Home Truth

Home Truth
A short story by Christopher L. Jones
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The call came at precisely four pm. My wife regularly called me at work - mainly to see if I was popping out of the office at lunch so I could do some spur of the moment food shopping, or to tell me just how badly our two children were behaving and how close she was to strangling the pair of them. But this call was different. This one was informing me that whilst she and the children were visiting her parents some fifteen miles away, she'd decided that, seeing as the children were having such a great time, they'd be staying the night.
This was a phone call I liked. Although I always missed the kids when they stayed over at their grandparent's - our house was always so big and empty without them ' it did give me the chance to indulge myself, to regress back a few years and enjoy a brief snippet of a time now long gone ' the days of bachelorhood.
Even before the conversation had ended I'd already planned my evening. A visit to the chip shop on my way home would be my first port of call, then, as the chips drowned in a bath of vinegar on my lap I'd watch one of my favourite films on DVD that would never normally see the light of day in my wife's presence. After that, I'd take it from there. The evening was my oyster.
When the end of my working day came I was away from my desk as soon as was physically possible. The thirty minute drive home was uneventful, the traffic mercilessly free of hold-ups and, with the chip shop empty, I was parking the car outside my suburban semi at just before six pm - a record time. The evening had started well.
The dark and gloomy Autumnal night was falling rapidly as I locked the car shut. Despite the cold and damp night air I strolled purposefully up my drive, gazing across to look through my neighbours' bay window as I always, sub-consciously, did. My elderly neighbours, Jean and Edward, sat, as always at this time of the evening, in their dark front room gazing at the early evening television ' most probably the news. They both turned their heads simultaneously to look at me; their faces, impassive as they watched, glowing in a grey and blue tone that flicked dark shadows onto their features rendering their eyes a deep black with their noses seemingly distorted at strange angles. I smiled to myself, unsure as to why, and entered my house.
I've never liked my house in the dark, especially tonight when it was uncharacteristically quiet and still. I quickly flicked the hall light on and strode through to the kitchen at the back. Turning on the light I un-wrapped my food and was struck as to just how quiet the house was. Feeling a little unnerved I walked out of the kitchen, this time through the door to the dining room (turning on the light) and through into the lounge. Once there, again only after I'd extinguished the dark, I switched on the television ' I needed the house to feel alive and lived in, rather than cold and lifeless.
Satisfied, I collected my chips, made myself a quick coffee and settled into my chair to watch the news without the necessity for having to lip read what was being said on screen because of two shouting children.
I was halfway through my meal when the change hit me.
My stomach felt as though it had plummeted out of my body and through the chair. A cold sweat began to break and my heart suddenly doubled in pace. I stopped mid-chew and stared invisibly ahead. For some reason, an image of me as a seven year old came flooding back; in particular the memory of me throwing half a brick at Michael Jarvis's head in the school playground, only to miss and shatter a window with enough noise to wake the dead. Everyone had turned to look at me and I felt tiny and scared, which was nothing in comparison to the fact that my teacher, the dreaded Mr Simpson, had seen me. That sickness in the pit of my stomach was back.
I was listening, for what I don't know, but I was listening, straining to hear past the noise of the television and into the quiet beyond for any clue as to what had struck my skin to be as cold as stone. I wanted to move, to drown out the sound of yet more death and carnage in some foreign land and to listen - but I was afraid; afraid that if I moved it would shatter the stillness of the room and unleash, in all its fury whatever it was that had inadvertently alerted every nerve ending in my body.
As I sat there, not breathing, I became aware of movement. Not movement as such, but rather the sound of movement which emanated from next door ' it was the sound of someone walking up the stairs. This sound, so familiar to me and, at this moment in time, so comforting, prompted me to move out of my armchair and stand in the middle of the room. I silenced the television and stood motionless. The muffled footsteps reached the top of the stairs and moved, slowly to the front bedroom. The feeling that one of my neighbours was only feet away and performing some regular daily function made me feel more comfortable, but the overwhelming sense of dread was still tangible, still very real.
I headed to the kitchen and poured myself a drink.
Calm yourself, I thought. You're being ridiculous.
I picked up the phone and dialled my wife's parents' house; a sizeable sense of relief washed over me when she answered. I asked if she was okay, that the children we're alright. Of course they were, why wouldn't they be? came the response. After a brief conversation I was pretty sure I'd managed to convince her that I wasn't beginning to go mad. When I hung up I could tell she was worried. She'd said I'd sounded panicky, not myself. She wondered if I'd been working too hard lately, that maybe I needed a rest. She was probably right; she usually was.
My thoughts broke with the sound of a door slamming somewhere next door. I looked towards the wall that separated our house from theirs and tried to imagine who it might be. Then I heard crying. Quiet at first but, as I moved closer to the wall, I recognised it to be unmistakably that of a woman's.
Jean.
As I put my hand towards my mouth I realised that I could just make out Edward's voice too, obviously trying to soothe his wife of over sixty years in the best way that he could. My eyes, inexplicably, filled with tears.
After a second glass of fine malt inside me I decided to load the DVD player as planned and settle down as best I could to watch my film. This I did, but the sense of uneasiness still prevailed as did the occasional noise next door. The slam of another door made me jump more than once and the quiet sobbing continued unabated until late into the night. Having the lounge light on full did nothing to ease my tension.
I didn't have a shower that night. I felt uncomfortable with the thought of closing a bathroom door which didn't have a lock and then shutting myself off further behind a flimsy shower curtain. I had images of somebody dressed as Norman Bates' mother entering silently and tearing it down and hacking freely at me whilst I slipped and slid on the wet enamel bath, grabbing at the knife in a hopeless attempt at self preservation. That scene always freaked me out, it wasn't so much the murder, but the fact that you couldn't see the killers face, only a pair of enraged eyes illuminated by the light reflected off of a nine-inch carving knife.
I shivered at the thought as I lay in my bed staring at the ceiling. I'd been in bed for ten minutes when the thought struck me so hard in the chest that my heartbeat pounded at my eardrums.
My bedroom door was unlocked.
The house was built in the mid-1930s and the original bedroom doors had old, single bolt locks on them. I'd never considered locking the door before but tonight I kicked myself at not thinking of it earlier. Again I felt that any sudden movement may trigger a shattering of the stillness of the room, a sign for the killer to strike from out of the darkness.
Trying to block this from my mind, I slowly peeled back the covers and swung my legs over the bed. My feet settled on the deep carpet and I stood slowly up. Instinctively, I moved towards the door that was at the foot of the bed. I reached out for the key that hung in the lock and touched the end with my thumb and index finger. As I did so, another bang resounded from next door and I physically jumped back, loosing grip of the key which fell from the lock and into the shadows below. I swore under my breath and got down on all fours, searching the pile with my hands. After what seemed an eternity, the cold metal made itself known to my fingers and I wrapped it quickly in my palm. In one quick motion I stood up, locked the door and jumped quickly back into bed, bringing the covers up to my chin.
It took several minutes for my heartbeat to slow to anywhere near its normal rhythm, and in doing so I drifted, uncomfortably, into sleep.
I dreamt that night dreams I never want to experience again. I dreamt of smothering and of being trapped in my body and being unable to move. I dreamt of invisible terror and of loved ones now gone.
I woke up the next morning crying.

Work the next day was more of a chore to get through than normal. I couldn't shake the images of my dreams; the more I tried the more clear they were. Then came the call.

The call came at precisely four pm. My wife's voice was deeper than normal and shaking - something was terribly wrong.
"What's the matter? What's wrong? Are the kids okay? , I asked.
"Yes. Yes, they're fine, she'd replied. She went on to tell me that when she'd arrived home from her mum's there were police cars parked in the road. "They were right outside our house, she's said. "I thought it was you. I thought something had happened to you.
She carried on to say that after parking the car in the drive a policeman had appeared by the front gate and had asked to have a word. "Oh God it's awful, she'd said. "Those poor people.
"What's happened?, I demanded.
"It's Jean and Edward, she said between sobs. "They're dead!
I slumped in my chair as the shock from those few, small words made me so numb that I almost dropped the phone. My colleagues later told me that at that precise moment the colour visibly drained from my face.
"Dead?, my voice sounded detached and lost.
"Those poor people, she said again, sniffing repeatedly. "It's some comfort to know I suppose that they wouldn't have known much about it.
"Wouldn't have known? Why?
"The policeman told me it was most likely a faulty boiler in their kitchen. They died from carbon monoxide poisoning.
With this my wife burst into tears. I tried to picture them in my mind, but as is so often the case with these things I found that I couldn't. They'd been lovely people. It was an awful thing to happen.
"Did they find them in bed or something? , was all I could ask.
"What?
"Jean and Edward, did they find them in bed?
"No, my wife replied. "That's the awful thing. They found them in their chairs in the front room. Looks like they'd just settled down in front of the telly with their tea and they just drifted off. They've been dead since late yesterday afternoon!
My mind raced. No, that was impossible. I'd seen them when I arrived home, they were there. They'd looked at me. I'd heard them talking, heard them moving around. My mind struggled to comprehend the facts, so much so that I tried desperately to push away the one thought that seemed stronger than all the rest.
The only explanation I could comprehend, the only reason for those feelings that I had felt in my kitchen that night was that I'd heard the dead voice of a loving husband trying to soothe, as best he could, the crying spirit of his recently deceased wife.