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Cough: Chapter 2
Chapter 2
The File
I sit here in my office, pondering the yellow folder. Another day at the office, great a new case, as if that wonderful "sludge beast from the basement" case didn't already decrease my lifespan... Another scare like that and I'll end up in the infirmary.
I bravely clasp onto the folder. "Here we go again." I mumble.
The large caps letters "CONFIDENTIAL" mark its cover. I flip through the file, page by page, browsing at the photos and the paragraphs little by little. And we have another missing person, Nancy Paradoux...
If there's one thing I learned from this kind of work, it's in the details, that's where you find the mask or the totem or the pyromaniac that sets people ablaze with his thoughts. I got used to looking at details because I had an encounter with one unforgettable detail in my past that still sends shivers throughout my body.
It was back in Burkwood County, I was about 12 years old and I would play near the old mill a lot, it was an odd place, always surrounded by trees, and shrubbery... it was called the old mill for a reason, the place was falling apart and the more of a hazard it became, the more my buddies and I used to go there. Boys will be boys right?
However one summer we went there and the old mill got creepy...
I don't remember why but we decided to move our daily hangouts to purple pastures, it was a lavender field owned by Mrs. Seeklemeyer, the old bat wasn't too fond of us hanging out there and she'd always peer out of her little cottage like creep and stare us down until we decided to end our meetings.
As comfortable as the location was,
I couldn't help but miss the old mill, so I went back there one afternoon to do some final reminiscing and low and behold, the mill was gone.
Not a brick nor a trace of the mouldy flour it used to have strewn on the floor... it was like the building grew wings and flapped off...
I do remember something partcularly strange about that day, in front of me, Mr. Seeklemeyer, the husband and better half of that disturbed old coot in Purple Pastures. He stood near the tree, stroking its bark slowly. He was staring at the place where that mill once was. "You see it too boy?" He asked me as if he could see me."See what?" I replied confused.
"Oh nothing, nevermind then." He spoke out in a trance. "What are you doing here mister?" I asked curiously. "Shouldn't you be heading home?" He turned in my direction, and looked at me, his eyes were pitch black. "It gets quite peculiar out here..." I could feel the fear crawling up my spine like little spiders, I fell on the ground and backed into a nearby tree. "Run along now boy." He said in a much deeper voice. I felt my legs carry me at a thousand miles an hour through that forrest.
The sweat swimming off my skin, my breath mutating into painful coughs, I could feel my heart racing, all the way till I hit the front porch and scraped my hands against the hard cement floor.
I never returned. And I never forgot. So with that in mind I head to the last page. I read through the paragraph, and the words become audible as I read the sentence out loud.
"Nancy was last seen playing near the old mill." Below an image of the mill, in exactly the way I remembered it!" Only now with some text scribbled onto it. I take out my magnifying glass from the top drawer of my wooden desk and the letters appear.
"I'm still here."
© A G Blake
The File
I sit here in my office, pondering the yellow folder. Another day at the office, great a new case, as if that wonderful "sludge beast from the basement" case didn't already decrease my lifespan... Another scare like that and I'll end up in the infirmary.
I bravely clasp onto the folder. "Here we go again." I mumble.
The large caps letters "CONFIDENTIAL" mark its cover. I flip through the file, page by page, browsing at the photos and the paragraphs little by little. And we have another missing person, Nancy Paradoux...
If there's one thing I learned from this kind of work, it's in the details, that's where you find the mask or the totem or the pyromaniac that sets people ablaze with his thoughts. I got used to looking at details because I had an encounter with one unforgettable detail in my past that still sends shivers throughout my body.
It was back in Burkwood County, I was about 12 years old and I would play near the old mill a lot, it was an odd place, always surrounded by trees, and shrubbery... it was called the old mill for a reason, the place was falling apart and the more of a hazard it became, the more my buddies and I used to go there. Boys will be boys right?
However one summer we went there and the old mill got creepy...
I don't remember why but we decided to move our daily hangouts to purple pastures, it was a lavender field owned by Mrs. Seeklemeyer, the old bat wasn't too fond of us hanging out there and she'd always peer out of her little cottage like creep and stare us down until we decided to end our meetings.
As comfortable as the location was,
I couldn't help but miss the old mill, so I went back there one afternoon to do some final reminiscing and low and behold, the mill was gone.
Not a brick nor a trace of the mouldy flour it used to have strewn on the floor... it was like the building grew wings and flapped off...
I do remember something partcularly strange about that day, in front of me, Mr. Seeklemeyer, the husband and better half of that disturbed old coot in Purple Pastures. He stood near the tree, stroking its bark slowly. He was staring at the place where that mill once was. "You see it too boy?" He asked me as if he could see me."See what?" I replied confused.
"Oh nothing, nevermind then." He spoke out in a trance. "What are you doing here mister?" I asked curiously. "Shouldn't you be heading home?" He turned in my direction, and looked at me, his eyes were pitch black. "It gets quite peculiar out here..." I could feel the fear crawling up my spine like little spiders, I fell on the ground and backed into a nearby tree. "Run along now boy." He said in a much deeper voice. I felt my legs carry me at a thousand miles an hour through that forrest.
The sweat swimming off my skin, my breath mutating into painful coughs, I could feel my heart racing, all the way till I hit the front porch and scraped my hands against the hard cement floor.
I never returned. And I never forgot. So with that in mind I head to the last page. I read through the paragraph, and the words become audible as I read the sentence out loud.
"Nancy was last seen playing near the old mill." Below an image of the mill, in exactly the way I remembered it!" Only now with some text scribbled onto it. I take out my magnifying glass from the top drawer of my wooden desk and the letters appear.
"I'm still here."
© A G Blake
