Amongst the Tombstones

I'm writing this because I know I'm not mad, but if I don't tell anyone about what happened, I may not be sane for long. I'm just gonna start from 2 months ago when Molly died and my life changed. Nearly all of us have a friend we can truly rely on, one which knows how you feel and think without ever exchanging a word. A friend that no matter how bad things got, would stand beside you and smile to let you know that you're not alone. My friend was Molly.

I knew something was wrong when Molly didn't turn up for our A-Level classes and didn't answer any of my texts or calls for 2 days. My Dad gave me a lift to Molly's house after school, but when we got there, it was closed off with police tape. The next day, the local papers front lines read, "man beats daughter to death with wrench, then hangs himself". I was distraught; I didn't leave my room for 3 days. My life stopped and I was instantly reduced to a curled up ball on my bed sobbing profusely. I knew Molly's dad slapped her around every so often, whenever I spoke to her about it she would always brush it off or ignore it. I never thought that bastard father of hers would ever cave her skull in with his work tools.

Molly's mother died when she was very young, so her aunt came to arrange her funeral. She invited everyone in Molly's class to pay their respects. The service was beautiful or as one could be at a funeral. Though it was a closed coffin funeral, Molly's aunt told everyone that she was wearing the dress she would have worn to the prom that year. My heart broke again when I heard it, it was barely a month ago when we had gone and brought matching dresses. Molly was buried beside her mom in an old local cemetery; her dad was buried in a different one not far away. After the funeral, I began losing interest in my studies, TV, music and going out. I often missed school and had frequent calls about my lack of attendance. Molly was such a major part of my life and now she's gone I feel as if there is a void left which can never be filled.

After a month of mainly living silently in my room and barely going to school my mom came to my room and spoke to me. She convinced me that I needed to keep going on with my life and that Molly would have wanted me to do so. With time I began to study again, I even found the fountain pen Molly had lent me in the last class we had together. It brought a smile to my face to see it again. I felt the need to see my friend once more; I needed to tell her I was doing fine and that I miss her. On the way home from school one day I bought a small bouquet of flowers and made my way to the cemetery. That's when I felt it. From the moment I walked through the gates of the cemetery I felt a strange feeling, as if the warmth of my body was being drawn out of my skin ever so slowly. I remembered feeling this slightly on the day of molly's funeral but I could have sworn it was the cold weather.

As I walked along the gravel path to get Molly's grave, the feeling intensified. I began to shiver and tremble as the heat was leached from my body. My breath misted and my hands went numb, all I wanted now was just to lay my flowers on Molly's grave and leave. I looked about over the weathered and aged tombstones but saw nobody else around, yet I felt there was someone watching me. Very, very, closely. I could only describe it as the type of gaze a wild animal gives to a human, studious and analysing, searching for weaknesses. After many long seconds had passed, I reached Molly's grave.

The flowers fell from my numb hands and my knees buckled. I fell face down on Molly's grave. All my strength abandoned me and vision blurred as I slipped from consciousness. The last thing I remembered before blacking out was the strange scratch marks across Molly's tombstone and a shadow of a figure standing behind me.

I don't know how long I was out, but I woke up in a dimly lit room struggling to breathe, feeling colder than I had ever been in my life. When my eyes adjusted I let out a choked shriek. A slender creature with tight charcoal black skin straddled my chest with its claw like hands coiled around my throat barely allowing me to breathe. Drool fell from the corners of its enormous mouth, filled with needle like teeth as it stared deep into my eyes with the large bloodshot eye in the center of its face. I thrashed and kicked but the creature’s grip only tightened. Then spoke in its hissing and ghastly voice "Centuries I have languished in the shadows of burial grounds, feeding on the scraps of souls left in the corpses, but now your entire soul will restore me"

The creature began to squeeze harder on my throat and I felt the blood in my head build up in pressure. I began to feel faint again as the life slowly began to slip from me. Thinking quickly I slid my hand into my pocket and pulled out a pen. I felt its shape in my fingers and knew it was the fountain pen that Molly had lent me. As fast as I could I flicked off the lid with my thumb and with whatever pitiful amount of strength I had left, I drove its tip into the monster's eye. The pointed nib sank through the gelatinous orb in the creatures head causing it to throw itself back off me and spastically thrashed around screeching. The long claw like nails on the creatures elongated bony fingers sliced across my forearm leaving 4 stinging gashes. My strength returned and my lungs filled with air once more. I quickly got to my feet and backed away from the monster writhing and flailing on the ground. I saw a coffin in the centre of the tiny room and behind it was a small door slightly ajar allowing a small band of light to illuminate the mausoleum. I bolted for it, running around the other side of the coffin avoiding whatever the fuck that thing was and shouldered the door open. Without looking back I ran out of the mausoleum and found myself on the far side of the cemetery. I didn't waste any time, I wasn't feeling cold nor was I feeling weak anymore, but I wasn't going to give that creature another chance to kill me. Clutching my blood soaked arm I sprinted for the gates, tears falling from my eyes as I ran.

When I arrived home Mom and Dad took me to hospital that night to get my arm stitched up. They didn't believe me when I told them about what happened to me in the cemetery. I convinced my dad to search the mausoleum that I described to them. But my dad and his friend went they only found its door to be securely locked. I'm now frequently visiting a psychological therapist as my parents are under the impression I deliberately harmed myself so that I could deal with the depression of losing my best friend. At times I think they may be right and that I did harm myself. I may have made an elaborate fantasy in my head to escape my depression. But when I wake almost every night trembling and drenched in cold sweat to the same nightmare, in which I'm being strangled by the terrifying thing, I think otherwise. I know I'm not mad, but nobody believes a word I say.