Eye of the Beholder

1

Blake let the door slam behind him on the way out. The bolt jammed into place about five seconds later, and as such, he was completely locked out of home. The rain was heavy, and he wore only a t-shirt and ripped jeans with old shoes, but regardless he braved the cold and let the rain soak him while he walked further and further away.

“This is all your fault”, his mother had said.

She was a woman who could not be argued with, especially over the last year. For whatever reason, Blake’s mother had changed, no longer was she motherly and calm, but cold and condescending. In whatever delusion had overcome her, she started to antagonise not only her former husband, but her son also. So, as she stood there in the kitchen, knife in hand with tomato juice over the blade, she shouted, and she blamed, and she tore apart her son.

“You weren’t meant to happen”, she said.

“Then why the f**k did you keep me?”, shouted Blake.

“Blake James Fowler, don’t you dare raise your voice at me”, she shouted back, knife cluttering from her hand onto the marble kitchen bench, leaving a distinct red stain in the white surface.

Despite the attitude she seemed to hold towards her son, Ms. Fowler insisted that her son spend every other week staying with her in the new house. As much as he detested the house, and the resentment his mother felt, he was forced to go along with it- being unable to drive. On that particular week, Blake’s father was away on business- he was a pharmaceutical sales rep for a massive company, so he would often run amuck in another country- and so Blake was forced to spend a second week at the house of his disgraced mother. At this point, Mr. Fowler was in Singapore, and had very limited time on his hands to engage in a phone call of any sort.

Blake was on his own.

He walked in the dark along the road, the water on which glistened against the light of the streetlamps. His street was long, and he did not know where he was going. The road stretches on in front of him, but the rain gets heavier and eventually he could barely see a metre ahead. The road was narrow and straight, but lined with dense forest, roughly 20km from the nearest town. This was all good and well, but Blake shivered in the bitter rain, which had water dripping straight from his hair into his eyes. The streetlamps created circular patches of light between the rows of trees, and stood a fair distance apart- it was difficult to see past the light, as the sky was covered with cloud and the lamps remained the only source of light. He had left his phone at home, now left with no connection to the world, but still determined to stay as far from home as he could.

From the shadow behind the next lamp, emerged two figures. They seemed to be deep in conversation as they walked, but Blake could not hear them over the crashing rain. He stopped dead in his tracks and watched, they were both male, of a similar stature. The light revealed them to be fully clothed in black, with tall, muscular builds which seemed unfazed by the cold. Heart beating fast inside his chest, Blake raced towards the forest and hid behind a tree. The forest and the road were a metre or two apart, at best, so he could hear the voices of the men as they walked past, but couldn’t decipher a single word. Their voices were deep, monotonous, but they seemingly spoke in another language. While craning his head in attempt to hear them, Blake’s ear caught on a loose piece of tree bark. He released a sharp groan in pain, clasping the tree for life, before realising that the shadowed figured had turned their heads. He could see their faces in the light, rough, weathered, unshaven, but was certain they could not see him. Their skin was pale, like paper. Deciding evidently that it was just some sort of animal, the men continued to walk, unperturbed by the rain. Blake waited until the figures had entered the cage of the next streetlamp before he emerged from behind the tree. Careful not to permit himself entrance into the lamplight, Blake tentatively followed the road, just outside of the visible area of the road.

Eventually, he was strolling nonchalantly once more, reaching a euphoric state wherein the minutes and hours were inseparable and he felt free. The house Blake and his mother shared seemingly had some sort of hold over him, for when he reached the signpost reading “Welcome to Hoxie! The Town of Yesterday”, he felt a metaphysical weight lift off of him, and his careless stroll turned more into a sprint, and suddenly the rain which obscured his vision was of no consequence. The euphoria of freedom soon wore off, and Blake became short of breath- despite this he persisted in walking to the town centre, which was yet some distance away, but he could see the lights of isolated buildings reflecting through drops of water, as a single coarse shriek perforated through the cold air.

Closer and closer he came to the dimly lit town, comprised of ancient wooden buildings in dire need of paintwork. Even by night, he could see the partially-rusted wire fence which enclosed Hoxie Community Church, a small building, and the only standing place in the town built of brick. On the occasional Sunday, his mother would dress herself up in the same dress, a knee-length frilled rag, the colour of lavender, and take their beaten-up car to this very same building to worship a God she didn’t believe in, except, of course, when it was convenient for her. At the front of the churchyard, the fence encases a large gate, which swings open religiously each morning at the behest of the priest, Father Michael. Left with nothing else to do, Blake meandered round to the gate, and reached his hand over to fumble with the latch on the other side, the only security measure keeping any intruder from the pinnacle of the town’s collective sanity. The latch was firm in its place, and required a fair amount of persuasion before it would twist at just the right angle to allow the bolt to pass through, upon which the gate creaked open, seemingly possessed in itself by some sort of external force. Ignoring the obvious symbolism of the gate swinging itself open, Blake made his way to the grand front entrance of the chapel, a hand-carved wooden door, heavy beyond measure but engraved with intricate patterns which were allegedly (in other words, falsely) claimed to be the characters of a lost language. The door could only be unlocked from inside, where the locking mechanism was infinitely more capable than that of the gate. Moving away from the overstated front archway of the building, Blake began to circumnavigate the church in the little light he had, until he found the second entrance. Obviously, given that the church was a small building in a small town, he had found the door within a minute- nestled safely behind an apple tree on the right side of the building.

By contrast to the front entrance, the secondary door was frail and flimsy, made of thin sheets of wood, and poorly varnished. Had Blake not known better, he’d have expected the door to fall open before him, but the lock held it firmly in place. Having taught himself long ago to pick a lock, he had begun to carry a paperclip in his wallet at all times- which he brought out to tamper with the churches’ feeble security. The lock was stiff after years of routine use day after day, but quickly gave way, and the door wobbled open, hanging limply from two hinges set into the stone over a small flight of stairs. He descended these, groping at the wall until finding a light switch, which operated a single bulb dangling from the ceiling, which flickered once, twice, three times as it turned on. The corridor seemed to get colder as he descended the stairs, but fearless as he may be, Blake kept walking. This part of the church looked untouched, like ancient catacombs- dark walls and a damp smell lingering in the air, as well as the thick layers of dust visible by the single light. He neared the end of the corridor, which contained exactly three wooden doors identical to the one he entered through, behind which were rooms housing god-knows-what, things he wasn’t overly keen to bother himself with. The opposite end of the corridor was adorned in a red carpet, albeit a dusty one, as the adjoining staircase led to the upper level; the chapel.

The upper level was a much more refreshing room than the dusty chambers downstairs, even considering Blake couldn’t see, but for the faint light coming in through the stained-glass windows, on which he could sparsely see the biblical stories etched in bleeding colour into the glass. Despite having only been in the church a handful of times, Blake knew the exact location of the lights, they were along the back wall, in a small opening behind the altar- likely so that no one could shut the church into a mid-sermon blackout, so in this place only the priest, and now Blake, could control the lights. The staircase brought Blake up close to the back of the chapel, so he was only a mere few steps away, but he froze as he approached the switch, for his view of the front row of pews had been so slightly obscured, only for a second. Passing it off as just the shadow of the cross on the altar, he reached for the lights, the hair on his neck standing on end. He flicked the switch, and the lights flickered, once, twice, and turned back off of their own accord.

Tempted to run back out of the building, Blake scorned himself for his cowardice, and looked firmly out among the rows of seating as he flipped the switch again. Once, twice, a movement. A figure appeared in that second flicker of lights, so briefly against the back wall, and he heard a crash, the sound of which echoed through the room as the lights flickered a third time and remained on. Taking one, two, reluctant steps forward, he saw the golden goblet which had fallen from the heavy sandstone altar. From the goblet trailed a path of a deep red liquid. Fearing for his life, Blake kneeled and put his finger to the red substance, raising it to his lips. Wine.

The night played out as a dream sequence from a David Lynch film, leaving Blake mystified to what awaited him in the dark. He heard the sound of footsteps towards the front of the building, and tentatively took one, two, three steps closer.

“Hello, who’s there”, he asked, his voice shakier than he could care to admit.

There was no response, and so he stood in position, unsure what to do with himself. Remaining this way for a few seconds, he was startled by a low rumbling noise to his right, jumping at the sudden break of silent tension, Blake realised it was just the engine of a car, and could see the glow of the headlights through the windows casting a dull glare over the room, with slight tints of yellow, blue, green, red, but all breaking on one shadow against the back wall. Paralysed with fear, Blake watched the shadow move, ever so slightly, before the car headlights moved on- and he was left in the dark once more.

More footsteps emerged through the silence he had been left in, and not knowing which way to run, also not wanting to make a noise, Blake simply dropped to his knees, unknowing, and closed his eyes- so when he reopened them to find the ceiling lights turned on again, he was taken aback.

“It’s a little past your bedtime”, Father Michael said tersely.

“Father, I…”

“Why are you in here at this hour, do you have any idea how much trouble you could be in”?

Blake’s response was delayed while he furiously scanned the room, the shadow against the wall just a few seconds ago was nothing, the room was well and truly empty, save for himself, the priest, altar and six rows of pews.

“Well”? Urged Father Michael.

“No, I… I was walking, and, uh, I thought I heard something inside”, stuttered Blake, his heart racing with the fear that whatever creature lurked against the wall could not possibly be the priest, it was too deformed, too grotesque.

“And I suppose, this ‘something’ is the reason that the altar wine is all over the floor”, interrogated the priest, an aging man with crisp white hair, who Blake noticed was wearing his clerical robe of all things, and was clearly enjoying the power he held over his intruder.

“Sir, please. I’m sorry, I’ll never do it again. It’s just, there was something against the wall”, Blake pleaded, voice turning to a cold whisper, choking over every last word as his teeth chattered.

“If there is anything in this church, it is here because you brought it with you when you broke in”, retorted Father Michael,

“Now get out of here before I have to call the authorities”.

“Please believe me, Father, there is something he-“

“Get. Out”, he replied, with a tone colder than ice, and so Blake had no choice but to stand and make his way sulkily to the staircase. He dared not to turn and look again at the room, instead going back to the dusty corridor downstairs, and around the corner back to the flimsy wooden door, which now stood closed, and locked again.

“Father Michael”? Blake called through the dry air, starting to make his way back to the stairs. He reached the bottom and called up “Father, the door is locked”. Hearing a faint thud, he ascended the stairs once more, calling again, “Father, are you alright”? The room was lit by a single candle, now, this Blake saw as he reached the top landing. He moved quickly to the light switch, but for all he could tell, it was not working, something was wrong. The altar was occupied this time, but he could not see by what. Stepping closer, his heart sank, for within that minute, the terse priest had found himself laying on the altar, impaled by a single wooden stake, eyes gauged out. Blake felt himself gagging, and worked to keep himself from screaming. The body was limp, already pale and dead.

Feet frozen, Blake stood there for what felt like an hour, watching droplets of blood fall from the altar onto the carpeted floor, where it blended in perfectly as if nothing had happened. Calmly, he found the strength to turn away and confront the glistening window behind him. Etched into the glass was a life-size portrait of Jesus, holding a shepherds’ crook, walking beside a pure white lamb. The moonlight shining through has projected the image faintly onto the floor, and as Blake turned to inspect the distorted story, he noted a shadow, obscuring the lamb on the floor, and immediately turned to see the same shadow by the window. Unknowing as to whether the figure was inside or out, he screamed regardless, “Who are you? Just let me go”.

The shadow took one step towards him, allowing the light to illuminate a pale face, with deep-set black eyes. The eyes were wide, and unnerved him to the point of fear. The figure was slightly taller than Blake, stooped, but firmly built. “What are you”? demanded Blake, knowing better than to assume the thing before him was strictly human. The creature c****d its head and grimaced with its sharp teeth and wide mouth. The face was sharp, and remained frozen in front of Blake for some time, until he found the will power to retreat ever so slightly, by only one step. The thing did not move, just followed him with a tilt of the head. It was impossible to tell where those hollow eyes looked, but to look into them sent chills down the spine.

Blake took one more step backwards then another, unconsciously making his way to the front door of the church, the heavy wood bolted from inside. He would escape and run, if the thing allowed him too. His pace increased slightly, until tripping over a stair and falling to his back. Breaking eye contact with the creature, when he looked back, it was gone. Not so much gone, as it had moved. He looked frantically for some clue as to where it had gone, but could see nothing other than the few small patches of light set in place by the moon through the windows. Crawling, breathless, away from the altar and past the rows of seating which by now felt endless, he heard nothing in the room except for the sound of his own limbs against the ground, and so he stopped. Draped by the cover of silence, he listened intently for some clue as to where his monster lay. There was nothing but a faint whirr of the wind outside, until he heard a single exhaled breath. Nothing more, nothing less, Blake knew only that the breath was not his own. He moved one arm forward, allowing himself to feel the dryness of the carpet as he edged towards the door, up the central aisle. He moved a leg, an arm, a leg, and so on. Crawling as silently as he could, constantly alert of any change in the room.

A bang. Something had hit one of the chairs, the one Blake had just passed. He froze, then heard a scrape, something scratching against that same chair, moving closer and closer towards him. He ducked behind the next pew, and waited. The scraping stopped, and across one of the singular light patches moved the creature, indelicately, as if lost. It walked slowly, whether out of caution or inability Blake could not tell. It walked again straight into a seat, at which point Blake decided whatever this thing was, it was just as blind as he. Releasing the breath he hadn’t realised he was holding, Blake looked up just in time to see the thing’s head turn. He held his breath again, as the creature remained still. It would wait there until hearing some other sound.

He retreated further into the row, planning to circle around the edge of the church and find the door, crawling backwards, and not daring to break his line of sight on whatever this monster was. Never had Blake realised how impossible it was to move silently, he controlled every movement of a limb, every breath restricted to the bare minimum. Eventually he reached the opposite end of the pew, and stood to walk to the door, which lay only ten meters from him, significantly closer than the thing, which had not yet moved from its vantage point close to the centre of the room. To reach the door, Blake would have to pass by a window, so he lowered to all-fours once more to crawl with extreme care out of eyesight, in case the thing really could see when the light was enough. He kneeled forward into a crawl, and began to move, completely confident that he was out of the creature’s eyesight, and once past the window, he stood again.

It was gone.

His journey to the front door became slower, more educated, more decisive. Blake could feel blood rushing through his body, but also how dizzy he was beginning to get, and even though he could barely see, there were colours appearing and disappearing in miniscule blotches in his vision. Breathing ever so slightly heavier, he stood tense and still, waiting for this phantasmic paranoia to leave. He moved one leg, then another. He counted twenty slow, excruciating steps to the front door, where he faced the problem of the heavy bolt, which would assuredly make noise. Looking out into the vast expanse of darkness, he silently prayed that this creature was a slow runner, for Blake knew the shape of the bolt, and felt confident he could snap it open quickly. Despite his inability to see, even given the moonlight filtering through the church, Blake remained frightened of once again meeting the gaping eyes of the monster- and felt his own eyes ache at the thought.

Hand on the metal, poised to pull the door open with all his force, but just enough to escape and pull it shut quickly. He had been cautious to this point not to make a noise, but in the doors’ old age it had developed an obscure creak, and would undoubtedly draw the thing closer. The door would open towards the inside, so he was prepared to pull. Fuelled by adrenaline, he pulled the metal pin, and was met with an immediate crash from the altar. He heaved the door open against the sound of sprinting footsteps, scraping his hands against the wood, just enough to squeeze himself comfortably through, and wrench the door shut with the ornate handle on the outside. As the door crashed shut, there was a second thud against the back of the door. The creature had been close, and faster than expected. He held the door closed, in case the thing figured out how to open it, given that the door was still unlocked- but hearing nothing he hoped it had been knocked down. Blake walked into the churchyard, and forced the thickest branch he possibly could down from a tree, and jammed it between the two door handles, so without force the door could not open, and may appear locked.

Trying to ignore the fact that the creature could just as easily break out of the church through a window, or even the rear door, Blake sprinted away, heart still racing with the fear of life being stripped from him, as it had been from the priest whose mangled body lay still on the altar. Now several hundred metres away from the church, Blake found a quaint building in the middle of the town, which happened to be a convenience store- and decided this would be the best place to rest for the night. So, Blake lay himself down on the wooden veranda which encircled the store, just underneath a window, and intently watched his surroundings, thoroughly unable to sleep, and unwilling to traverse the road again. The rain had stopped while he was in the church, and now only the whistling of the breeze accompanied him where he would wait until the morning.

Another shriek. Blake jolted upright, standing immediately to see the cause of his fright, but immediately seeing his vision clouded by dizzying patterns of colour before him. The scream had come from some distance away, and he felt surprisingly calmer than he should. Turning around to look inside the window he had lain below, Blake was met with his reflection. Where his eyes should have been, there lay two black holes.