Flight of Stairs

“Cole could you please turn off the lights already” her husband whined She sat in my bed, almost ready to go to sleep reading Pride and Prejudice for what may have been the tenth time. “Oh come on I’m in my favorite speech here, only five more minutes,” she persisted. Her husband rolled over and covered his head with a pillow. “…And now nothing remains for me but to assure you in the most animated language the violence of my affection…” She read to herself as she giggled silently. Right after she began to put the bookmark in the book and stood up to turn off the lights, Cole heard the baby monitor next to her bed whale. The baby was once more struggling to get some sleep. The cries were subtle but enough to get his mother’s attention.

“Don’t worry; I’ll go get it this time.” She assured her husband. Cole headed to the hallway that led to the stairway. Her husband and her had decided to put the baby’s room next to the stairway in case that something like this would happen. She guided herself to the light switch in the hallway and flipped it. Artificial light showered the hall and the stairway that led down to the room. She could hear her baby was once crying from all the way upstairs. Cole began to head down the stairs groggily. Being a school teacher had taken its toll on her. Her leisure time, when she managed to get some in, was either spent sleeping or reading as she enjoyed being immersed in her books. She looked at the dim light that came from the baby’s room. The light from the hallway was unable to reach all the way down to the room next to the hallway, so she had put a dim night light inside so as to bring have something to guide herself in there. Suddenly, a loud crash came from the living room, not far away from the stairs. She saw from where she stood on the stairs shards of glass and a half broken window. She stood paralyzed as she saw the silhouette of a man emerge from the hole. The man came into view of the dim light. He was an average looking man, dressed with dark green pants and a matching shirt with stripes of another disturbing shade of green. What disturbed Cole the most by the appearance of this man was the fact that he had a sack on his face. He did not have any orifices through which he could see or breathe or even speak out of; just two solid buttons for where his eyes should be and a minuscule stitched heart shaped mouth. She stood there frozen as she was shocked to see the man look back at her with his expression.

Everything was silent at this time of night, everything but the cry of a baby. Cole began to feel cold seat on the back of her neck. She darted her eyes, and glanced at the doorway from which the cries poured out, only for a couple of seconds. She turned back to see the man in horror, hoping he wouldn’t catch on. She was horrified when the man himself turned to the door and stared into the room where her son was in. Cole shut her eyes hoping this would only be a night mare; that everything that had transpired would only be a fantasy of her over active imagination. She tried to muster every drop of courage she still had and opened her eyes. Tears began form as she saw the man go into the room from which her beloved son was in.

“Rick! Rick! Hurry up and come!” she cried as she desperately ran down the stairs. As she ran she saw that the lights in the baby’s room turned on. She ran and cried to her husband as loudly and desperately as she could, but her pleas seemed to fall into deaf ears.

From the room downstairs, the cries that were from discomfort became anguish. The baby’s voice sounded as if it was in a dreadful struggle. It chocked on its own tears and produced vile sounds that were heard by his frantic mother. Cole began to trip up on the stairs once in a while. Every passing second built her unbearable suffering. “Leave him alone you bastard!” She cried with a quivering voice. The cries that sprung from the room became more violent. Cole sobbed at the thought of the atrocities that were happening to her baby. These damned stairs seemed to go on forever as she kept running down. The only thought more infuriating than the atrocities in the room, more than her husband not coming to her aid, was the fact that she was only steps from the room, but every time that she took a step, it looked like she took a step backwards instead of onwards. She then heard a distorted shriek come from the room and then…

Silence.

Cole felt her body go limp. She put her hands on her mouth as she sobbed and reached the final step of the stairway. She kneeled and pounded her fist on the ground not daring to even look into the room beside her. She laid down on the ground as she felt the dread that came from this cold night, not caring about the man that was a few feet away from her. She shut her eyes and turned to the doorway, only to see the man looking down at her, almost as if his fake sown mouth was smiling at her. He reduced to her level and looked into her eyes with his own. She then heard a familiar voice say “Cole! Cole!” She was too numb to even think of trying to escape from this man. She felt herself being shaken as the man in front of her kept staring into her eyes. “Cole! Cole!”…

***

Cole woke up abruptly to her husband as he shook her. “Cole honey, are you ok? You were having a nightmare. You were screaming and sweating…” As he said this, cries from the baby monitor came out. Without hesitation, Cole sprung from her bed, into the hallway, turned on the lights and ran onto the stairs. She swiftly ran down the stairs; and she entered the room and turned on the lights, she was welcomed to see the familiar sight of a baby boy crying in the middle of a crib. She took him in her arms and began to comfort her son as tears of happiness made themselves present. Her husband followed suit and appeared in the hallway worried for his wife. “Are you ok Cole?”

“Yes Rick” she replied as she held her baby in her arms joyously “I am ok, I was just…reminded of my past.”

“Are you sure you don’t need anything honey?”

“No, I am alright. I though I had forgot about my childhood and my uncle.”

“Don’t worry, its all over now, you were just a victim of a bad nightmare is all.”

And with that, they both departed upstairs, baby in hands, to sleep for the rest of the night at peace.