouldn’t focus on what was going on outside in the world. She knew her mother needed the distraction. She asked her mother for help in reorganising her clothes and making piles of clothing that didn’t fit her any longer. She wanted to give those to a charity shop. Her mother beamed with pride watching Lilith, amazed at how mature her little girl was. Liana and Lilith painted each other’s nails and did face masks. They then built a fort of pillows and snuggled inside to watch a couple of movies.

Lilith helped her mother to clean up afterwards and watched closely as her mother grew more tired, her body relaxing as she finally settled onto the sofa and curled up with a blanket. Lilith waited.

Sure enough, once her mother’s gentle snores reached her ears, Lilith moved swiftly. She ran quietly upstairs to her bedroom and ran to her wardrobe, pulling it open to reach for a small sturdy backpack that hovered near the back of the wardrobe. She found her favourite fleece jacket with a hood and pulled it on, throwing the backpack onto her shoulders. She walked towards her little bedside cabinet and opened a drawer, taking out a small camera and a flashlight. She kept one beside her bed ever since she discovered her love for reading books under the bed covers, enthralled with mysteries and adventures. The small camera she normally used when out in the garden or on holiday with Liana, taking pictures of everything she liked. The proof was in the large collage on the wall above her bed, layered with dozens of photos of beaches, trees, animals, flowers and anything else that caught her curious eye.

She hesitated, looking at her bed. What if her mother woke up and saw her bed was empty? She grabbed her favourite doll, with the same coloured hair as her own dark chocolate locks and put her in the bed, covering her with the duvet and drawing it close over the head, leaving only some of the hair visible. She grabbed a spare pillow from a shelf in the wardrobe and put it under the duvet as well, giving the impression that she was curled up in bed, safe and warm. That should do it.

As mentioned before, Lilith wasn’t stupid. She hadn’t done this before but she knew the theory of sneaking out. She looked at her little pink clock on the bedside cabinet. It read 7pm. It would still be relatively light out for another hour or so. She put the flashlight in her pocket. She might still need it.

Lilith snuck out of the patio doors in the kitchen and slid the door shut silently behind her, taking care not to let the sudden movement rustle the blinds too much. Her plan successful, she found herself running through the garden, down quiet side streets and all the way to the very field the reporter had been standing in earlier in the day. It hadn’t taken her long, the field was in the centre of the town and was usually filled with dog walkers and other people.

As she stepped into the field, she was struck by how still and silent everything was. She looked around her and saw the houses lining one side of the field, all their curtains closed, shielding themselves from the eerie sight outside their windows.

The sight...Lilith turned to look up at the sky. A soft blue, with a few clouds gently taking their time to pass above her head. But it was disrupted by the tear. An inky darkness that looked like someone had literally ripped a tear into the sky like it was a piece of cheap fabric, revealing nothingness underneath. Clouds seemed to just stop when reaching the tear, disappearing as though it was being taken by the darkness. The sunlight was almost muted, an eerie green light where the sun's rays should have been.

Her breath caught in her throat as she noticed something moving within the darkness. Large dark tentacles, a very deep green so dark it could have been mistaken as black, slowly unfurled from within the tear, reaching into her world, spreading to envelop most of the sky, the atmosphere around her darkening and turning almost thicker, making it harder for her to breathe. Indeed, her breath was coming out in ragged gasps as she fought for oxygen, realising the tentacles were literally sucking the oxygen from the air.

A deep rumbling came from within the dark chasm as something fought to push through, the tentacles shaking with all their might. Lilith’s eyes widened as she heard an unearthly scream before the tentacles were withdrawn suddenly, light almost blossoming again, changing from the horrible green light back to the warm and natural sunlight. The tear still remained in the sky, black as ever. The tentacles were gone and so was the screaming.

Lilith had tears in her eyes as she realised the daylight was fading fast and she didn’t feel like remaining outdoors any longer. Her curiosity satisfied, she was left feeling wrung out and just wanted to get back to her room, tucked up in bed. But she needed to write about what she had just seen. Nobody else had witnessed the horror. She wanted to find out what was going on.

Lilith made it up to her room in almost no time at all. She had sprinted the entire way home, not wishing to look back at the tear. She didn’t want to see more tentacles poking out.

She had just put her pyjamas on and clambered into her bed beside the doll when her mother came into the room. Liana looked worried.

“Were you tired? Did you want to come up to bed, sweetie?”

Lilith pushed the horrors of the evening to the back of her mind as she looked Liana in the eye and lied. “Yes mummy, I just wanted to get a little cosy and read a little before bed. I’ve brought Lacey into bed too, look.” She held up the doll for her mother to see.

Liana smiled, tiredness marring her beautiful features. “Okay, you get some rest and we’ll talk in the morning. We need to decide what we’re doing tomorrow.”

“Goodnight, mummy.”

Tomorrow...Lilith wondered what that would bring as she drew a notepad and pen towards her, ready to write about the horrors she had witnessed.