The Girl and The House by Gregory Harvey

(1 rating) Rate this Story (5 best) 1 2 3 4 5

She couldn't see anyone through the stained glass, not that she thought she would have. Isabelle moved closer to the door, grabbed the handle (which was warmer from the inside) and flung it open. Nothing was there. As Isabelle reached to close the door, she noticed that the rain had stopped. It had been replaced with a light breeze that was blowing gently through the box gums. She shut the door. It must have been leaves or something scratching against the door.
Isabelle, who had gone from starving to full after only a bowl of soup, now sought only one thing. Sleep. She had been walking through the bush for only God knew how long. Her feet were aching from the thick scrub, and her mind was also. Without even so much as a thought, Isabelle headed for the bedroom. Ignoring the cobwebs, she climbed onto the old mattress and rested her head back on the pillow. It was surprisingly comfortable; an improvement over her own bed in fact.
However there was still a feeling in her stomach that Isabelle could not quite ignore. It didn't feel natural. It felt as though either something was watching her... or the mattress was feeling her. These thoughts drifted out of her consciousness as Isabelle succumbed to her tiredness regardless; echoing off into sleep. The torch dropped out of her hand, onto the floor.

She awoke shortly afterwards. There was a sound, different from the knocking, resonating through the bedroom; a sort of muffled scratching. Isabelle slowly moved off of the bed, as if the slightest sudden motion would give her away. The scratching rose in pitch, now echoing presumably through the entire house.
Isabelle turned and looked at the bed, but could only make out its faint white outline without her torch. She became aware that she was feeling light-headed. While her imagination came up with a hundred, horrible answers for what might be scratching, Isabelle got to her knees and began looking for the torch. Air was escaping into the house through the loose floorboards.
Her head felt very strange.
After a minute or so of searching (and after becoming convinced she would never find it) Isabelle laid her hands on the torch. She flicked it on before rising to her feet.
Now that she could see the bed, Isabelle's mind almost froze with terror. The pillow was moving; pulsating with almost grotesque rhythm. And there was a hole in it... one Isabelle couldn't quite see into. Timidly, she moved forward, shining the torch into the hole.
Inside the hole, coiled in masses of bloodied blonde hair, were rats. Red eyes bounced back in the torch light, as Isabelle fearfully lifted her hand to her head. What remained of her hair was matted with blood, which oozed from the scratches cut into her scalp. Isabelle fought a scream, before fleeing into the front room of the house. The victorious screams of the rats were cut off almost as soon as she left through the doorway.
Unable to think, Isabelle crawled into one of the room's corners. The blood from her head was only just beginning to spill onto her face as her hand let go of the torch.