I woke up to her staring at me. I think some part of me, some deep instinct, had felt her gaze even though she was silent and almost invisible in the darkened corner of my bedroom. I remember having a moment of confusion as I wondered if I was dreaming…or if I was awake, if I was seeing things.
But no, she was there. A young woman in her late twenties or early thirties, dressed in jean shorts and a purple t-shirt, chin-length blonde hair framing a face of hard angles and deep shadows. I sat up with a start, but she didn’t move a muscle.
“Miss? Hello?”
No response.
I felt my fear, and my anger, begin to grow. “Ma’am? Why are you in my house? Are you high or something?”
She moved then, the motion after such stillness making her seem like a statute come to life. Leaning forward, I saw more of her face. She was crying.
“I wish. N-no, I’m fully here. For now.”
I felt my anger cooling a bit. Maybe she was a junkie, but maybe she was just confused or needed help. “Lady, did someone hurt you? Or did you fall or something? You’re in my house. And I don’t know you.”
The woman gave a short and bitter laugh. “So you say.”
She wasn’t acting violent or even clearly crazy, but this was already past the threshold of weirdness that I felt I should be dealing with without calling the cops. I eased my hand over to the nightstand where my phone was charging. “Look, I don’t know what’s going on, but I’m kind of freaked out. If you don’t go, I’m going to call 911 and let them figure this out, okay? Do you want to go, or do you want me to call?”
She shrugged. I could see her shirt said “Be the change, not the doll hair.” What the fuck did that…
“I can’t leave. They won’t let me. It’s part of the game.”
“What game? What are you talking about?” I was already punching 911 as I spoke, half asking the questions just to stall her. She clearly had something fucked up in the head, and I really didn’t want to get stabbed because I waited too long to call for help.
The woman just stared at me as I talked to 911, and it was only when I was finished with the initial details to the dispatcher that she interrupted.
“Please don’t let them take me.”
I couldn’t help but pull the phone from my ear as I focused on her again. I knew she had to be crazy, a paranoid schizo or something, but the raw sadness and fear in her voice made me doubt myself. It was stupid—crazy people get very genuinely upset about their delusions all the time, it doesn’t make them real. But something about this woman made me want to believe her. To help her.
“Don’t let who take you? What are you talking about?”
She leaned forward more but stopped when she saw me slightly recoil. “When the cops arrive, they’re not really going to be cops. They will send two men. They’ll look like twins. They’ll even tell you a joke about how they’re probably the only twin cops in the world. But they aren’t cops and they aren’t taking me to jail or to a hospital or whatever.”
I heard the dispatcher’s voice still talking into the phone and I surprised myself by hanging up on him. I kept studying this strange woman sitting in front of me. “Where do they take you then?”
Her tears had slowed down before, but I saw new tracks glistening down her cheeks as she looked away for a moment. “They take to me to this place they call the Farm, though I don’t know what it really is. It’s very big and very remote. But that’s what they do most nights. They take me to that place.” She swallowed and wiped at her eyes. “Sometimes they can’t wait. They just get a little ways from here and pull over. Get me out and drag me into the woods. Tear me apart.”
I felt my eyes going wide. “Are you saying they…did someone rape you?”
She gave another short, sad laugh as she shook her head. “No. I said they tear me apart. Bite me. Eat me. On the nights that they lose control. The other times…most of the time…they carry me to the Farm. And that’s so much worse.”
I slid off the bed, my stomach sour with fear. I’d made a mistake not getting away from her sooner. Not staying on the line with 911. She was clearly insane and might be dangerous and I was trapped in here with her. Trying to sound calm, I eased toward the door as I kept talking. “I…um, I see. You look pretty good for someone who’s been eaten or whatever.”
The woman grimaced as she stood up. “Don’t you think I know that, John? I can’t explain it. I don’t know how or why they’re doing it, but every night, when things finally go dark, I wake up back here, with you. Not a mark on me and dressed like it’s that first night. I’d think I was living the first night over and over, but it’s not always the same. You’re…not always the same. So I have to be coming back every night.” She gave a shudder. “And then they come and take me again.”
She had taken a couple of steps toward me, and I avoided her touch as I stepped out into the hallway. “Look, I think you’re just confused or sleepwalking maybe. I don’t know how you know my name, but maybe we met once and now I’m in some weird dream you’ve had? Either way…”
The woman stopped at the doorway and sighed. “I don’t know why I keep trying. You never believe me. You never remember.” There was a knock at the front door. Her face crumpled as she looked in its direction. “And now it’s too late.”
I almost reached out for her, tried to comfort her. I wanted her to know I was on her side, whatever side that was, and I was going to try and help her. But then the knock came again, this time harder and more insistent. “I…I’m sorry. Look, let’s just talk to them. See if they can help, okay?” She just stared bleakly as I backed down the hall to the living room and on to the front foyer. “Just let me answer the door. I’m not going to let anyone hurt you.” The words sounded stupid and hollow as I said them, but then I reminded myself that what the woman was saying was insane. No one was trying to hurt her, and I needed her out of my house. So I opened the door.
And saw a pair of twins in police uniforms smiling at me.
“Evening, sir. We got a 911 call at this residence?” The one on the right spoke while the left twin just nodded and kept smiling.
I glanced back and saw that the woman wasn’t in the doorway of the bedroom any more. Shit, where had she gone?
“Um, yeah. I…well, there’s a woman in my house. I woke up and she was in my bedroom. I’ve never met her before.”
The right twin looked at the left twin with a smirk. “We’ve heard that one before, eh, Chip?”
Chip looked back at the right twin with a knowing wink. “Indeed we have, Chomp.”
I blinked. “I’m sorry. Not trying to be rude. Did you just say his name is Chomp?”
Chomp turned back to give me a squinting perusal. “He said Champ. My name is Champ. Have you been drinking tonight, sir?”
As I went to answer, Chip clicked a flashlight on his shoulder and shined it in my face. “You can be honest with us, sir. Have you hurt that girl?”
I raised my hands to block the light, and suddenly Chomp…Champ…was gently pushing me back against the doorframe. “Sir, please keep your hands lowered. We don’t want any trouble, and I’m sure you don’t either.”
Fighting down new confused irritation, I shook my head. “I don’t. I just want her out and all of you gone.”
Champ nodded. “Good. Chip, go secure the interior while I keep an eye on our friend. See if you can find this lady he claims not to know.” He chuckled again, his good humor seemingly back. “Although I will say, calling the cops is a hell of a way to end a night of romance.” Chip shot past us into the house, and I found myself ignoring Champ’s comment to call after the other twin. “Please go easy with her. She’s really upset and confused.” Champ stepped back and gave another nasty chuckle as I looked down the hall.
Chip had done a cursory look around the living and dining rooms, but then he bypassed the rest and went straight for the dark door leading into my bedroom. The inky black seemed to swallow him as he entered, and only a few seconds later I heard the woman screaming. I started to go back in, and Champ lightly put his hand back on my chest.
“Hold tight, sport. My brother can handle her.”
I went to respond, but then I saw them both emerging from the shadows, Chip walking her out with her arms behind her back. The twin looked past her to Champ. “She was in the closet. The fucking closet. It was a classic.”
“Is she okay?” Chip ignored me, but Champ stepped closer as they approached. His breath was hot and strange-smelling as he leaned down to whisper to me.
“She looks fine as paint to me, sport. Lucky break for you, huh? We’ll have her out of your hair in no time.”
I caught motion out of the corner of my eye as the woman suddenly darted toward me. She called out something, but at the time I didn’t understand it, and I was more concerned with Champ hurting her as turned to stop her. But all he did was grip her shoulders and steer her away from me, and within a second Chip had caught up from behind and they were carrying her out to their patrol car. I trailed behind, somehow more scared and worried now than I had been all night.
“I bet you’ve never been visited by twin cops before, eh?” Champ’s eyes twinkled in the sodium street lamp as he closed the woman into the back passenger compartment. “Why I bet we’re the only pair in the country. Maybe the world.”
I nodded numbly. “Yeah, I guess so.”
He watched me for a moment before glancing down at the window where the woman was staring out at me. “I guess that makes you double lucky tonight.”
I forced myself to look away from her gaze and caught Chip’s eye on the far side of the car. “Where are you taking her? Just to the local jail? Or where?”
Chip looked at Champ, who was grinning at me again. “Why sure. That’s exactly where we’re going. Assuming we don’t stop for some grub on the way.” He shot a glance at Chip. “What do you think, brother? I know we’ll get in trouble, but…hell, sometimes the appetites rule, eh?” He looked back at me, his face serious now. “Don’t you worry, sir. We’ll take good care of her. You have a good rest of your evening.”
I wanted to ask more, but they were already getting in the car and driving away. The last thing I saw was her looking at me through the back glass as they faded into the night. I felt jittery and unsatisfied as I walked back inside and shut the door. What had she been saying? Something about the owl? What had it been?
”Ask the Owls if I’m telling the truth.”
Oh fuck.
When I moved into this house six years ago, I found out it had a security camera covering the front and back yards. Both feeds went to a little computer monitor in the man cave/rumpus room basement, as well as to a hard drive that kept seven days back-up. The cameras were probably ten or fifteen years old, and I found the whole set-up slightly creepy, but I’d never gotten rid of it. It was already installed and running, and it could come in handy if someone ever tried to break-in or mess with my car.
But that had never happened, and over the years I rarely thought about it unless someone commented on one of the fake owls—one sitting on a post in the back yard and the other in a tree next to the driveway. When someone did comment, I would always get embarrassed and explain that it wasn’t a decorating choice. It was what the previous owner had set up to hide the security cameras.
My hand was numb as I gripped the knob to the basement door. I half-expected and hoped that I’d check the cameras’ computer and find it had died in the last few months without me knowing. But no, it was humming right along, and after re-familiarizing myself with the software, I was able to watch my strange encounter with the twin police officers a few minutes earlier. Trembling slightly, I scrubbed back to the night before.
Oh God. At 1:32 a.m. the night before, a patrol car had pulled up. Two men that looked like the twins got out and went up to the front door. They knocked and waited for someone to answer.
And then I opened the door.
A panicked buzzing began to build in my ears as I double-checked the day and time. No, it wasn’t a mistake. It really was from the night before. I even remembered wearing that t-shirt to bed that night.
But I was the only thing that was different. The girl they pulled from the house was the same, if less defiant that time. She walked somberly to the patrol car, and though the video was black and white, I could see enough to guess that was the same shirt and shorts she’d been wearing tonight.
I reached for my phone to call…who? 911? My family across the country? George and Ruby? Who could I call that wouldn’t think I was as crazy as I’d thought the woman was? I needed more proof.
So I went back another night. And then another. I went back five nights, and with sight variations, the same thing happened every single time.
How was this possible?
Trembling, I started to call 911 again. I needed to tell someone and I needed to make sure that woman was really okay. That they hadn’t…well, that she had gotten somewhere safe.
And then I woke up in my bed. I wasn’t particularly worried or stressed about anything. I had a few hours of work to do during the day, but that night I was going with George and Ruby to an exclusive “interactive adventure” I’d gotten invited to online. It was called “The True Horror Movie Experience” and was described as “a multi-night tailor-made journey through terror and madness”. It sounded weird and awesome, and I had been looking forward to it for…well, for a long time.
At the time, I didn’t remember any of the night before. I had no memories of the strange woman in my room, the men who came and took her, or what the Owls showed me after they were gone. I’m telling you this so you can understand that I didn’t know. Despite everything that had happened, everything that she had tried to do to warn me, to save us all, none of it mattered because they had taken it all away.
Until they gave it all back.
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Credits
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