The woman

Sneaking around the darkness of my home, through the hallways, and checking up on my family members asleep. I smiled to myself, knowing no one would catch me. I walked into the hall closet, and pulled back the rug, revealing a small door that only I knew about. I grabbed onto the latch, and opened the door. A faint light glowed in the distance. I lowered myself, closing the door shut behind me. The space was confined, enough for one person to crawl through. Further and further down I climbed, until I reached a space where I could stand upright. I walked ahead to where I knew there was an opening above me, and crawled up into it, grabbing the inside of the opening so as not to fall out. I crawled towards the light, bending my head so as not to bump the low ceiling above me. When I reached the light, it was a small window. Almost like that of an air conditioning vent. I looked through, and saw a man sitting at a desk, facing away. His home was clean, save for the desk which he sat, was cluttered with books and papers. He had almost no furniture, a couch tattered and torn sat alone in a corner. A candle flickered on a coffee table on the other side of the room, a plate of food sat next to it, old and moldy. The man turned suddenly, blood dripping from where his eyes used to be. His face cut and bruised, his throat cut. He stood from his chair, and started walking, limping really, towards me. He stopped, the vent being the only thing between us. I could smell his breath, a mixture of rotting meat and dirt. He raised a twisted finger to the vent, and without warning hit it with his hand and scampered away. I crawled on to the next vent, a family sitting at a table eating what look like the corpse of a dog. Ripping muscle from bone, and chewing the flesh with blood dripping off their lips. They looked at me with a lust in their eyes, I had what they didn’t: freedom. Shaking my head, I crawled to the next vent; I looked in to see a woman sitting on the floor in front of a T.V., nothing playing on it but static. A couch sat in the middle of the room, the leather yellowed with age. In front of her, she had the body of an infant, and with a crude knife she began to peel off the skin of its body. After she was done, she tacked the skin on the wall, leaving it to dry. She sat on her yellowing couch and spoke aloud, she knew I was watching. “You believe you have freedom, yet you have no idea. You don’t make decisions. A greater fate is already decided for you on the day of your birth. You enjoy spying on the tenants of Hell, because you know that you can go home through the hole in your closet to your nice, warm home and loving family. But I tell you, enjoy it now. I might not let you leave.” She smiled towards the vent, her teeth blackened towards the gums. ‘You’re crazy’ I thought. “You have no idea!” she exclaimed and howled with laughter. She stretched out on the couch, and yawned. “You know,” she began “This couch is made from human skin. You see, many people come, came, through this passage before you did. Like you, they thought their home lives didn’t suffice them. So fate dealt them a passage, a passage that showed them what Hell really was. Sort of a ‘you don’t know what you have until it’s gone’ life lesson. Of course…I never let them leave.” She flashed her smile towards me, and I felt scared, scared for my life.

I turned to crawl away, in the distance I heard her call “You may as well give up, you won’t make it home!” followed by her cackle. I was crawling as fast as I could, sweating with fear and the annoying lack of space that only allowed so much movement. I passed the family, and the man with no eyes, and began to crawl towards the opening. I lost my footing and feel hard to the floor below me. I ran to the end of the hall, and pushed up the door that led to the hallway closet. I heard an angry scream, and felt a hand tighten around my ankle, pulling me back down. I fought hard against the hand, but it pulled me back into the dark hallway. Up the opening I went, and dragged past the vents of the man with no eyes, and family. The woman had pried away the vent, my body falling hard to the floor of her home. When I awoke, I was strapped to a table, a pain in my legs. I had just enough freedom look out over my legs. My legs were red with blood, and I saw only muscle. My skin was gone. The woman walked in with a bowl in her hands. “Hungry?” she asked. She held the bowl low so I could see what she offered. It looked like stew, except for the small hand that floated inside. “Ah the hand…yeah I never like to waste anything so I thought “since babies look good enough to eat, why not try it?’ so I did. It’s actually pretty good. Want some?” She held out a spoonful towards me, and I winced. She laughed, and placed the bowl near my feet. “Now I need to finish the back of my couch, so thank you for volunteering.” She took a knife from her pocket, dried blood on its hilt. She took it and looked it over, admiring the design. Then, with a fleeting motion, stuck the blade into my skull until the handle touched my head.