The January Featured Story is by Dominique Lamssies
Please feel free to email Dominique at: onigumosheart@yahoo.com
THE WOMAN WHO LIVED
by Dominique Lamssies
She didn’t bother to turn on the lights; instead she began making her dinner by the fading sunlight outside. It was a nice enough day: blue sky, not a cloud to be seen, but it was hot. She opened the window in her bedroom.
As her food cooled, she turned on the television. She found some rerun of her favorite show and her mind shut down as she began to shovel food into her mouth.
A commercial ended and there was a second or two of darkness, telling the viewer that the show was about to come back on. Then three seconds of darkness, then four. She perked up, chewing her food a little more slowly. What was going on? Station problems?
Suddenly, the screen turned red. “Emergency Broadcast System” showed in big white letters in the middle of the screen. Then in smaller black letters underneath: “Emergency instructions to follow.” She flinched hard when that screeching warning siren went off to get the attention of those who were only half watching.
She looked around the living room and out the front window. Nothing seemed wrong. What could possibly be warranting the screaming warning? It must just be a test.
She searched the screen for the word “test,” as if it were hidden somewhere and it was up to her to prove that any emergency they proclaimed was a hoax. She didn’t find it.
For a moment, none of this seemed real. It was such a beautiful day. It was quiet and about as close to perfect as it gets. How could there be an emergency? Her brow furrowed. What was going on?
Her eyes jumped to the top of the screen as words began to move there. “Warning lasts from 8:00 p.m. until 9:00 p.m.” The words ran over and over across the top of the screen. Her eyes flicked to the clock on the wall. It was ten after seven now, but still no word of what the emergency was.
Suddenly the TV emitted a shriek, like feedback.
She immediately dropped her plate of food onto the floor and covered both ears with her hands. The next sound from the TV was a radio broadcast so garbled and full of static that not a word was comprehensible. She leaned forward on the couch and listened hard, her eyes wandering the floor as she focused on the noise coming from the television.
There was definitely a human voice in there, and they were speaking deliberately, trying to convey something. But try as she might, she couldn’t make herself understand any of it. It lasted maybe ten seconds, then, as if the other end of the phone line had simply been hung up, the noise ended and the emergency screen disappeared into blackness.
The local anchorman appeared next, calmly announcing, “We’ll be seeing some stormy weather tonight as those remnants of the earlier typhoon in the Pacific reach the west coast here in Oregon. Full coverage tonight at eleven.”
She let out a little sigh. Just a storm. Probably a bad one if it was the remnants of a typhoon. But still, just a storm. Stay inside, close the windows, unplug the computer, and get some candles ready, just in case.
She swung her feet over the couch and stepped in the warm macaroni and cheese congealing on the floor. She sighed and her body drooped a little. I guess I'll be cleaning tonight, she thought.
She hopped to the dining room table and grabbed a handful of paper napkins. She wiped off the bottom of her feet and looked out the sliding glass door. It seemed to be clouding over. Maybe it was going to be a bad storm after all.
She shrugged and turned away. She went into the bedroom and checked the clock. It was 7:30 p.m. now. She looked out the window again, seeing that the sun was gone, eclipsed by heavy gray clouds. Everything took on a blue sheen in the dimmed light. She pulled the blinds down. She thought about turning on the TV, but heard the distant rumble of thunder and decided to leave it off. She liked to listen to thunder. She changed her clothes.
It was so hot in the bedroom. But the trees outside were rustling in a breeze. She stopped and reached up under the blinds, feeling the window screen. It was cool outside. Why wasn’t the air filtering into the room? A few seconds later, she heard something outside.
“Here kitty kitty.”
She stood slowly and lifted the blinds a little. She peered out into the driveway. Her neighbor stood on the edge of the street, swaying a little, his back to their houses.
“Here kitty kitty.” She noticed that her neighbor spoke in a monotonous drone.
Her brow furrowed as she looked at him. There was a wisp of smoke floating up from his hand. There was a cigarette between his fingers. She couldn't quite tell, but it looked like it had burned all the way down to his fingers. Slowly, he turned his blank eyes back and looked straight at her.
She felt her heart skip a beat as those empty eyes stared at her. She dropped the blinds and turned back into the room. She swallowed. It’s nothing; I’m imagining it, she thought, peeking back outside. Her neighbor was gone and she heard his door shut.
She heard a wail of what, a siren? Yes, she knew it was a siren when more began to sound. Then everything lapsed into an eerie silence, except for the occasional rustle of leaves in a breeze that still didn’t penetrate the room.
It was calm now. When it got so calm and quiet in an urban setting, it would make anyone uneasy. Everyone was used to cars driving by, and sirens, and brakes screeching and dogs barking and people shouting as they walked down the street. So much so that when it stops, they got uneasy.
She opened her blinds again. The sky was gray, a dark shade of gray that sucked the color out of everything around it. The houses around hers had been shades of blue and yellow and beige only a few hours ago. One had even been orange, owing to the hippies that lived in it. Now, every last one of them was white, and their driveways were as black as the newly paved road that they connected to.
She looked at the clock. 7:50 p.m.
She heard someone cry out, “Help!”
It was a man, but not a voice she recognized. “Somebody help me please!” It was getting closer, and she could hear footsteps on the pavement. She looked down the driveway and saw nothing.
She quickly put on slippers and rushed outside. No one was there.
“There was a typhoon near Japan,” she heard a woman’s voice say, as loud as if she’d been trying to drown out the man screaming for help.
She decided the woman’s voice came from the other side of a fence on the right side of her house. She crept forward and turned her ear to the fence.
“I heard that,” a man replied. “Hopefully it won’t bring in any of those horrible sea birds.”
Before she reached the fence, something brushed her leg and she jumped and screamed. The little cat her neighbor had been searching for looked up at her as though surprised. She reached down and picked it up.
She backed slowly toward her house, carrying the cat. Once inside, she set it down in a chair and let it sniff around. She liked the cat enough to bring it in out of the storm.
She checked the clock again. 8:00 pm.
She turned the TV off and thought about giving the computer a try. But suddenly there was a great white flash of lightning and then a rumble of thunder so loud it shook the whole house. The frightened cat took off down the hall.
The storm had finally come. She decided to leave the lights off.
The emergency warning had said she only had about an hour of this to go.
She went back to the front window. The sky was no longer gray. She thought, Wow, that was quick. Is the storm over already?
She decided to take a look for herself. She went to the backdoor and slid it open slowly and quietly. She peeked her head outside to make sure there was no one and nothing out there. She stepped out and let the silence envelope her.
She stepped out into the middle of the yard. In front of the house, the sky was golden orange. Hints of pink showed where the sun was setting. All of the houses on the block seemed normal again; their colors reflecting reality. There was a rainbow too, the largest one she’d ever seen.
Suddenly a flash of lightening split the sky. She jumped when another great clap of thunder rocked the earth. The black clouds were returning. They rolled across the sky quickly until not a hint of light was left and the sky was as black as it should be at midnight.
She headed back toward the house as darkness overtook her. Something pelted her on the back of the head. It must be hail; it was too heavy to be rain.
She ran to the covering of the back porch, and once there, she touched the back of her head where she’d been hit. She looked at her fingers and saw something black and thick, like oil. She turned and saw the black drops falling and covering the ground until it was as black as the sky.
Movement caught her eye by the overhang. A black shape.
Was that a person? She didn’t stop to figure it out. She bolted for the house, locking the sliding glass door behind her. She grabbed a knife from the kitchen counter and ducked down.
Something banged on the glass door. She gripped the knife tightly.
The banging stopped. She didn’t dare move, fearing that whoever was out there would hear. If she kept quiet, maybe he would get tired and just move on…
She jumped as the banging now sounded on the front door. Was he hitting harder or did the wood just make more of a noise? Whoever was outside pounded again and again. I saw you, he seemed to say. I know you’re in there and I’m not leaving until you come out and face me.
A noise came from the bedroom and it sounded like a shelf full of books crashing down.
The cat! she thought.
The pounding stopped. Had the person outside heard the noise? Of course he had; the window was open.
Still clutching the knife, she moved as quietly as she could to the open bedroom door. She peeked in and saw the cat was perched innocently on the bookshelf, despite all the books lying on the floor. But before she had time to do anything about the cat, she saw something pressed against the screen.
Her eyes widened as something began to soak through. It looked like the black, oily stuff that was still falling outside. It seeped into the room like a great black arm, slithering across the floor, searching for the source of the noise. It moved slowly over the bed and the floor and all the books.
Oh my god! her mind silently screamed. It’s not a man! It’s…
The black ooze moved toward her and she scrambled back, only narrowly avoiding it as it seeped into the hall. Once in the hall, it stopped and slowly seeped into the living room.
In the bedroom, it had left behind a giant black stain. The cat jumped down and approached it.
She lunged just in time to grab the cat’s tail to pull it away, but the cat dug into the carpet with its claws and twisted back on her with a hiss.
She let go. It sniffed at the stain, before taking a tentative step onto it. But as soon as the cat touched it, that dark arm swooped back into the bedroom with an otherworldly scream and grabbed the animal.
She pushed herself against the bedroom wall and pressed her eyes closed.
The cat screeched and was gone. The dark arm again slithered into the hall, knowing something was there and searching for it.
Knife still in hand, she pushed herself away down the hall, whimpering. But the noise she made attracted its attention and it surged toward her.
Panic overcame her and she stabbed at the dark smear, thrusting the knife into the black mass.
It didn’t faze the thing, which effortlessly split into two pieces. Now her knife was jammed into the floor.
She let out a scream, half in fear, half in frustration. Then she ran, knowing full well that the thing was hot on her heels. Her instincts led her to the front door. She opened it with a jerk and slammed it shut. The black mass slammed against the door with a force that nearly knocked the door down.
She looked back at the house and saw a huge black mass clamped onto her home, seething and jiggling almost like it was a big pile of black pudding.
But her legs were still moving of their own accord. She walked backward away from the mass, her eyes still on it.
She screamed and jumped when she backed into something. She whipped around and was face to face with her neighbor. He stood stalk still, his vacant eyes pointed at her, but not really seeing her. He had a knife in his right hand, and she wished she still had hers.
“Do you see that thing?” she nearly shrieked, waving her arms at her house.
His body heaved as he took a deep breath, opening his mouth slightly. That was when she saw the black tendrils flicking out from between his lips.
She took two steps back and saw a woman, the one whose voice she had heard from the other side of the fence. The woman’s eyes were just as vacant and she had a hammer in her hand.
The man took a step forward. His arm jerked over his head as if a marionette string had pulled it. She dodged the wild and uncontrolled swing, moving to the right. The man turned to face her and she decided to take a chance.
Slowly, she positioned herself behind the other woman, then lunged forward, shoving the woman into the man. They both hit the ground but neither of them seemed to notice. The man seemed content that he had something in his grasp and his arm dropped, burying the knife in the woman’s back.
The standing woman cringed and tried not to scream, instead whimpering, “Oh my God, I’m so sorry.”
Everything went still.
The man didn’t move as blood soaked the woman’s back. It seemed like he shut off as soon as his blade met something. He wasn’t even trying to free himself.
She was so focused on the pair on the ground that she didn’t see the movement until it was almost too late. A dark spot entered her peripheral vision and she twisted away as a dark arm grabbed for her. She took a step backwards but tripped over the prone man.
She fell onto the cement with a pained hiss, then saw something on the ground: a lighter that had fallen out of the man’s pocket. It looked oily, but was it really? There was only one way to find out.
She snatched up the lighter and flicked it on.
The blackness stopped.
“Okay,” she spoke out loud. “The opposite of dark is light, right? So let’s brighten this place up.” With the lighter still held out, she pushed herself up and walked backward toward her neighbor’s open garage.
The dark bulk oozed forward tentatively, and she could almost see the curiosity in its non-existent eyes.
She refused to turn her back on it as she searched the garage with a series of quick glances for anything she could use. She found it on the workbench: a can of lubricant spray.
She stepped out of the garage and decided to test the theory. She held up the can and sprayed it over the lighter flame.
An orange ball of flame erupted. The darkness screeched and slithered back.
“Okay,” she told herself. She needed something that would catch on fire that she could throw at the mound.
The man under his dead neighbor began to shift, shimming his way out from under the dead woman.
Both hands still poised and ready to fire, she looked for anything she could use to start a bon fire. There were no fallen tree branches, no loose fence slats.
The man with the knife fought to his feet, having managed to throw aside the dead body. The shadow gathered behind him as he faced her. Her hands began to tremble. “I don’t want to hurt you,” she told him, but the man took a dragging step forward, his knife arm jerking up.
She hit the button on the lubricant and squeezed her eyes shut as she threw the lighter at the man. She saw the light from the fire through her shut eyelids. The heat hit her face.
She opened her eyes to see that the man still stumbled forward, not seeming to notice that his hair was aflame. But he had dropped the knife on the ground. She knew she had no choice, so she ran forward, her scream frustrated and hurt, as she jammed her shoulder into the man’s chest. He flew back into the black glob.
As soon as the flame hit the black ooze, it erupted like a big red blossom. She heard shrieking, and thought it was the man, but suddenly she realized it was the black ooze making the sound. It screamed and flailed.
She curled into a ball on the ground, her arms over her head as her body shook with sobs. She didn’t notice the black thing crumple. The flames spread as the black thing went silent.
She didn’t care that she heard sirens in the distance, or that they were coming closer. None of it registered until she heard shouting and the stomping of boots. She looked up as paramedics swarmed her.
She was limp as the paramedics pulled her up into the ambulance. She lay on a gurney, staring at the ceiling, wondering how she was going to make anyone understand what had happened when she didn’t understand it herself.
“Can you speak?” one of the paramedics asked, his face floating over her.
Her lips fell open. “What time is it?”
“Ten fifteen,” he said.
She let out a relieved sigh. “Oh good. The emergency is over.”
“What emergency?” the paramedic asked.
“The one the TV announced. The one that went from eight to nine o’clock.”
The paramedic smiled compassionately. “Yes, ma’am. The emergency is over.”
He shot a glance at his partner, who whispered, “There were no emergency warnings on TV tonight. This poor woman must be in shock.”
Dominique Lamssies lives in Portland, Oregon and lives for dead people. All of them. Any of them. Especially Japanese ones, which she spent five years studying while pretending to teach English to well meaning Japanese students. She is the author of several pieces in Eye-Ai Magazine about Japanese travel and folklore and has written a series of essays about dead people on the Hub Pages website.
You can check out her blog called The University of the Bizarre HERE