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The Monster Under the Bed (5) : There’s a faint scratching under your bed. Maybe you’ve heard it in the nights leading up to now, or maybe it’s just started, but the scurrying noise is starting to drive you mad. What is it? A bug? A creature? Your imagination? If you try to ignore the noise, it grows louder and louder and louder, until it’s practically all you can hear. You can try to ignore it but sleep is impossible. If you’re hoping to get any rest, you’re going to have to investigate–but you’re not going to like what you find. A flashlight under the bed yields nothingness–a darkness so deep that it seems to swallow up all light. The noise is worse but you can’t see anything. But you’re already in its trap. If you try to reach into the darkness, something grabs your wrist; if you try to walk away, your ankle. Its grip is icy and sharp, like being grabbed by knives, and it pulls. No matter how hard you fight against it, it’s stronger–and it drags you into the darkness. You fall, for what feels like an eternity–and then you jerk awake, violently. Maybe it was just a bad dream. But it doesn’t explain the fading red marks from where it grabbed you. When you look again, it’s just your bed–but you have the distinct feeling that something is missing.
There were plenty of rooms and beds for Desiree to lay on or under in the Sharp Manor. Each one was made and clean now that almost every room had been opened back up and sorted through. It gave her plenty of places to lay or hide though hiding wasn’t as much a necessity as it had been in the past. Melody did come around but it was very rare and only seemed to be for the purpose of picking Liam up or dropping things off which was fine with her.
She didn’t like the younger Sharp, not one bit, even if things had apparently improved between them and Aloysius. So she was content to continue slinking between side rooms and staying out of sight. The only issue she started to have happened after she’d recovered from the bat bites. Maybe recover might be putting it loosely though if hallucinations were part of that ordeal. She thought it would be better not to bring it up and worry Liam or Aloysius as she otherwise felt better. The chills were gone and she was healing up nicely all without causing Aloysius too much stress.
Sometimes when she would walk into a room, she’d hear it, that small sound of something scurrying or trying to dig into the wood floors of the manor. Even in the rooms with carpeting, she would sometimes hear it but when she looked under the various beds she found nothing. If they were mice, she was certain there would have been other signs long before now but there were no chewed holes in the baseboard and no food had been nibbled into by anyone outside of her and the two men who lived with her.
Sitting in the doorway one night, she watched and waited, trying to plan the best way to figure out what might be under there. It happened most commonly in the room that was the oldest, the one that had the pull down ladder up into the attic. Though attic was putting it lightly, it was a whole additional floor with rooms up there as well but it was mostly storage now. She refrained from going up there because the air was thick with dust and even if she went up in her glamour with a scarf, it left her coughing and wheezing much like Aloysius did in the winter time with the dry air.
Slinking closer, while trying to keep low to the floor and not make much noise, Desiree tried to peer into the darkness beneath the bed. Tonight the noise didn’t stop when she approached, it went on regardless of how close she got and that meant she liked this whole situation even less.
Pausing in her approach, her ears perked up as she heard another sound. Were there more of these things in another room? At least that was what she wonder until she heard an unfortunately familiar noise that came from the shared bedroom of Aloysius and Liam. Shaking her head, she knew that meant she wouldn’t be sneaking in there tonight.
As she neared the dark space beneath the bed, the sound did stop. Flicking her tail and reaching out with a paw, she felt something grab her. Hissing and calling out for Aloysius, her plea was cut off as she was pulled into the darkness. It hurt, whatever was grabbing her was so strong and its grip was pointed and vicious.
Even though she could normally see a bit in the dark, this darkness was so deep that she couldn’t even see the lit room around the bed. Clawing at the floor, she felt it fall away and her paws found nothing to grab on to. It wasn’t a good situations and she was horrified that something could get into their home like this.
Just as she felt like things were closing in, she scrambled and blinked, opening her eyes and finding herself nested on the bed in one of the other rooms, the one next to Aloysius’s room. Looking around, nothing seemed to be in the room with her but as she stretched she could feel some discomfort on her back leg where she’d been grabbed. This wasn’t something she’d bring up to either Aloysius or Liam, she didn’t need them to worry and not feel safe in this manor.
But just in case, she hopped down from the bed and nudged the door open to the next room. Luckily they were both asleep and it looked like new bedding had been set up. She was sure whatever bedding had been there in the beginning of the night was in the wash but that wasn’t something she’d comment on out loud.
Hopping up onto the bed, she curled up in front of Aloysius, pressing into his stomach and resting her head on his hand. It was quiet in here as the two slept so she found it easier to relax and fall asleep. Whatever had been making sound beneath the beds in the manor seemed to be gone, at least for now.
