Another Life, JenniferNewman [short story to read .TXT] 📗

Chapter One: Monday 8:58pm
There was a loud bang as the door upstairs slammed shut. Everyone had finally left. Leaving me alone, in a deserted house. Standing stock, still in the same place as I had been five minutes before. Before everything had unfolded and refolded itself in a completely different order. Things were changing inside my head but I blocked them out for later. Concentrating instead on my here and now.
The room was slowly getting darker and darker as the day closed to an end. There were no lights in this room but I could still make out silhouette of the round wooden table just to the left of where I stood in the square room. There were chairs scattered around the room where they had been abandoned minutes before. The room itself was quite big with a high ceiling. A round pillar stood in the centre of the shadowed room casting even more shadows across the old walls.
I continued to glance around the room. A lot had changed here in the last couple of minutes but nothing in this room looked the sliest bit different from the last time I had been here.
I had been only five or six years old when my Mum had gotten a better job and my Aunt had died leaving a great deal of money to use. We used it to move to a grander house in a better area than the one I was now standing in.
The only difference was the mess and dust catered around the place. Mum would have never allowed this.
I could hear the distant sound of a clock ticking away, disturbing the otherwise complete silence.
My mind was ringing with the voices of my friends and family still with hope. I shook my head and brushed away the stray tear that had escaped my closed eyes with my free hand. I realised then that I was still holding on to the wooden rail of the stair case leading down to the basement.
The clock made a loader ticking noise striking ten times before going back it’s the regular sound. Ten o’clock already? Oh.
I looked down at my hand, the one not still gripping on to the rail. My nails were long and painted blood red, my hand was shaking from my lack of balance on this narrow stairway.
The floorboards above the room I was in started to creak, as if someone had been standing there just as long as I had, but only now moving. I grabbed hold of the rail and made my way back up towards the empty living room. One step at a time. One more step. When I reached the top of the flight of stairs, the sound of the clocks ticking got loader. How long had I been standing down there in the basement only now leaving to enter the room above where I had listening to the people?
I stumbled my way over towards the soft cushioned chair where my cousin had been sitting before.
When I reached it I slumped down with a great ‘oaf’ sound. I heard the creaking floorboards again but this time they sounded so much loader. Was there someone up there? I shook my head again, no I had been here before that sound was just ordinary to me. No it wasn’t that. It was just me being jumpy as always but not just that it was from what I had just heard. No there was no one up there and there was definitely no……. what was I going to say. No it was not that. God I am getting paranoid. There is no one else in this house and there is certainly no ghost! Get a grip!
There it was again. I horridly stood up and started to walk towards the direction of the door. The night was falling fast now. I could only just make out the objects in front of me, but that made no deferens because I had walked through this house a million times. The saying ‘know it better than the back of my hand’ was the only way I could think of to describe how I felt about this house.
When I reached the hall which lead towards the front door. The noise sounded again.
Now I was nearly running towards the door. When I finally flung the oak door open, the cold air came rushing in after it. I shrived was it really that cold out there? What time had I arrived? These questions were only some of many buzzing around my head.
All I could do at that point was run just to get away from that house. I never wanted to come back here again.
Too many memories. Good ones and not so good ones. At this moment they were all buzzing around my head like bees and a honey pot.
I was still running when I collided with a tall figure that was walking in the opposite direction.
“Sorry” I muttered taken aback. Had I really been that scared of what my own mind had come up with in the house that I missed this large boy?
“That’s okay. I wasn’t looking where I was going.” The boy replied with a thick American accent. He removed his long slender fingers from my arm where he must have tried to stop me from knocking him over.
I nodded slowly glancing behind me nervously. Was I really looking behind me to check if I was being followed? By what my old next door neighbours cat? God get a grip on yourself! I scolded myself silently.
“Not to be rube or anything but you look kind of freaked out. Are you okay? I mean not to pry......” he asked but started to train off when he saw the look on my face. Was I really going to consider telling a totally stranger that I was running from some crazy thought that my mind had just decided to terrify me with? The worse thing is I was considering it. I even opened my mouth to answer when I court myself. I was just shock up that’s all as soon as I got away from that house I would be able to think clearly again.
“I’m fine thanks. I just need to be somewhere.” I Mumbled the first stupid words that came into my head “Sorry again for running into you” I said as I began to walk at a slightly faster pass than I would have normally, in the same direction as I thought the bus stop was.
“Okay no problem bye.” The boy called after me as I darted off out of his sight. I could not be sure but I swear I saw something that looked like amusement cross across him face just before I turned around to make sure I didn’t run into anyone else tonight. Though as I said I couldn’t be sure.
It was getting darker by the second and by the time I reached the bus stop I was really starting to wish I had bought a coat. Why was I so stupid all the time? The only good thing about the cold was that it took my mind off of what I had just heard and the episode with the boy all I could think of was the cold and how the bus better come soon or I might decide to walk.
It was then that I heard footsteps a little way off from where I was leaning against the bus stop shelter. My head snapped around in the direction the noise had come from but the darkness was too deep. I would have been lucky to be able to see my hand if I held it right up to my face right now. I took a step backwards and found myself backed up against the other side of the shelter. Was it not my imagination playing tricks on me after all?
The footsteps were getting loader but I was paralysed to the stop just waiting there for whatever it is that was walking my way. The darkness that surrounded me made it feel like I was being swollen by the night itself. Just as suddenly as the footsteps had started they stopped. The night was once again silent but I didn’t dare breath. The sound of someone breathing in slowly and then out again was the only noise I could hear until suddenly I heard the... the.... person I suppose it had to be. Yes it had to be what am I thinking? Move away with heavy foot falls in the over direction. As soon as I was sure I could no longer hear whatever it had been, I breathed out loudly.
Okay everything is okay. It could have just been someone coming to the bus stop to get a bus but forgot something and had to run back. You don’t even know the new you were here. Excuses like this kept running round my head but none of them made any sense to me. I must just be still in shock and was making a big deal out of everything. That’s it I'm just being what Mum calls a ‘Drama Queen’. I can deal with that it’s a good way to think. Now if only I could believe it.
Slowly I began to realise how stupid I was being and unfolded myself from the ball I had curled up in on the floor. I got to my feet slowly as to keep my balance. As always I am a very clumsy girl but I felt even more unstable on my feet than usual. I grabbed hold of the old plastic seat to steady myself and looked around me. Surly I was just being really silly in thinking I had been in any danger here I should just really get home as fast as I could and get some sleep. I would probable laugh at myself for being so stupid and be glad that is was dark so no one would have seen my reaction to hearing mere footsteps how silly. Back to the here and now though I was still completely terrified and couldn’t seem to get my heart under control. Even if the stranger had come back I would not have been able to hear its footsteps thanks to my dramatic heart beats.
Just as I was thinking about walking all the way home I saw the head lights of the bus coming my way. I was in luck I had not really been looking forward to walking in this kind of darkness with my mind making up all sorts of threats along the way.
I put my hand in my pocket to find some money to pay for the ticket when I realised that my purse was not the only thing in my pocket. I pulled out a hand full of papers along with my purse. When had I put them in there? I stuffed the papers back into my pocket and stuck my hand out for the bus to stop.
When I had boarded the warm bus and sat down at the back nearest to the exit. I pulled out the papers again after all the journey home was a rather long one when on a bus. I slowly looked around me in spite of what I had told myself at the bus stop. I just had to make sure but no one was even remotely interested in what I was doing. There were six people on the bus