Lend me your ears and I’ll tell you a story

You dump your bag inside the door; it had rained the whole time you walked home so you go upstairs for a hot shower. This is going to be the best weekend you think, your parents have gone on a business trip so your home alone and throwing a great party tomorrow night. The wind is howling through your bathroom window and there is a splattering of drips on the carpet from the drips that made it through the window.

You turn the shower on full blast so you can hardly hear anything above the din and get in, you reach for a flannel but the wind must have blown it across the room, you get out to grab it off the floor but as you step out of the shaft of water you hear a ringing sound, forgetting the flannel you put a towel around your self and turn off the shower to see what it is. You think it’s the alarm-the mental asylum alarm, it can’t be, it shouldn’t be, and it won’t be. It rings through your head like a bad omen, warning you, telling you.

Why can you hear it from your house? There are so many fields all around, your thoughts wander off the alarm for a moment as you think how at your secluded farm you can make as much noise as you want at your party. Your brain switches back to the present and you can still hear that bloody alarm. It’s him he’s escaped, you panic, as quickened thoughts run through your mind you turn the shower off and put some jeans on, it’s him, you know it’s going to be him, he knows where you live and he’s coming to get you.

They’d phone me if it was him, wouldn’t they? ” You yell into an empty catacomb of air, it won’t stop but it releases your tension. You slump into a frayed and sagging couch to think what to do but from the window behind your head you can hear movement in the tall brittle maize. It’s only just audible above the alarm which seems to be getting more and more intense. You spin around its stopped raining but in the dry half light you can just about see a trail through the maize. You dash around under the noise of the alarm slamming windows and checking doors.

You come to a halt, beside the telephone and stare at it for a while, your brain catches up, and finally you decided to phone the asylum, just to check if it is him, just to be sure, just to be safe. You pick up the receiver and dial, ring, nerves begin to built up and tighten your throat. Ring, and you’re cut off it, why? It sounds like the wire has just been cut. Your attempts to phone the asylum seem ever more important now. You grab your mobile from the top of the fire place, dial and it rings once.

You will it on, it rings again. “Just once more, once more please. But it’s too late after the second ring it cuts off again. The old door, it’s green paint peeling off from years of misuse, which leads to the porch crashes and slams against its frame, you run to lock it as you scurry down the corridor a cold breeze brushes past you, you think the front door is open, so you look out into the relatively new porch but all is still; unnerving thoughts fill your mind, you clumsily lock the door and your thoughts are only broken by the telephone high and piercing above the low brash ring of the alarm. Ring, ring, ring, ring.

You manage to rush and pick up the receiver in your shaky state but all you hear is a low rustling of keys, paper, something, you can’t make it out, but as you strain your ears the dialler hangs up and you mind is filled with torment. Exhaling you put your head against the wall at the end of the corridor where you are still standing next to the phone. Footsteps in the kitchen, drips on the carpet, you can’t turn around, you’re paralysed with fear, the incessant ringing still over head and now from behind you an unsteady breathing pattern approaches.

You hold your breath as you can feel the presence behind you and the back of our leg feels suddenly wet, “what? ” with sudden unexpected bravery you spin around firstly thinking nobody is there until you look down to see your sopping wet chocolate Labrador puppy-Bessie, sitting begging for you to tell her it’s all right, but you can’t, you need her, just as much as she needs you. To your right lies the family room, you shut the curtains and turn the television on, in an attempt to make it sound like your not home alone. Thank God Bessie got in, wait, how did she get in?

You have no flap and you had locked all the doors, nothing makes sense and there are so many noises in your ears. The unforgiving alarm, Bessie panting, the BBC news reporters babbling on about a local murder, the wind howling down the blocked up fireplace behind the T. V and well, and a thud. A deep resounding thud in the pit of the fireplace, as you hear this noise Bessie bolts out the door and down the corridor. You want to do the same but instead of down the corridor, you hurry upstairs to your room you just want to feel safe, safe, you shut the blind, but the moon like an omnipresent, omniscient eye shines through.

It must be late you turn your head to gaze at the clock, eleven twen….. Tiredness has engulfed your body and you fall into an unsettled tormented sleep under the heavy gaze of the moon and the noise of the alarm. Later you wake up, The Alarm has stopped and the phone in the hall is ringing. You put your feet on the floor but realise it is covered in ice or at least something extremely cold. You stand up and step onto the rug but as you do so it shatters into a million pieces just like a piece of glass.

You are thrown back onto your bed and reach for a pair of shoes, after putting them on you slip, slide and fall down the stairs finally reaching the phone. You warily say “hello” You hear a voice “Hi It’s mum don’t worry he hasn’t escaped it’s somebody else I’m in a meeting I’ll call you later bye” she chimes before you hear the hung up tone. As you relax a strong smell fills your sinuses and an icy cold hand pushes you down, down, down, the smell of nitrogen filling your head. You shout but no one can hear you….!