The Dread Pursuit

I braced my back against the door. It was nearly in. The decrepit walls of my refuge shuddered with each and every blow the thing outside made against them. I knew it would only be a matter of time before I again was on the run.

The air grew thick and hazy as I tried to find something with which to bar the door, but –as misfortune would have it– the room was dark and empty. Each beleaguered breath hung in my lungs like molasses as I watched the lock give way, and my silent prayers did little as the door began to burst inward against my weight. The very walls shook with ever more fervor, just like the quickened beating of the heart in my chest.

I then looked up to see motes of dust flittering in the moonlight, like specks of pepper in a white soup. At last, as if providence itself sought to bring me a sliver of hope, I noticed a window high up on the opposite wall through which I might be able to make an escape. I counted my blessings – just in time for them to shatter along with the window's glass. It had found a way in. With no time to spare, I flung the door behind me wide open and made a break for it. The hunt began anew.

The narrow hall beyond the door seemed to stretch infinitely into the shadowed expanse. Without further delay, I flung myself down it, putting every ounce of my will into each stride. The aged floor was horribly warped, causing me to trip every few strides, and the cracked plaster on the walls crumbled at the merest touch. Yet no matter how much I stumbled, no matter how much the hall decayed as I ran, I knew I could not look behind me. It was certainly there, just a step behind – as it ever was.

The hall steadily grew more lightless, and the air grew gravid with dust. Wooden beams now showed through patches of rapidly yellowing plaster. At every step, the walls and ceiling dissolved into hungry, merciless shadow. The thing's chase quickened behind me, and I, utterly exhausted, struggled to outpace its newfound frenzy. Suddenly, a floorboard shot upward underneath my foot. I tripped over it and fell at the feet of the thing that had been chasing me. However, I had met with neither tooth nor claw, neither blade nor bludgeon, I simply felt nothing. I found nothing but sudden freefall, and the airy embrace of the ravenous void below as the broken end of the hall fell away above.

With a hard gasp, I abruptly awoke in my bed. I felt warm amidst the sheets, which all were wrapped tightly around my trembling body. Sunlight graced my eyes, letting me know that I had indeed been plucked from torment by my timely savior: morning. I shed a few tears of joy as I carefully unwound the blankets from myself. One steady breath later, I reached my foot down to find my slippers – only to discover they weren't there.

My heart sank as I realized I was not in my room, or – should I say – I was not in my room now. I was back at my parents’ place, my childhood home, nestled in the corner of my old room. But even then, nothing at all seemed right. For one, the room was not even my size. It appeared exactly as it had when I was five – exactly as it had when I was five. That was the other thing, I was sat upon my old platform bed. My feet rested not upon my slippers, but the old city rug play mat I used to have. Lego sets and old books that I hadn’t seen for years laid strewn about the place, and my old yellow rain coat poked out from the door of the closet. Everything existed as I remembered it from the midst of childhood.

Across from my bed was the door. It was an old piece of varnished plywood with a tarnished brass doorknob. I knew right away that the door had no lock. In fact, the doorknob barely held the door shut on the best of days. This realization arrived as soon as the next: It was waiting behind that door, waiting to know if I was awake.

I wasted no time. I had to hide. As quietly as I could, I hurried to the closet and opened the door just wide enough to fit myself through. Once inside I turned to shut the door, only to find myself in the yard beneath my bedroom window. It had not noticed me yet, but it would very soon. I hung close to the vinyl siding of the house as I went around to the back yard. After a few deep breaths, I ran across the grass. I could feel it then. It knew where I was.

At the corner of the yard at the old house, there was a gap between two of the neighbors' fences that led to one of their gardens. I squeezed myself through and dove into my neighbor's rose bushes. The thorns tore at my skin as I dug inside, trying to find the small hollow that laid between the bushes and the wooden fence of the other neighbor’s yard. But I did not stop – I could not stop. I clawed my way through to find that the hollow became a dirt path that ran on forever. The rose bushes rose to the height of hedges on either side of it, and the sky above it was only darkness and moonlight. Nothing else existed but oblivion behind the flowers as each petal quickly withered and died before my eyes.

I stood for a moment, marveling at the extraordinary sight before me, but I tarried a moment too long. I heard It tear through the nearest fence, ripping the rusted chain link from its very posts. I dared not turn around. Instead, I did the only thing left I could do: I ran down the path as quickly as my legs could carry me.