The Face That Watches

There's a strange face in the woods outside my window. Mum and Dad won't listen though. It stares and stares... Little brother hates hearing it about it. He thinks it is meant to scare him, the story about the man with no face. The face watches me all hours of the night and day...

Big sister says that it is all lies; she says that Mum and dad should call in head doctors.

It doesn't matter how many times I tell them about him, the man in the dark, no one listens. I don't like when Mum says I have to play outside, because I have to be close to him- he is too tall. He is too thin. Like he doesn't eat!

The man doesn't move when he watches me, he just makes me cold, makes it so I can't run. I don't like when he is around and I think I should stay away from the fence. Mum has to drag me inside for dinner because I can't stop staring, she is angry at me for being out so late in the cold, can't she see him? The tall man that is now standing in our yard.

After dinner tonight, Mum is making me sit in my room- no TV- because I didn't come when she called. I sit at my desk with my homework, trying to finish it before Dad comes in to check, when I see him standing in the yard. The man without a face; the tall man, standing to close to my window. He is always there now, even when I point him out to mum and dad; I don’t know why they can't see him.

My dreams are full of him now, he is standing in the background as I do real magic for my friends. He stands in my dreams watching, I have told him to leave me alone, but only in my dreams. - Mum called the doctor today, she says I am very sick, I keep coughing up blood and I can't sleep. She says I'm not eating very much, she tells him of the tall man I see, I don’t think it matters anymore. The doctor says I will need to go to hospital, he says that maybe something is wrong with my brain and I will need scans. The coughing is bad now, it hurts a lot, the tall man is still watching.

Mum sits with me in the night time to make sure I am ok, she asks me what I am humming and I can't tell her. I don’t know the words, I didn't even know I was humming. She tucks me in and kisses my head, the tall man isn't outside my window anymore. He hasn't been there for a whole day, but he is still in my dreams. His long, long arms reaching for me.

The music is loud in my ears, I can see mum reading to me- her lips are moving- but the music is so loud. I cough and cough, lots of blood come up this time. She sits on the end of my bed staring at me, waiting for it to stop, but it doesn't. I wish it would because I need to tell her something...

The tall man isn't outside the window anymore, the tall man isn't in the yard, he isn't even in the woods... The coughing is too much and I feel like I am falling asleep… I try to fight it very hard because I need mummy to know...

The tall man is the corner now... He is in my room...

Credit To: Mara