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Scoring Winger
Join Date: Jul 2010
Location: Nice try, NSA
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A 100% completely original story
by Crazy Bacon Legs
Okay, I admit I have always had a case of the nerves. Maybe some people would even actually call me “crazy,” but I am not. My nerves have always made my senses very sharp; especially my hearing. I have always had incredible hearing, and I hear good things and bad things. Does hearing things make you crazy? Let me tell you my story, and then you can decide for yourself.
I don’t remember when I got to thinking such drastic thoughts about the old man who lived in my home. I did not dislike him. He was a pleasant old man and a good tenant. He rented a room in my home and kept largely to himself. He was kind and gentle, and I didn’t want anything from him. I didn’t want his money or his things. In fact, if it were not for his eye, things would have been different. You see, he was blind in one eye. It was bluish-white in hue, covered in a milky film, and any time he looked my way, I felt the blind gaze of that filthy eye on me. Eventually, I knew I could not live with that eye gazing, unseeing, into my being. The eye was part of the man, and consequently the man had to die. There was no other way.
Here’s the point: you may call me crazy if you wish, but a crazy man would never had proceeded the way I did. I made sure I treated the old man more kindly than I ever had in the week leading up to his death. And then, every night at midnight, I would sneak into his room. I had an old lantern that I brought into the room with me, and I would keep it shuttered as I crept into his room. It was pitch black in there, as he was accustomed to sleeping in pure darkness. The windows were completely covered, and he didn’t even keep a digital clock in the room. You would have been stunned to see how stealthily and silently I moved and snuck into the room. It would be an hour or so before I was far enough in his room to see him. I would then open the shutter on the lantern just a fraction of an inch. The trick was to open it just enough to see by. The thinnest stream of light would open onto that evil, blind eye. But each time, that eye was closed. For seven nights I did this, and each morning I would cheerfully wake the old man up, asking how his sleep was, and even prepare him breakfast. He would have had to be a genius indeed to know that I was sneaking into his room to peer at him. He suspected nothing, because I was so clever.
On the eighth night, I was even more careful than usual when I opened the door. Time seemed to crawl by at a snail’s pace as moved so slowly it was almost not movement at all. I opened the door a millimeter at a time, so slowly that I nearly laughed at loud. In fact, I might have let a noise out, for suddenly the old man moved in the bed. But I was too clever to move in reaction. I froze in place and held my ground. The room was perfectly dark, and I knew he could not see me. After several minutes, I started pressing forward again so slowly he wound not detect me.
I was about to open the lantern when my thumb bumped against the fastening with a small click. The old man sat up in an instant, yelling, “Who’s there?”
I froze again and didn’t move a muscle. An entire hour passed as I stood, frozen to the spot. I did not hear the old man move either. He sat in his bed, listening. There was no lamp near the bed, so he sat and listened for movement, just as I had the previous seven nights.
A noise escaped his lips, and I knew it was the start of a moan of abject terror. I knew the sound all too well; the same noise had escaped my lips on many nights. I knew how terrified the old man was, and I felt pity, and yet I also felt joy and laughter bubbling up inside me. He had been seated in his bed for an hour, waiting, and his fear had been growing exponentially the entire time. He had undoubtedly been trying to convince himself that it was the wind, or a mouse, or the sound of distant traffic. But all his attempts to rationalize the terror that welled inside him were useless, because what he sensed in that room was Death itself. And I was Death, incarnate.
Finally, I grew impatient. Although I knew he was still sitting bolt upright in the darkened room, I decided to open the shutter on the lantern just the tiniest amount. You cannot possibly fathom how quietly and slowly I opened the shutter just the smallest fraction of an inch, until a thin tendril of light escaped. It fell directly on that hideous, blind eye.
Oh, and this time it was open. I felt rage welling within me at the sight of that eye. The milky blueness chilled me to my very soul, and it was all I could see. I had aimed the thin strip of light directly on that hated orb. I could see no other part of the old man’s face. It was as though I had instinctively placed the light directly on that hated eye.
I told you before that I am not crazy. I merely possess incredible senses. Faintly, I began to hear a low thrumming noise, like a faintest drum beat in the distance. I recognized the sound almost immediately. It was his heart. Even across the room, I could hear the old man’s heart, and my rage intensified.
Even with that rage threatening to boil over, I held my ground and kept perfectly still. I kept that thin strip of light fastened on the eye. The sound of the beating heart increased. Louder and louder it grew – thump THUMP, thump THUMP – and my nerves began to fray. The old man must have truly been terrified, for with each passing second the sound grew louder. I told you already that I am a nervous person, and I was not making that up. In that black, silent house, the volume of that rhythmic beating filled me with absolute terror. Yet I still found a way to hold on and remain still. Still the beating grew louder. With a stab of panic, I realized that a neighbor might hear. If they heard, I was done. The time was right, and the old man had to die. Now.With a yell, I opened the lantern all the way and lunged at him. He yelled once, but only once. In a flash, Iyanked him from the bed, pulled him to the ground, grabbed a pillow, and shoved it hard against his face. I grinned wildly as I held the pillow there, with him thrashing about beneath me. His thrashing began to dwindle, and he twitched several times, and then was still. I held the pillow firm against his face. For several minutes, the beating continued, and then began to fade away. Finally, it stopped. The old man was dead. I removed the pillow and looked at him. He was dead for certain. I placed my hand on his neck, feeling for a pulse. Nothing. He was dead, and I would never see that hideous eye looking at me again. To be certain, I closed the eye. I sighed as relief flooded over me.
If you still think I’m crazy, you will change your mind when I tell you about the careful steps I took to hide the body. As the night marched by, I worked quickly and quietly.
I knew the floorboards were loose in this old bedroom, and I pried up three of them with ease and slid the body in the hole. I replaced the boards and looked at my handiwork with pride and satisfaction. No human eye (not even his) would be able to detect that the boards could be or had been moved. There was no blood due to his suffocation. I had been careful; Ever so careful.
I finished up at around four o’clock, and it was still pitch dark outside. At precisely four o’clock by the kitchen clock, the doorbell rang. I almost skipped to the door, happy and satisfied, because I had nothing to fear. I was supremely confident. Two men were at the door. They were police officers. They told me a yell or scream had been heard by a neighbor, who had called them. They wanted to know if everything was okay.
I smiled warmly at them, because I knew I had nothing to fear whatsoever. I invited them in as I explained that the yell had, in fact, been me. I had woken up from a nightmare, and had even scared myself with the scream I had let out. I explained that I was alone as my renter, the old man, had gone away on vacation. I invited the police to look around, and even led them myself into the old man’s bedroom. I showed them his property was all in place and accounted for. Even the small roll of twenty dollar bills he kept on his dresser was undisturbed. I was so confident that I had them wait as I brought chairs into the room and invited the officers to sit for a while. I placed my own chair over the very spot where the old man’s body lay.
It was evident that they suspected nothing. To them, I was a relaxed man with nothing to hide, except perhaps some embarrassment for shrieking loudly enough to have the police called. We chatted for a while, and things were going well, but then I felt myself starting to grow faint. I felt a headache coming on, and heard a ringing in my ears, but the cops still sat there chatting away. The ringing intensified, and I began to talk faster and more openly in an attempt to ward it off. Then I realized the noise was not coming from my ears at all.
I know I grew pale and agitated, but still I talked faster and louder. The sound was a low, dully, quick thrumming, like the beating of far off drums. And it started to grow in strength. I began to breathe quickly and felt as though I might pass out, but the police officers did not notice. I talked of idiotic, mundane things as I got to my feet and waved my arms about, making as much noise as I could, but it was no use. The noise grew even louder. Why were the police still there? I paced back and forth, stomping loudly in an effort to cover the noise, but it continued to grow! I began to yell, swearing and raving. I lifted the chair and slammed it on the ground over the old man’s body, but still it persisted. The police officers continued to chat, smiling at one another and me – could they know? Did they know, and there they sat, just pretending to be clueless in an effort to mock and humiliate me? Finally, I couldn’t take their mocking smiles any more, and I felt a scream welling up inside me. Still the pounding grew louder and louder! I had enough!
“You jerks!” I screamed, “stop pretending you don’t know! I did it, okay! I’m guilty! Tear up the planks! Here, here! – it is the beating of his hideous heart!”
Now I am sure you’ll agree that I am not crazy.
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This story is 100% original and is not a poe ripoff of another story.
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@crazybaconlegs ***Mod edit: You are not now, nor have you ever been, a hamster. Please stop claiming this.***
Last edited by Crazy Bacon Legs; 02-07-2012 at 04:30 PM.
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