CHAPTER 18

There's a monster at my door.

I hear it all the time. This hissing of its breath. The scratching of its claws. Rapping its knuckles on wood.

Knock, knock, knock.

There's a monster at my door.

It wears the face of my mother. It wears the face of many. It smiles to deceive, to trick, but its teeth are needles, razor-sharp and tipped with poison. I see them.

I see.

There's a monster at my door.

No shadow can hide me. Darkness cannot conceal me. I'm a flickering light, I'm warm flesh, I'm a beating heart.

Knock, knock, knock .

There's a monster at my door and it won't go away.

It won't ever go away.

*******

The faint scent of cigarette smoke filtered through the gap in the partly-open doorway.

The voice of a newsreader I couldn't stand, drifted in with the smoke, serving as nothing but background noise to the crack of bone and screams I could still hear.