in my trembling fingers, and it took all my effort to work the catch. With a concentrated effort, I finally got it to click into position as – just a few centimetres from my face – sharp knuckles rapped slowly on the door’s small window pane.
‘Go away!’ I cried, my voice shaking as badly as my hands. I backed away from the door, not daring to take my eyes off the outline of the figure lurking outside. ‘My mum’s going to be home in two minutes, so you’d better get out of here!’ I lied. Mum would probably still be at the home, still trying to get Nan to go with the nurses, still trying to get away. I was on my own, with someone or something standing right outside the front door!
Which left the back door clear, I realised. Whoever was outside was at the front of the house. And unless you go in through the living room and out through the kitchen, the only way to get to the back garden from the front is by going round the whole house. It’s a twenty-second sprint in good conditions, so in the dark, and with the wind and rain, it’d take at least double that.
That meant I’d have a forty-second head start to get out the back and across to the next row of houses over the road. Forty seconds to get away. I almost cried with relief. I’d get out of this yet.
The rhythmic rapping stopped as I sped through to the kitchen, catching the side of the door frame and swinging myself through for extra speed. My feet found a puddle of cooking oil and I skidded and slipped my way to the back door, arms outstretched and flailing wildly to keep me from falling on my face.
Rat-a-tat-tat.
My stomach almost ejected my entire Christmas dinner as I realised I was too late.
They were already at the back door.
But nothing could have made it round that fast. It was impossible. There had to be two of them out there, that was it. Nothing supernatural about it. Just two people messing around. That’s what I told myself, but whether I believed it or not is a different matter.
The key wasn’t in the lock. There wasn’t time to look for it, so I scrambled unsteadily over to the table and snatched up a chair. Thank God we’d taken them back through from the living room after dinner.
Struggling to stay upright on the slippery floor surface, I wedged the back of the wooden chair tight against the door handle, jamming the door tightly closed. It probably wouldn’t hold them off for long, but at least it’d buy me some time to…
To what? I had no idea what I was going to do next. I’d been working on sheer adrenaline for the past five minutes, and hadn’t really expected to make it this far. There’d been no time to think ahead, and now my escape routes were blocked. There was no way out of the house. I was trapped!
The steady knocking on the back door was driving me crazy. It might have had something to do with the shape of the kitchen, or the number of wooden cabinets mounted on the walls, but the knocking seemed to echo more in here, making the sound even louder.
I couldn’t stand listening to it for another second. Stopping only to shove the table up against the chair for extra support, I left the kitchen and pulled the door closed behind me. Maybe the door blocked out the sound, or perhaps the knocking stopped right at that second. Either way I couldn’t hear it any more.
Back in the living room, I risked a glance at the front door. The silhouette no longer filled the little window. From here the way looked clear, but for all I knew whoever was doing this was standing just outside, waiting to grab me as soon as I stepped out into the night. That was a chance I wasn’t about to take.
In the gloom, my hands searched the sideboard for the phone. This was too big to handle on my own now. I’d call Mum. Or the police. The army, maybe. Anyone who could help me. Please, I thought. Someone help me!
The handset wasn’t in its cradle. Stupid portable phone, I cursed, looking around for any sign of the slim silver telephone. My eyes proved almost useless in the dim light, and I was forced to carry out a fingertip search of the couch, the coffee table, and every other likely hiding place.
Before I could even properly begin searching, a sharp rap of knuckles sounded on the living-room window. Frantically I hunted for the handset, too terrified to look towards the source of the sound. I was babbling incoherently, tears staining my cheeks, barely able to think. I found myself searching the same places over and over again; moving the same cushions, lifting the same pieces of scrunched and torn wrapping paper. Where was it?!
Another bolt of lightning tore the sky, briefly freeze-framing everything in the room. Through the window, the electric-blue light cast a long, looming shadow on the wall across from the window.
The shadow of a man in a wide-brimmed hat.
In the flash I spotted the phone sitting on top of the TV. I’d seen it in the dark, but assumed it was the remote control. A vague memory of Nan trying to switch on the telly with it earlier popped into my head, before being pushed back down again by sheer, choking terror.
Mum always forgot to put the handset back on charge and the little battery symbol was blinking at me in a way that seemed far too cheerful, given the circumstances. ‘Please,’ I begged it. ‘Enough for one call!’
It was nearly ten miles to the care home. The police station would be much closer. If I was lucky there’d be someone at the local one, otherwise they’d have to send someone from town. Why did I have to live in such a backwater?
Fingers shaking, eyes blurred with tears, I stabbed three nines on the keypad and held the receiver to my ear.
Nothing happened. I pulled the phone away and peered at the little LED display. The battery was still flashing, but it was hanging in there. The number was right, but it wasn’t working. Why wasn’t it working?
Trying to ignore the sound of the knocking on the window, I pressed the cancel button and redialled the number.
‘Come on,’ I hissed, as I waited for something to happen. ‘Come on, come on, come on!’
After what seemed like an eternity, I heard the ringing tone I’d been waiting for. Yes! In just a few seconds the line gave a faint click as someone answered.
‘Help me,’ I begged, not even waiting for the emergency operator to speak. ‘I need the police, there’s someone here. They’re trying to get into my house! Please, come quick!’
An empty hiss down the line was the only reply.
‘Hello?’ I said into the soft static. For a moment I could hear my own voice drift off into the chasm of silence on the other end of the phone. Another failed connection? I’d have to hang up and dial again.
Before I could end the call, a low moan reached my ear, breaking up and distorting as it travelled down the telephone line.
‘H-hello?’ I said again. My voice echoed back to me, and I could hear my own fear.
Further moans and groans crackled from the earpiece, low and menacing, but with some urgency in their tinny tones. As I listened, I realised the sounds weren’t just random groaning at all. If I concentrated I could almost make out what sounded like words. Broken words.
Mumbled words.
I concentrated harder still on the distorted, indistinct voice. And then, suddenly, the sounds made sense. I understood them. Every word.
Time to die.
I let the handset slip from my fingers. The plastic back flew off as it bounced on the carpet, letting the tired battery ping free. A low mumbling repeated over and over in my head – time to die, time to die, time to die…
I jumped as the CD player suddenly sprung into life. The electricity was off, yet somehow the orange LED display on front of the machine had blinked on. Hypnotised, I watched the track number display count slowly upwards. One. Two. Three. It made it all the way to track eight, then stopped.
For a moment there was nothing but the faint whirr of the disk spinning,