Hide Away – A Thursday Doors Writing Challenge.

I have to confess that, as a writer, I haven’t been overly good at writing on the fly. It used to be the way I’d start my stories and writing projects. I was proud of being a perennial “pantster”. As I have continued to hone my craft over the years however, I have become more reliant on planning and plotting my projects, knowing how they begin and progress towards a conclusion, accounting for plot, character and narrative ahead of time and writing to a plan.

As I continue to recover at home from my Achilles rupture, I have been trying to reconnect with my love of writing – something which has escaped me over the past few months (and few years if I’m being completely honest). I’ve looked for ways of doodling, brain storming and just generally playing around with ideas to see if there is anything worthy of pursuit.  My blog has been a help and so has my small coeteri of blogging friend.

Once again, I have to thank one particular writerly friend – my fellow Central Avenue author Darlene Foster – who, this week, posted a writing challenge on her blog – courtesy of another writer who Darlene follows named Dan Antion. The challenge is called Thursday Doors and it is designed to encourage writers to craft a piece based on a particular image. The image Darlene chose for her own challenge piece  – House Of Broken Dreams – is an evocative photograph of an abandoned homestead, captured by photographer Katy Trail Creations.

image credit: Katy Trail Creations.

I love old, abandoned homes. Here in South Australia, there are many examples of old, abandoned homesteads – particularly in rural area. Many are stone and brick construction, in contrast to the homestead in the photograph which, I suspect is situated somewhere in the Dakotas in North America (I stand to be corrected though).

The old adage, “if these walls could talk” comes to mind. Who lived here? What lives did they lead? When did they arrive and Why did they leave?

I always find myself creating stories from my interactions with these stone ruins and sometimes, if I’m lucky, I’ll find something inside or around these ruins – a broken bottle, a rusted tool or piece of cutlery, a tattered piece of linen, even the remnant of a child’s toy. It doesn’t take much to engage my mind in contact with something tactile and a possible story behind it.

So. Here we go. My attempt at a Thursday Doors story. It is a product of my imagination and it has elements of nightmares I’ve experienced, which should give you a sense of what is to follow. I also have to admit to being inspired by a British crime/mystery/drama series called “Unforgotten” which stars an amazing actor named Nicola Walker. Anyway, thanks again to Darlene Foster for encouraging me yet again.

Hide Away.

The sky above, though blue and flecked by high clouds, weighed over a dessicated rural landscape. What should have been an otherwise pleasant spring afternoon, felt heavy with portent.

A compact SUV motored at a crawl along a gravel trail leading in from the highway. Though there were still several hours until dusk, the vehicle’s head lamps shone and its beams speared forth, splashing across a long abandoned farm house, hovering there until the vehicle was forced to follow the angle of the trail to the left. Drawing alongside the corpse-like, two storey homestead, the SUV stuttered and stopped, then sat idling for interminable moments.

Anika sat, gripping the steering wheel and peering through the window at the house. Her jaw was set hard. Her blue eyes – vivid, intense – scanned the brittle weatherboards, searching for signs of life. Inertia kept her welded to the driver’s seat, yet her muscles and nerves sang like electric wires. Eventually, she forced herself to relax her hold on the steering wheel. She pressed the SUV’s Start/Stop button, extinguishing the engine. In the ensuing silence, she relaxed her shoulders. She lifted a finger and smoothed some errant strands of her dark brown, greying hair over her right ear.

Anika looked across to the passenger seat where a leather satchel lay beside a smart phone and the shining gold star of a police badge. She reached for the satchel, lifted the flap and felt inside. Her fingers clasped a manila folder which she drew out and set on her lap. Opening it, she examined the contents inside – two A4 sheets of paper. She lifted one of the pages up and rested it against the steering wheel.

It was a scan of a photograph; a sepia image of the very homestead beside Anika, taken a lifetime ago. In it, the homestead stood proud, noble. White painted weatherboards. Flower gardens in front. An apple tree. Sunflowers in the corner. A Clydesdale horse, pulling a wagon – on which sat a trio of young women who were dressed in linen and straw hats – approached the trail. A strapping young man leading the horse, looked towards the camera with a flat expression that revealed little about him while the young women smiled sunnily in the wagon.

Two of them at least.

Anika drew the scan closer to her and examined the features of the third girl. She was a child really – an adolescent at most. Her expression stood stark in contrast to her companions. She did not smile. Her stare was hard and cold. Above her head, Anika noted a visual anomaly that was not a natural part of the image. A blemish. A shape – roughly ovular with a ragged, elongated cross passing through it. Something about it made Anika feel cold.

Swapping the first A4 sheet for the second, Anika inspected the document. It was another scan of a fragile fragment of yellowed paper with a barely legible scrawl on it. Lifting a pair of glasses from the collar of her shirt, Anika set them on her nose and squinted at the spidery text. To her, it felt as if it had been written with a shaking hand.

“Second fierplaice, down staires. A crumbly hearth.”

Anika’s eyes glazed. Her thoughts ticked over. These two fragments – these clues – had come across her desk without explanation. Anika was encouraged to dismiss them. As the leading inspector of her particular taskforce however, Anika was obliged to pursue a lead – regardless of how inconsequential it might have seemed. She roughly folded the A4 sheets and shoved them into the pocket of her puffer jacket, setting the folder aside. She unclipped her seatbelt and reached for her badge and phone, casting a cursory glance at the screen. The signal strength flickered between a pair of bars, then a singular bar, then nothing at all.

“Bloody hell,” she hissed in a Yorkshire accent.

Drawing up the zipper of her jacket and hanging her police badge from its chain around her neck, Anika climbed out from the cabin and scanned the trail in both directions. A harsh wind wailed through the dry branches of dead trees nearby. It was cold. Her thin nose wrinkled. The air smelled dry and carried a faint scent of decay that made her feel nauseous. The grass underfoot crackled and turned to dust. She approached the abandoned house.

The windows were boarded over with faded planks that contrasted with the ruddy, frail weatherboards of the homestead. Loose sheets of iron slapped against roof above her head; the wind whistled through cavities in the structure creating disembodied squeals. Anika shivered as she examined the second storey door way above her head. The door itself was long gone. A dark cavity – like a rotted tooth, looked out mournfully in its place.

Hitching her jeans, Anika stepped carefully onto the rickety stoop, testing it with her booted foot before putting her full weight onto the decking. The timbers creaked and bowed, but they held. She approached the front door of the homestead. It stood slightly ajar. Placing her palm against it, Anika pushed. Though its hinges were rusted, it took little effort to push it open. Anika peered into the gloom.

Hesitating, Anika tapped the doorframe. She felt a pall of darkness settle around her. She wrestled with wanting to proceed, while part of her wanted to turn tail and retreat back to her vehicle. As vulnerable as she felt, her natural curiosity won out. She proceeded over the threshold… 

…And gasped! The air was sucked from her lungs as a floorboard cracked like a gunshot underneath her.

Reacting with a panicked pinwheeling of her arms, Anika leaped back, even as she felt her right leg plunge through the floor and she crashed to the stoop, just inside the doorway. The commotion disturbed a flock of pigeons who had made their home in the gloomy hall of the homestead. An eruption of feathers, flapping and strangled birdsong whirled around her as the pigeons took flight, making for the entrance. Several birds slammed into Anika and she swatted at them desperately, blowing air through her lips to prevent herself from inhaling feathers and shit. Scrambling  backwards on the stoop, she waited until the cacophony settled.

When the tumult had died away, Anika rose, grimacing as a sharp pain bristled up her right shin. She checked herself. The denim over her shin was torn; a ragged gash had opened up and was bleeding. She grunted and felt her breath quicken; tendrils of fear gripped at her skin. 

Fighting against panic, Anika closed her eyes and forced herself to slow her breathing. She pulled her phone out from her jacket, activated the flashlight and examined the laceration. She hissed. It would need attention sooner rather than later. Again, Anika toyed with retreating  but a pull to stay and explore further held her.

Rising to her feet Anika brushed herself down, centered herself and appraised the doorway and the hall beyond – this time, with more caution. She grimaced against the pungent odor of bird shit and feather.

Anika inspected the floor boards, testing them as she moved forwards, ignoring the pain in her leg. Some of the boards were more precarious than others. If they bowed too much, she retreated from them to try others.

There were two openings either side of the central hall. To her left, Anika saw a large room that might have been a formal lounge or drawing room. Wooden detritus littered the floor there, the remnants of what might have been furniture, some mouldy bales of hay. She cast the flashlight over brick fireplace against the interior wall. It appeared intact – perhaps even usable, Anika thought.

Anika drew the phone’s flashlight across to her right, aiming it through the opening into a second, indentical large room. Through a maelstrom of barely identifiable junk, a second fireplace stood in a state of partial collapse; its wooden mantle had broken in two and hung in a precarious V-shape over the stone hearth. Anika squinted, aiming the flashlight down. The hearth appeared damaged somehow – as though someone had taken to it with a sledge hammer. Part of it had fallen away completely, disappearing into the floor underneath.

A smile creased her lips. “A crumbly hearth.”

Anika turned and stepped carefully into the room. Blood continued to  drip from her leg and onto the floor boards. She ignored it as she crossed the cluttered space in a zig-zag pattern around piles of timber, assorted refuse and rusted remnants of farming implements.

In her wake, various shadows began to move, as if of their own accord. Serpent-like, they coiled around the blood droplets on the floor, nudging against them as though testing them. As a dark finger of shadow retreated, it pulled a blood droplet with it…

Reaching the fireplace, Anika winced as she lowered herself to her haunches and studied the hearth up close, passing the flashlight over it. Aside from the poor condition of the stone itself, there was nothing remarkable about the hearth, much less the fireplace. It was little more than a ruin.

Shaking her head, Anika scootched herself back on her haunches and passed the light up the brickwork, following it until it disappeared into the ceiling, then back down again.

Nothing.

Anika looked down at the floor boards. As she lowered the flashlight, she spied a blemish in the middle most board that nudged against the hearth.

A shape, roughly ovular with a ragged, elongated cross running through it was burned like a brand into the timber, its char long faded but the resulting impression remained. Setting her phone on the hearth, Anika felt inside the pocket of her jacket and snatched out the pair of A4 sheets, unfolding and examining them in the half light. She compared the symbol in the photograph to the floorboard. It was unmistakable.

Reaching down, Anika touched her fingertip to the depression made by the symbol and felt a distant crackle of electricity pass through her. Her blood curdled in her veins.

Rising to her full height, Anika searched around her, looking for something she could use. In a twisted pile of metal, she identified the rusted blade of a shovel and, in short order, she wrested it free.

Returning to the hearth, Anika set the smartphone on the damaged mantle, angling the flashlight so it was aimed at the floor. Inserting the shovel’s blade between the floorboards, she gripped the stunted handle and pulled against it with as much strength as she could. Grunting with effort, Anika was rewarded with a loud crack as the marked board gave way. Dropping the blade, she jimmyed the board up with her fingers and tossed it aside.

Anika smiled and set to, repeating the process, removing several more of the floorboards in the vicinity of the hearth until she had opened a sizable cavity in the floor, large enough for herself to fit through. Grabbing the phone, she peered down into the cavity. Under the beam from the flashlight, Anika saw at the bottom, a dusty leather travelling case. She stared at it as though gripped by a mesmerizing force.

Pocketing her phone, Anika assessed the drop, reasoning that it was not much more than four feet. Hopping over to the hearth, she sat at the edge, then carefully lowered herself to the ground beside the case. Anika flinched at the sound of squeaking as unseen rodents scurried away into the darkness. She squinted in their direction, then turned her attention to the case.

It was old – that much was certain. Adorned with brass and leather and fabric; the kind of travelling case that might accompany a passenger on a grand steam ship of yesteryear. The once lush fabric panels were tattered and decaying, though dusty leather straps dry and cracked, the brass clasps and lock tarnished and rusted.

Inspecting the case further, Anika realised its robustness presented a problem. The case was locked and the brass clasps were hopelessly seized. Reaching through the gap, Anika felt for the rusted shovel blade and pulled it towards her. She squatted before the case and studied the clasps, feeling with her finger tips for a space to insert the edge of the blade. Finding an opportunity, Anika slipped the edge of the shovel into a shallow space in the right most clasp, then applied a gentle pressure. The blade slipped and she cursed under her breath but, undettered, Anika tried and tried again until she was able to prise the clasp apart. She repeated the process for the remaining two; the final clasp proved to be the most determined to test her resolve.

Anika sat back on her behind for a moment and winced at a fresh gout of pain that bristled through her leg. The blood had began to dry on the denim though she noticed some dust had stuck to the ragged laceration. Brushing it away as best she could, Anika reappraised the case. Her heartbeat began to thump in her ears. Fingers of cold anticipation crawled up her back, between her shoulders and over her neck. She wanted to get out of here – even as her curiosity fountained again.

Scrambling to her knees before the case, Anika reached out and released the leather straps and buckles then pushed her fingers between the lid. It gave way with a degree of difficulty but Anika was able to overcome the resistance and lift the lid away. The hinges of the case squeaked in protest and the lid stopped short of falling back completely.

Even without the assistance of her phone, Anika could discern the contents in the gloom. A rumpled blanket, tattered and holed with cavities large and small – courtesy of time and rodent’s teeth. Anika detected a subtle rustling and flickering movement and upon drawing her phone up in her hand, she looked down on a myriad network of cockroaches scuttling back and forth over the hillocked fabric.

Screwing up her features, Anika examined holes in the blanket, looking through them and spying elongated, yellow and brown forms that appeared immediately familiar. Using the shovel once more, she brushed aside the offending cockroaches until they retreated far enough from a portion of the blanket she could grab at. Snatching the material, she yanked it from the interior causing a brief expulsion of dust and insects, and set it aside.

Anika gazed into the case.

Unmistakably human. Unmistakably complete. Curled into a foetal  position, the partly mummified skeleton looked strangely peaceful in its makeshift sarcophagus. It was held in this final pose by portions of paper thin, remnant skin and the tattered remains of a linen dress.

Anika’s investigative skill set kicked into action as she held the flashlight, drawing it back and forth in slow passes. Wiry tufts of long hair sprouted from the back of the skull. The shrivelled skin was largely intact over the eyes and nose. Anika could see the eyes were closed and delicate lashes still graced the lids. Below the nose, the   skeletal jaw was parted. All its teeth were present. Its mummified arms were drawn up and its dessicated hands and fingers were held together before its chin in what might have been a silent prayer. The tattered remains of what might have been a linen dress hung limp over the ribcage. Anika waved the light over the exposed pelvic bones, examining them and making rough calculations.

‘Female‘, she determined.

Anika continued her scan down over the legs, which disappeared into a pair of quaint boots that were unmistakably feminine and unmistakably antique. She noted floral patterned stitching still evident in the leather.

Anika felt for the folded papers in her pocket and pulled them out, flicked them open and shone the light upon the sepia photograph scan. The trio of girls in the wagon – two wearing their sunny smiles, the third with her hard, brooding stare. Anika’s eyes hovered over the man holding the reins of the horse. That expression – flat, lifeless.

In her mind, Anika began asking questions, teasing out threads, making connections.

No!

She stopped herself and brought herself back to what was objectively before her. A young female, interred in a travelling case that had been hidden beneath the fireplace of a long abandoned homestead. Anika had to call this in. She needed to get a team out here to help. To process the site and the body. To gather evidence and build a picture.

Anika checked her phone. No bars.

“Damn and blast,” she cursed.

Gripping the edge of the floorboards, Anika prepared to climb out of the cavity. Springing from her uninjured leg, she propelled herself up…

…And felt an invisible fist punch hard against her chest with enough force that she was thrust back down into the cavity, striking her head against the under floor portion of the hearth.

Crumpling to the earth near the case, Anika saw flashes of light pop in front of her eyes. Nausea overwhed her. Rolling over, she retched into the earth. Her heartbeat throbbed in her ears; cold fear gripped as she fought to maintain consciousness.

Anika scrambled to a sitting position and glared above her head, searching for her attacker. Seeing her phone laying nearby, she grabbed at it and wielded before her, shining the flashlight above her. There was nothing. No-one. The wind wailed through the weatherboards with greater ferocity, aproximating an agonized protestation that was accompanied by the violent slapping of iron against the roof far above.

Anika reached behind her head, feeling the warmth of the fresh laceration and seeping blood. Nausea swirled again as she forced her sluggish body to action. She staggered to her feet, grabbed the floorboards and attempted to climb once more.

A blanket of shadow crawled along the floor and over the detritus in the room towards her, rippling and shifting like a black sea breaking on a shore…

Anika blinked incomprehensibly at the apparition; her breathed halted. Scrambling for purchase, she struggled to pull herself through the gap, grunting and swearing. Feeling for purchase behind her, she planted her foot against the submerged portion of the hearth to propel herself.

The shadow crept inexorably, surrounding her on all sides. A deep and sonorous thrum vibrated through the room, into cavity below the fireplace, into her body…

Fingers of black reached out, slithering over her hands, across her forearms. The smartphone’s flashlight was swallowed up by the darkness. Unrelenting, it continued its course up and over her shoulders. She felt cold tendrils against her neck. Her breath quickened. Her movements became sluggish. She panicked but had no means of fighting against it.

Anika tried to scream but no sound escaped from her. Black fingers pushed their way into her mouth and towards the back of her throat. She felt a dread cold as the blanket of shadow exerted an inexplicable pressure against her – a living entity.

As Anika struggled, half in and half out of the cavity in the floor, she felt for the phone, turned it over and tried to look at the screen. Pulling against the apparition, she brought the screen to her face and glared at the signal strength indicator.

One bar. Two bars. No bars. One bars…

The shadow was consuming her. Her lungs burned. She felt her consciousness was slipping. With a supreme effort, Anika managed to manipulate her thumb in a practiced pattern across the screen.

Officer in Distress…Send.

A final, strangled cry erupted around the cavernous room.

Then. Nothing.

The room was empty.

The howling wind pushed its way through the decaying timbers of the homestead, scattering dust motes around the collapsing fireplace, across the abandoned smartphone, through the cavity in the floor and over the travelling case underneath.

***

A trio of police 4×4’s tore through the entrance to the property, fishtailing along the the gravel lane of the house. Red and blue lights flashed against the weatherboards of the house. Sirens wailed across the night time landscape. The vehicles screeched to a halt adjacent to the SUV parked by the house. Doors flew open. Men and women spilled from within, weapons drawn.

A young officer in plain clothes and kevlar vest strode forth and paused in a defensive posture, his weapon raised.

“Anika!” he called urgently. “Anika!?”

Looking back over his shoulder, he saw his companions fanning out towards the abandoned SUV, towards the rear of the homestead and the nearby field. Widening his stance, he moved forwards, around the corner of the homestead and flanked the front of the building. Two of his uniformed colleagues came up behind him, positioning themselves in a protective cordon off both his shoulders, several feet away. Acknowledging them both, he raised his free hand, singnalling to them to halt.

He turned to face the homestead and approached the the darkness of the open front door.

“Anika?!” he called once more.

He listened in the ensuing silence.

…And thrust his side arm out before him at a sound that emerged from the interior. Cocking his left ear towards the door, he squinted. It was a sound, unmistakable. A sniffing, a weeping. Out of the corner of his eye, he detected movement and he steeled himself. His colleagues did the same.

From the entrance to the homestead, a figure emerged – small and willowy. Dressed in tattered linen and a single, pointed leather boot, the girl leaned against the door frame and peered out into the night. Her long, dark hair framed her pale and dusty face – wild, untamed. Tears streamed down her cheeks from redenned eyes. Her countenance was plagued by disorientation, grief and fear.

Blinking as though to clear her vision, the girl focused on the man standing just beyond the stoop. She raised her left arm, reached out with her delicate fingers, straining with the effort. Her dry and cracked lips parted…

“H…help me!”

There you have it – my attempt at a Thursday Doors piece of flash fiction. I’ve crafted it on the fly, using a single image as inspiration and I’ve written it with my gut. I hope you have enjoyed it for what it is. Feel free to critique it, criticize it, rubbish it completely or perhaps even praise it if you think it deserve it. Importantly – I thank you if you’ve made it to this last paragraph and are still with me.

DFA.