There I Was Gone

 

Picture credit: Pinterest 

By Prevail Otobo

It happened so fast. I was alone in the house for the first time in a long while. The silence was thick, almost too perfect and unsettling. I remember peeking at the clock, it was exactly 1:03 a.m.—just before I heard a subtle but terrifying noise. It wasn’t loud, but it shook me. A cold shiver ran down my spine. Different questions began gushing through my mind. Why had no one ever gone into the storeroom? Since we moved into the new house—or since I was old enough to keep memories—I had never seen anyone walk through the black door tucked into the far end of the hallway. 

It had always been there, quietly plaguing that side of the house. I stood up slowly, each progressive step weakened my legs. My legs were shaky, and my palms felt moist. I gestured the sign of the cross repeatedly, whispering “the blood of Jesus” under my breath, hoping it would shield me. I didn’t even realize when my hand reached for the door handle. There I was face to face with the thing that had scared me for years. I started to turn the handle, just a little, and immediately froze. A deep stillness settled in my chest. My hands trembled. I couldn’t go on. Something stronger than fear held me back. I stumbled a few steps away, turned, and ran back to my room. I slammed the door, locked it, plugged in my AirPods, and pushed the volume to 100. I didn’t want to hear anything else. I buried myself under the covers, desperately trying to convince myself it was all in my head, I was probably in a nightmare. By 10 a.m., my parents were back. Their return should have brought relief, but their expressions said otherwise. They looked drained, and broken. My mum had tears in her eyes. My dad’s face was stiff, his eyes distant. Neither of them said a word to me. They didn’t even acknowledge my presence. I stood there, confused, watching as my mother broke into tears in my father’s arms. “All will be well,” he kept saying, over and over. This wasn’t new. They had ignored me before. As the only child of a middle-aged couple, I was often left alone in my world, unnoticed. I was used to the silence.

 I went back to my room—the one directly beside the black door. I tried to distract myself by cuddling my teddy bear and studying the Barbie posters on my wall. My Barbie-themed duvet had always given me comfort. But that day, it felt different. Cold. Like it no longer belonged to me. Then the banging started again—louder, more aggressive than before. I clutched the sheets, my heart racing and pounding so loud! Panic overtook me. I screamed. I cried. “Help me!” I yelled at the top of my lungs, hoping someone, anyone, would rush in. But no one came. I couldn’t stay. I flung open my door and ran outside. And then I stopped. A crowd had gathered. People I knew. Some I didn’t. All dressed in black. My mother was sobbing uncontrollably. My father stood stiffly beside her, trying to hold himself together. Aunts, uncles, neighbours… they pretended not to see me as I approached closer, in my perplexed state, I pushed through the crowd, trying to understand what was going on. And then it struck me like lightning

Me.

Lying peacefully in a casket. My body, was perfectly still, wrapped in white. The banging sound came again—from the room in the house. This time it echoed outside, louder and more aggressive than ever before. Suddenly, the lights went out. Everything turned black. Everyone had disappeared, it was just me in an endless dark place