I still hear her crying

It’s been four months since she passed away. I’ve been told that it takes time for you to get over things. That grief wraps itself around you like a serpent, choking the happiness out of you until you can learn to live with its weight all over your body. I’ve read enough pamphlets and sympathetic messages to know that I’m not alone in my suffering. But this is different. I still hear her crying.

It started two months after her death. It always happened in the middle of the night, after my restless mind had finally given up tormenting me and finally let me get to sleep. I would be in a deep dreamless sleep and then suddenly it would wake me. Her piercing, mournful cry. The same cry I had heard the night she died.

I would bolt out of bed and run to her room, only to find it empty. Empty except for the horrible sound of her tears. After a minute or two, I would wake up fully and realise the situation.

To begin with I thought I was going mad. That I was imagining the sound. But after a few nights, I made sure I was fully awake when I was disturbed. No half-dreaming hallucination. No sleeping pills or alcohol to help me sleep. Just a sober realisation that I was awake and sane and hearing her crying.

I tried to tell my wife what was happening, but Emily wouldn’t listen. How could she? What I was saying, no one would believe. After two weeks of me waking up and running to the other room like a madman, Emily moved out. Back to her parents.

The crying didn’t stop. I heard her every night. Do you know what the saddest thing is? Every time it happened, for the briefest moment I would forget that she had passed. It would take me back to before when she was alive and cried out. I would wake up and run to her. To soothe her.

But I would soon snap out of it and realise what had happened. The sheer despair would often bring me to my knees, the grief pouring out of me. It felt like I was being used. Like something was feeding on the pain that I felt.

I didn’t tell anyone what was happening to me. They would either abandon me like my wife or try to help and take me away. I didn’t want to leave my flat. This was my home. Our home. I wasn’t going to leave her. Not yet.

*

Two weeks after my wife left, Pete turned up at my door unannounced. Pete was one of my closest friends, I had first met him when I was at university. He had been out of the country on business for the past four months, so had only been able to send his condolences from afar until now.

When I opened the door, he was stood there smiling with a sleeping bag tucked under one arm and a travel bag slung over a shoulder.

“How you doing mate?” he said.

Before I could reply, he had stepped inside and walked into the living room. He put his bag down on the sofa and reached inside, taking out a pair of beer bottles.

“Don’t know about you, but I could use a drink.”

I nodded and took the bottle from his hand. “You’re the first person whose asked me that in forever,” I said. I was about to twist off the bottle cap when I realised I didn’t want to drink here. This place was…sacred now.

“Let’s go down to the garden.”

I took Pete out the flat and down the stairwell to the garden at the back of the building. There were nine flats in the complex and we all shared a small green space at the rear of the building that backed onto some woods. There was a bench and a small paved area for barbecues. It had not been well-maintained, so the bushes were overgrown and unruly. I sat on the bench and resisted the urge to look up to my flat. It was her bedroom that overlooked the garden. I didn’t need reminding of that now.

Pete sat and chatted to me, just talking non-stop. I think he was afraid at first that any break in conversation would lead to awkwardness. That I would mention my misery. To be honest I was glad to just have my thoughts filled with his white noise.

“I’m starving, have you got anything to eat?” said Pete as he finished his drink.

I shook my head.

“Good, I was hoping you’d say that. Let’s go grab a burger.”

*

I took Pete to a pub around the corner. It had been a while since I had ventured so far from my flat. Sitting at a table eating a burger with Pete, I felt a lot better. Better than I thought it would be to be honest. I thought it was a cliché, the whole change of scenery thing. But it worked.

We finished our burgers and a few more beers. Pete wiped his mouth with a napkin and then took a deep breath.

“So, I spoke to Emily.”

“Right,” I said. Here we go. Here comes the intervention, I thought.

“She told me about your nightmares.”

“They’re not nightmares.”

“Whatever it is. She said you were hearing crying?”

“Yes.”

“Every night?”

I sighed. He’s going to call me crazy, I thought. Try and convince me to get help.

“Look. I can’t imagine what you’re going through. But you’re my best mate. So here’s my suggestion. I stay at your flat tonight. If I don’t hear any crying, then tomorrow morning we go see if we can get you some help. Right?”

“And if you do hear crying?”

“Well,” said Pete, “Then we have a different problem to solve.”

He reached out his hand across the table. I shook it.

“I’m not sure you’ll be able to help me. Whatever happens.”

“I can try.”

Pete stood up from the table, seemingly extremely relieved. “I’ll go grab another round.”

I watched him go to the bar and start chatting to the barmaid. There was no chance he was going to hear anything that night, I thought. But I would be glad for the company. Even if it would just last the night.

*

We returned back to my flat a few beers later. I thought I would be drunk, but there was something about the walk home that sobered me up. I think it was how nervous Pete was. I don’t think he expected to hear anything that night. Which meant his best friend was crazy, and he would have to deal with that.

I opened the door to the flat and walked us in, avoiding her room for now. I pulled out the sofa bed and found some clean sheets for Pete to put down.

“If you need anything, just give me a shout,” I said.

Pete laughed. “You’re supposed to be waking me up.”

He sighed and patted me on the arm. “We’ll be fine. You’ll be fine.”

“I hope so,” I said, more for his benefit than mine.

I turned the lights out to the living room and went to bed. It always felt so big and so cold. In that moment, I missed Emily. It had been a few weeks since I spoke to her. I promised myself that, if Pete was right, I would call her in the morning. Before they locked me up in some insane asylum at least.

*

I woke with a start in the early hours. The crying was back. But it was different. It was still her voice, but there was something more plaintive about it. It was urgent. Desperate even.

I jumped out of bed and ran to the door to her bedroom. I was met by Pete who was stood there holding his head in his hands.

“You can hear it!” I said.

“Of course I can! What the fuck is going on?”

We ran into the bedroom and turned the light on. It was empty again. Pete looked around, searching for something.

“The crying,” he said, “It’s not coming from inside here.”

He walked to the window. I turned the light off and joined him.

We looked down into the shared garden, dimly lit by the sole lamppost that stood over the patio area. Pete was definitely right. The crying was coming from outside.

“Can you see anything?” he said.

I peered down into the darkness. I must admit my mind was swimming. I had gone from thinking I was hearing things, to finding out that the source of my night-time disruptions was not only real but also audible to people other than me. Why hadn’t Emily said anything?

“There!” said Pete, “In the bushes at the back.”

He pointed to one of the overgrown hedges that backed against the wooded area behind the building. At first I couldn’t see anything. But then I spotted it. A pair of glowing circles peering out between the branches. Like the eyes of a fox caught in the headlights of your car. But these eyes weren’t reflecting the light from the lamppost. The light was coming from inside.

“What the fuck is going on?” said Pete.

I barely heard what he said. I was angry now. Furious that someone, or something, was playing a trick on me. Trying to convince me that I was mad, or just keep me grieving.

“I’m going down there,” I said.

“You can’t!” said Pete, “This is fucking mad. You should call the police.”

“And tell them what?” I said. “If I don’t go now, I might never get a chance again.”

Before he could say anything, I was out the room and out the front door of the flat, making my way down the stairwell as fast as I can. I was glad when I heard Pete’s footsteps behind me.

My pace slowed when I reached the door to the shared garden. I’m not sure if it was because I had time to think things through, or maybe that initial surge of adrenaline faded quicker than I expected. It was just, looking through the window in the door to the garden, I had no idea what was going on. Just that I was being targeted.

Pete stopped beside me. He had a fire extinguisher in his hand, he must have picked it up from the stairwell.

I opened the door and stepped out. The night was cold, a lot colder than it had been when we returned to the flat earlier. It was also quiet. The crying had stopped. For a moment I thought that it had gone, whatever it was that had been making the sound. But then I saw those eyes in the bushes ahead. Staring right at me.

I made my way across the patio to the bushes. Pete was lagging behind but I didn’t care. I had to see what was tormenting me.

I left the soothing glare of the lamppost and entered the darkness of the bush. Away from the light, it felt much bigger than it looked. Like I could get lost easily in the undergrowth. But that wouldn’t happen. The eyes never stopped staring at me. They were guiding me in.

I found myself in a gap amongst the bushes. A little clearing that was far too big for my mind to take in. The eyes were in the centre. As my own eyes adjusted to the gloom, it was like a light was lit in the area and I could suddenly see everything. Whether I liked it or not.

The eyes belong to a creature like I had never seen before. It was vaguely humanoid in that it had two arms, two legs and a head. It was crouched down on its hind legs, the top half of its body turned away from me. It’s skin was a pallid disgusting grey, almost completely bald except for thick black hairs that occasionally sprouted disgustingly. It had no nose, just two dark slits that opened and closed erratically. The eyes glowed amongst the grey, almost hypnotic in their intensity.

The creature seemed pleased to see me. A long slit of a grin opened on its head revealing a mocking, twisted smile. It suddenly felt like I was in a trap.

The creature began to twist, to turn its body towards me. It was then that I saw it was holding something in its arms. Cradling something. My heart began to beat faster. I dreaded what it was about to show me.

Pete suddenly burst into the clearing beside me.

“Jesus fucking Christ!” he said, “What is it?”

I couldn’t say anything. I was focused on what the creature was holding. It was like a lump of clay. Half-formed. But I knew it was supposed to be a baby.

My baby.

The lump opened its eyes and mouth and began crying out in anguish. It was her cry, the cry that I had heard that horrible night four months ago.

“Fuck this,” said Pete.

I turned to him. He was stepping forward, the fire extinguisher raised. He was going to attack the creature. Something inside of me twisted. A sense of dread. I wasn’t ready to stop the crying. Not just yet.

I grabbed hold of his arm. He turned to look at me as if I was mad. He fought to break free, but the struggle sent him off balance.

The creature smiled. And lunged.

It leapt at Pete and knocked the extinguisher at his hand. It then started scratching like mad, a frenzy of frantic attacks. The lump was gone as quickly as it had appeared. I realised then what had happened. It had been a trap all along. I just hadn’t been strong enough to follow the trail until now. The creature had been using my grief like a lure. And I had fallen for it.

Pete cried out in pain as the creature attacked. It seemed to grow as it fought with him, the creature becoming bigger and stronger until Pete was helpless in its hands. With one mighty bite, the creature closed its jaws around Pete’s neck. His cries stopped sharply.

I’m afraid to say I ran. I knew there was nothing I could do to save Pete, but I wished I had at least tried. I ran back through the bushes, back into the garden and the stairwell. Back to my flat.

I collapsed on my bed and pulled the blankets around me, like a scared child. There was something about the warmth I found there that sent me slipping away. For the first night in forever, I felt sleep coming and I did not resist.

*

I woke up the next morning feeling confused. The sleep had refreshed me. Recharged. My body felt fantastic, even if my mind was a mess.

I got out of bed and went to her bedroom window to look down at the garden. There was no sign of the creature or Pete. Just the garden.

I went to call the police but couldn’t bring myself to do it. What would I even say? I gathered Pete’s belongings together and took them to the bins. They would be collected that day. No one would ever know Pete was here.

That day, I went out and bought some groceries. Restocked the cupboards. I even got some cleaning products. I felt like I could make this flat feel like my home again.

*

I’m writing now in the middle of the night. I still hear her crying. But this time it stays in my dreams. Sometimes I hear Pete’s voice, crying out in pain. Hoping for someone to help him. But it doesn’t bother me that much. I can live with hearing that every night. For now, at least I am happier. Pete’s visit really did do the trick.