The Midnight Hour

I lay awake and alert in my bed buried deep beneath the covers, gripping the crisp, new pages of the latest horror and science fiction monthly magazine that I had bought home a few days earlier. A small torch hovered over each page as my eyes swept across the lines of words like they were tied to some form of addiction, afraid to let go of the string of events, craving, needing to know how the story unfolded ‘one more page’ I told myself over and over again, but it became another, and another. I was lost in the middle of a ghost story, a classic haunted house scenario; in this story, a young man had just bought an old house only to discover that it was haunted and the ghost would not let the new owner claim stake on his territory, I had reached the chilling climax, the confrontation between the man and ghost when I heard the strangest sound coming from down stairs.
After giving it a brief few seconds of my time with nothing in return, I thought nothing of it and aimed the torch back down to the part of the page I was reading, then I heard it again, a small rustling noise as if someone was downstairs looking for something, I distinctively hears draws closing, and things being moved about. Were it not for the second time I might not have paid it any more notice, but it proved to be no coincidence, there had to be someone (or something) down there. I lifted the cover from over my head and briefly appreciated the fresh, cool breeze that washed over my face before I turned around to look at the clock, it was midnight exactly. I thought it to be a little odd at this time of night, as I sat upright in the darkness, with nothing but the meager light of my torch to keep me company, my mind started to wander and my imagination was taking over, pushing away all forms of logical thought, and soon every short story, every horror movie and urban legend I had ever heard or saw came flooding back to me like a bad memory. Whatever it was, it was directly beneath me so it had to be coming from the living room, I just couldn’t figure out who or what it could be, It couldn’t have been my parents, they would have made a racket walking across the landing before they even got to the stairs, I would have heard them sooner, but it might have been my older brother or my younger sister, they were a little more quiet, like me they had gained a lot of practice at sneaking downstairs after bed time and raiding the fridge for a midnight snack, under normal circumstances I would have thought it was that exactly and dived back into my magazine, but there was one small fact, our midnight feasts were never at midnight, they were closer to nine or even ten o’clock at the latest, and they would know better than to sneak downstairs and make a noise as loud as that at this time of night.

Since I had been reading my science fiction and horror magazine, my imagination was becoming more than a nuisance by now, I started to imagine all of the fantastic and horrific possibilities it could be, aliens from another world looking for victims to abduct, or it could have the beast from under the stairs looking for his own midnight feast, or even the old ghost from my most recent story, angry and vengeful as ever, waiting for the right moment to come up the stairs and kill us all in our sleep, to take back what was rightfully his. As I sat up and alert in the darkness, I began to realize that I was getting a little carried away, and since I hadn’t heard the noise for at least a minute, I was thinking about ignoring it and getting back to my ghost story, that was until I heard it again, that horrible sound, louder this time, sending a chill up my spine, swift and mercilessly all the way up to the bottom of my neck, causing a judder throughout my entire body, I didn’t like it one bit, I was shaken up, but I was also old enough to know that ghosts and ghouls and monsters under the stairs weren’t real, and so, with that first and foremost in my mind, whilst also whispering those exact words to myself over and over again, I pushed the covers away from my feet and climbed out of bed…curiosity had got the better of me.

I stood at the top of the stairs, waiting, hoping that any minute now I would wake up in a cold sweat in my bed, hoping it was all a nasty dream, trying to move as little as possible, I reached one arm over to the other and pinched myself, it hurt, but nothing happened, and I certainly didn’t wake up. I stared down the long, straight staircase deep into the midnight darkness, it was ominous and it filled my whole body with fear, all of me except my feet, they would not turn, they would not run.

Instead, they crept down the stairs one step at a time, gripping the hand rail, squeezing the feeling out of my hand, and taking each step so slowly (because when you’re walking in the dark, every step seems like you’re stepping into a bottomless pit) but I always managed to find the step below. As I went ever so slowly down the stairs, taking time between breaths to make sure my heart was still beating, something stopped me…it had suddenly occurred to me right there and then and not a moment sooner, that I was walking down a staircase (my own staircase granted, but still a staircase in total darkness) towards an unknown noise at midnight, I took a moment do consider whether I still wanted to continue, this was how horror stories started, I had no idea what I would find when I reached the bottom and I certainly didn’t want to find a ghost or a zombie anything like that. I was almost praying it was only human, a thief in the night or something, father Christmas (in the middle of may that wasn’t likely), my sister or brother poking around in the dark, foraging for a midnight snack, anything except the unknown, something I didn’t know how to handle, but then it came again, that sound, it caused my heart to skip a beat again, I stood poised halfway between steps, still trapped in thought, I could dash back up the stairs, into my bedroom and slam the door behind me, locking whatever was downstairs out of my room and try and hold up in my bedroom until morning, or I could go down there and face whatever it was and conquer my fears. I thought I might be able to stay up all night to keep guard in case whatever was down here tried to come after me, but soon decided that it was probably more difficult to stay up all night than it was to face this thing.

Both thoughts danced around my head, each coming fourth and presenting their case to me like two lawyers in a court, and I was the judge trying to decide who was right. I had to admit that running back to my bedroom seemed like the most tempting offer, and I probably would have turned around with my tail between my legs and ran back upstairs to the safety of my bed if it wasn’t for a similar noise coming from my bedroom door, I decided that whatever was downstairs was most likely able to get into my room, closed door or not, so the brave option prevailed, and I took the rest of that step, and then another, and then another, and I continued to take each step slowly and one at a time until I had reached the bottom. I had now reached the hallway, directly in front of me was the front door, to my far left was a pale green shoe rack, but the night had absorbed colour from the world, and all that I was left with was a crude form of night vision my eyes had adjusted to, the shoe rack was a pale shade of grey, the carpet beneath my feet was a darker shade of grey, almost black, I could feel the thick furry carpet between my toes, it was only a small comfort, but it was one none-the-less. To my immediate left was a tall rectangular mirror running up the wall, and to my right was the door, the closed door leading in to the living room, where the chilling noise was coming from.

I took another step towards the door, and leaned forwards, I could feel something in my stomach flipping over and over, again and again, I didn’t feel good at all, but with all of the courage I had in me, I put an ear up against the door. It was now ever so clear, a rustling sound, almost like someone was in the living room rummaging through draws, dropping things, metal sliding against metal, and wood and plastic, all kinds of objects sliding and scraping together, I was right, who or whatever was in there sure didn’t care about the level of noise they were making. I stood there in the darkness for at least two full minutes, my eyes closed, and my breath held tightly behind my lips, for fear of the intruder hearing me breathe, I would have stayed there for at least another minute, listening and waiting, if not for, a huge crash echoing from beyond the door pushing me back to the foot of the stairs. It was such a mighty crash that it must have awoke my parents, or my sister, or my brother, or all of them, if someone told me that horrifying sound had woke up the entire neighborhood I would not have been surprised. For a few seconds following the loud crash, there was total silence, not a single noise came from the other side of that door, I stayed well back, whatever fear I had managed to quell within me, rose up and took control once more at the point of that great crash. Whoever was in there must have dropped the television or tipped the bookcase or something of equal size, it scared me half to death, but still I stood there curious as ever.

Once again, the low level rustling continued, I let it go on for a moment more before I drew enough courage back together to approach the door, this time, instead of placing my ear against it, I gripped the handle tightly in my hand, I didn’t think the icy cold steel of that handle would ever let me go, I tried to push it down, but it did not move, I tried once more, but still it did not move, I tried a third time, my hand trembled, the muscles in my bicep ached, but still the handle did not move. I gripped my wrist with my other hand and steadied the shaking, it was fear, fear that was stopping me from opening that door and confronting whatever was on the other side, nothing else, no lock, nothing broken, just my fear. I let go of the handle and wiped my sweaty palm down my pyjama vest a couple of times, once it was dry I reached down and gripped the handle again, this time I pushed down on the handle ever so slowly, and inch by inch it lowered, making every effort to make sure the handle went down smoothly and without a sound. I don’t remember if it did, but I don’t think it disturbed who or whatever was on the other side. Once the handle was all the way down I began to push the door open ever so slightly, first a crack, then another, then another, until it was large enough to peek through, there was nothing to see, the rustling was clearly coming from the room, it just wasn’t within my view, I decided that if I wanted to see who or what it was I would need to swing the door open in one swift motion, just like ripping off a band aid, quick and painless. I took a couple of deep breaths and then pushed the door open as wide as it would go. At this point I have to tell you that if I live to be a hundred years old, still nothing could ever prepare me for what I saw that night I opened the door to my living room, my eyes grew wide with shock and horror, my feet sank into the carpet which was now quicksand pulling me down, I could not move, my legs were motionless and rigid, and the thing before me turned to face me…

There staring me into paralysis, floating at least two feet off the floor was a ghost, just like the ones in my stories, except this one did not look like someone with a white sheet drooped over their head, this was a full person-shaped spirit, arms, legs, and a head, but all of it almost completely transparent, the sight of it was terrifying, but not from fear of what it would do.

The reason that it terrified me so; was that I had never actually seen a ghost before, I had read countless stories about them, what they do and the various reasons for them appearing, but nothing I had read, ever prepared me for this, I was afraid because I didn’t know what to expect. I wanted to scream but was too scared to even make a noise, what if it reacted badly to my scream and tried to kill me, there was no way I could escape a ghost, it floated no more than six feet away from me, and stayed there floating up and down gently on waves of air. Its clothes were all ragged and torn, they were dirty and from the looks of them probably at least a hundred years old or more perhaps, its hands were poised by its sides, the way they were bent upwards a little with its fists clenched tightly, gave me the impression it was about to strike, its knuckles were all bruised and beaten, with stains of blood smeared across its fingers. And its face, that was the most terrifying part of all, it stared at me with its glazed empty eyes, nothing but white within white, they were so hollow and chilling, it was as if it were trying to peer into my soul, that’s what it felt like as it examined me closely, it had deep black bags underneath its eyes and its jaw hung open like it was unable to stay closed.

I didn’t know what to do; my fear had all but completely taken over my body, the spirit and I might have stayed that way a while longer if not for a deep and painful groan that ached its way out from bowels beyond the ghosts transparent mouth. I blinked hard, and did it again, but it was still there, then, once I realized that I had regained control of my arms, I put my hands over my ears to mute the awful sound, but still it came, there was no escaping it. Louder and louder it grew until it was so unbearable, surely someone else must have heard it, it was impossible to believe that I was making all of this up, or even dreaming it, it was just too real, with the ghost at the height of its scream, I did the only thing I could think of, I did what anyone would do in this situation, I screamed back.
"SHUUUT UUUP!"
And then silence, the ghost closed its decayed and rotting jaw, and went completely silent, it stared at me and then turned around, it continued to go on doing what it was doing before, rummaging through draws and piles of old papers, throwing ornaments about the room like it was trying deliberately to cause as much damage as possible. I stood in awe of the spirit, in slight admiration of the power it had over me when I first discovered it, the fear I felt then was enormous, too much for just one person, but now…as I stared at its back, as I saw it for what it really was, the fear subsided, and I began to regain control over my emotions once more, my fear was no longer my master, I realized that if I had the power to tell a ghost, a spirit from the next world, to ‘shut up’, then I guess it wasn’t as powerful as I once thought, it was only a person after all, a dead one perhaps, but still just a person.

I felt the need to bring my contact with the spirit to the next step and so I took one, literally, I put one foot in front of the other, and then again, and again, making sure I was very careful not to fall or knock anything over, I continued to take slow, cautious steps, until I must have been no more than three feet from it, I tapped it on the shoulder, or where its shoulder should have been, and my hand passed right through. Whatever I did to the ghost, it didn’t like it, for as soon as my hand had passed through, the spirit turned around and threw dozens and dozens of papers up in the air and in my face, this time I had considerable more control over my fear and managed to not let it consume me once more, the spirit was furious, it flew across the room, knocking things over, throwing papers and trinkets at walls, but still I did not move, the ghost violently lashed and twisted in the air around me, but still I did not move. After a minute or two of flying through the air, throwing things about and nearly hitting me with them a few times, the spirit could see that I wasn’t going to run off as perhaps it had planned, instead it lowered itself into a corner, tucked its head between its knees and started to cry.

The spirit was sobbing quite loudly, it took off it’s cap and cried into it, for a while, it seemed pretty pathetic, and so small now, such a leap from where I stood not five minutes ago. I started to feel sorry for the spirit, after all, it didn’t do me any harm, and all it seemed to be doing in the first place was looking for something, something quite important to it by the looks of how it was rummaging through those papers, feeling quite sorry for it at this point, I took another step towards the ghost and knelt down on one knee, I looked at it with kind forgiving eyes and asked
"Please tell me what’s wrong…maybe I can help"
It looked up at me, I could tell it knew exactly what I was saying, but it didn’t respond, not with words anyway, instead, it handed me a pencil with some initials engraved in it, it read ‘C.M.W.’ I studied the pencil deeply, examining all of every inch and mark on it, there was nothing of any remote interest on the pencil other than these initials. I held the pencil delicately in the fingers of both hands, and looked up apologetically at the spirit, who had started to show some kind of color in its eyes, not much, perhaps I could only see it because I was so close to it, but it was there just the same, a kind of pale hazel color was trying desperately to push through, but it was still extremely feint. I looked down at the pencil and then back up into the spirits eyes and shook my head.
"I don’t understand"
Its eyes opened a little wider, fear and worry showed all over its face, it pointed to the initials on the side of the pencil, stabbing at it with its transparent skin, but it did not speak. I shook my head again.
"I still don’t understand what you are trying to say"
I looked down at the pencil once more in the hopes of this time finding something to discover what the spirit was trying to tell me, but nothing, as I looked back up at the spirit, it snatched the pencil out of my hands and began to stand up, I could see the dim hopes of hazel fading once again in its eyes, whatever I was getting close to rapidly drew away, I stood up as it turned its back to me and floated through the living room towards the back door, it was quite fast, to fast for me to catch up with, especially since it was floating through all of the furniture and I had to climb over in order to reach it, I tried desperately to catch up, I held my arm out in an attempt to reach it, knowing full well that even if it was a foot in front of me I still wouldn’t be able to grab hold of it, that my arms would simply pass right through its body, but still I reached out for it.
"Please wait…please just…"
And then it was gone, it disappeared through the back door, and didn’t look back.

I turned around to look at the mess it had made, only to discover that the living room was as spotless as my parents usually left it, not a single ornament or a single sheet of paper was out of place, it was as if the spirit had never even been there. It was as if I imagined the whole thing, but I knew I couldn’t have, it was just too real…too real.

I turned around and followed my weary feet up the stairs back up to bed, I decided that I had had enough ghost stories for tonight, if I did imagine the whole thing, then it was about time I got some sleep. The next morning I awoke to a bright and bold sun shining through where my curtains should have been, but they were open, my mother usually came in at some point in the morning and opened them in an attempt to wake me up, and it worked, the brightness of the light almost blinded me it was such a shock to the system, after a minute or so, my eyes adjusted and I climbed out of bed.

As I wandered down the stairs, those same stairs which I had travelled the night before perhaps in my dream, I could hear my brother and sister arguing with each other at the breakfast table, I couldn’t tell what it was they were saying exactly, but I could hear muffled voices. I pushed the living room door open and proceeded to walk all zombie-like through the living room and into the dining room where my brother and sister and mother sat having breakfast.
"Morning sleepy head, you look like you were up late last night…I bet you were reading those comics again weren’t you?"
I stood in silence and stared up at my mother, with the most innocent look I could muster at seven thirty in the morning, she stared back at me with those familiar motherly eyes, they said that she knew what I was up to, but also that shoe would let me off this time. Unsatisfied with my punishment-free guilt, I tried to explain myself, unaware of how ridiculous I sounded.
"No, listen, I’ve got a really good excuse why I was up so late last night, and it’s the truth honest"
"Go on then…can’t wait to hear what it was this time"
So I began to describe to her everything that went on, in as much detail as I could, not missing out a single thing, and afterwards I stood there looking up at her expecting her to let me off the hook.
"I’ve heard some whoppers before but this one has certainly got to be you’re most creative"
"But I-"
"-I don’t want to hear another word about it…its bad for you staying up all night reading those horror comics…junk for the brain, and I won’t have any more of it is that understood?"
She stared down on me waiting for an answer, she wasn’t going to let me go until I admitted defeat, there was nothing I could do, no way I could ever prove it, I had to admit I was in the wrong, maybe I did make it all up, maybe it was because of the horror and science fiction monthly that my imagination took control, I dropped my head, ready to concede those bitter words of defeat when my father came rushing in. He was clearly late for work, I could ell from the way he was rushing around whilst still doing up his tie.
"Is there any coffee on hun?"
But my mother did not respond, this whole business with me and the ghosts really got to her, she was getting quite angry that I was lying to her, and my father could feel it too, he knew from her silence that something was wrong, he stopped rushing around long enough to look and see her towering over me like an angry titan.
"What’s the matter?"
He asked, my mother’s eyes did not move from mine, they seemed to be burning a hole in mine.
"We’ve got a problem…he’s lying again"
My father put his jacket down and approached, considerably less angry than my mother.
"Oh not again, what is it this time?"
"He says last night he saw a ghost, a ghost with the initials C.M.W."
I interrupted her, trying to make sure that her story was straight for my father, it probably wasn’t the best idea I’ve ever had.
"No that’s not right…I said those initials were on the pencil it gave me…the ghost never actually told me his name"
"His?"
My father had a habit of doing this, he liked to play along with my stories until I realised how ridiculous it sounded; only this time, I wasn’t making it up, this time I genuinely believed I was telling the truth, but that made no difference to my parents, I tried desperately to make them believe me, I could see my brother and sister giggling to each other behind my parents backs at my expense.
"I assume it was a he because it looked like a man, a dead one, but still a man"
"What did you say his name was again?"
"No, no, NO I didn’t know his name but the initials on the pencil were C.M.W."
I was getting quite frustrated by this point, I could tell my father was mocking me, but I refused to back down on this one. He stared back at me with a kind of half smile, we both knew what he was doing, it was the same thing he did every time I told one of my stories, only this time, something happened, his grin dropped along with something else inside his head.
"C.M.W. you say…like the writer perhaps?"
"Huh?"
I was stunned, it sounded like he genuinely believed me, but he had tricked me before, I had to be sure he wasn’t trying to mock me again.
"What writer, who are you talking about?"
"The writer C.M. Williams, Charles Morton Williams, he’s a local folk legend around here you know"
I genuinely didn’t know whether to believe him or not, I had to know more.
"What happened, how do you know who he is?"
"Well, what happened was…"
He knelt down on one knee so that our eyes met and looked directly into my eyes
"…There was a famous writer who lived around here about a hundred hears ago by the name of Charles Morton Williams, he was so popular that he would have to write his book in hiding so that no one would be able to find him and see his next book before it was ready, but of course as you well know, patience is something that not all of us have, and there were a lot of people who simply couldn’t wait, so, it is said that when Charles Williams disappeared to write what would become his last book, he was followed, those that followed him waited in secret for nine months while he wrote the only copy of his latest book, until the day he finished, the legend goes that in the middle of the night, three unknown thieves broke into his home, stabbed him to death and stole the only copy of his manuscript in existence, every year people claim to see the ghost of Charles Morton Williams the writer wandering the streets of this town, looking for his lost manuscript, his final masterpiece…that’s probably what you saw"
My father stood up and calmly finished doing up his tie, he never took his eyes off of me, he stared down at me and that familiar half grin appeared again, I wasn’t sure until then if he was telling the truth or not, but when he grinned at me like that, I knew he had to by lying.
"You’re lying…I don’t believe you…you’re just trying to give me a taste of my own medicine because you think that I lie all the time"
He stood there as he put his jacket on, still grinning.
"Perhaps…or maybe, just maybe I’m telling the truth, and you really did see the ghost of Charles Morton Williams last night…only you know the truth"
He put his hand on my head and ruffled my hair up a little, and walked to the front door.
"See ya kiddo!"