Brenda

As she got out of bed that morning, Sherry was doubtful if she could face her mother again. It’s hell, she thinks to herself, but one worth going through. she starts her daily routine for the morning.

**********

Six months ago…..

“She needs to take her pills every day, is that clear?” Sherry looks to her two sisters, Barbara and Kelly. “Yes. I understand. I just don’t want to go through with it, though.” The doctor looks at her with an uneasy face and puts his hand on her shoulder. “It will be hard,” he says to comfort her, “I had to go through the same thing with my dad a few years ago. It’s no fun.”

After some discussion on the daily prescription their mother needs, they exit the office and head to their mother’s room, 1994 Brenda Hood.

Kelly: I don’t have the fucking time to tend to mom’s needs. Shit! I have five kids! And Greg can’t take care of them every night, and I surely can’t take them up to mom’s. Fuck my life!

Barbara: It seems like this day came so fast. Why now? It seems like all the worst things happen when I least expect them to. I don’t even have a job. How am I supposed to do anything with no money?

Sherry: (blank thoughts)

************

Sherry turns on the news with her bowl of cereal sitting in her lap. Nothing new. Everything going to shit, as usual. She tries to call Barbara, who spent the night at mother’s, to no avail, remembering that she usually leaves her phone on vibrate. Plus, she’s probably still asleep. Her mother doesn’t even know where her phone is most of the time, so why bother.

***********

Five months ago……

Brenda was alone in her home one afternoon. She didn’t expect Kelly to get there until she dropped her kids off at a friend’s house. Brenda went into deep thought, thinking of who those four kids were, or was it three? She sits in her recliner, silently, watching the window. A sound. A faint murmur.

Darrel? Is that you? No. Darrel has been dead for years. I need to tell myself that.

She looks around the living room from her recliner. Everything looks normal. But that lamp. Has it been on this whole time? She gets up and walks over to the lamp and turns it off.

Did I have it on? What was I doing?

Kelly knocks on the door. Brenda walks over and opens the door.

“Hi, mom. Have you taken your medication?”

Brenda looks at her tells her that she didn’t.

“Mom. For God’s sake, you need to take the pills, or you won’t get better.”

“Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain, Kelly. I don’t like that.”

***********

Sherry starts making breakfast, not for her, but for her mother. She turns the eggs over and checks the biscuits. As she does this, she wonders why she doesn’t take her mother to a nursery home. Her sisters never seem intent on taking care of their own mother. It’s always me, me, me. But she knows that is out of the question.

***********

Four months ago…..

Brenda cannot seem to go to sleep. She keeps hearing that voice that just hovers over her constantly. She doesn’t remember everything, but she hears these pleas to come to the basement. She knows there is no basement. Every door leads to a bedroom, a closet of clothes, a pantry, and bathrooms, but not to a basement.

A noise. One. Two. Three. Three knocks at the door. She raises up in bed. Barbara could get that. She’s just in the living room.

Brenda puts her head down again. Peace for ten seconds. Then the door. Opening. The hinges of the door are not very loud, but she can hear it. The door closes. With a bang. Brenda is now up, but she can’t move.

Barbara had to hear that. She has to be awake now. She’s just in the other bedroom. But what if she’s not.

Brenda gets out of bed and puts her slippers on. She walks to the bedroom door. She’s hesitant to open it. She puts both hands on the doorknob and the door swings open. Nothing. Just her home. She breathes a sigh of relief.

But it is not long. The voice returns. She recognizes it. It sounds like a man, but it has a low tone. It’s right behind her. She can’t look back. She rushes past the living room and kitchen as fast as she could go and stops in front of the door. She turns the knob, but she can’t open the door. It’s locked.

What? But how did he get in here? or whatever it was that was….in her room.

She turns around. Darrel?

The voice. “Come the the basement.”

Brenda looks all over, but no one is there.

“I don’t have a basement! I don’t have none! You hear me! I! Don’t! Have! None!”

She wakes up. Barbara is at her bedside, asleep.

A dream?

************

Sherry packs herself some clothes for the night. She decides she is going to take her mother to a night on the town.

She needs out anyway. She never stops talking about some basement.

************

Two months ago……

Brenda can’t stand being alone anymore, but she doesn’t have high hope in her daughters anymore. It’s almost as if they force her to take these damned pills. Why do these pills matter?

And also, why does that man never stop to say anything. She will see him walk in the hallway into a different doors or rooms. When she goes to look for him, he seems to disappear.

Sherry….please don’t make me take these pills.

Sherry is not there yet. She went to get groceries.

There he is again! Why does he do that!?

She realizes something. He always comes from one part of the house. Darrel’s room. She gets up and walks into the hallway and turns to her late husband’s abode (he died in this same room). The door is closed, but she is used to this now, because that man never opens or closes the doors he walks through.

She opens the door and enters the room. And there it is. She knows where that man comes from now. The closet. The door is wide open, and she swears to God she knows that door was closed.

Sherry comes in the house and finds her mother in Darrel’s room.

“Mom, you miss him?”

Brenda turns around and looks at Sherry with distaste.

“What in God’s name took you so damn long!?”

“I told you mom, I went to Kelly’s to help her with her computer.”

Brenda was shocked. “You said you went to get groceries.”

“Mom, we went over this. Barbara gets the groceries and…”

“How does she buy groceries when she doesn’t even have a fucking job!”

“MOTHER!”

“What? What?!”

Sherry starts to cry. She can’t bear it. Why does she even make her take the pills anyway, she’s not getting any better.

“Nothing.”

***********

Sherry gets into her car and drives up the hill to her mother’s house. Today has been so good so far. She looks to her left and peers through the trees to see a deer. So lovely. She crest over the hill and turns into the driveway to her mother’s. She’s here. Park.

************

One week ago….

Brenda knows now. The figure means to harm her. She can’t stand it. She reaches for a cup and it propels toward her where it either hits her stomach or, if she is quick enough, hits the wall. Things get knocked out of her hands and falls to the ground. She can’t count how many times she has been cut her arm with a knife.

The figure is now following Brenda. She has a description of what it looks like. A hollow, black man (or woman, or whatever it was) that has no facial features or gestures. That’s it. Nothing else is unique about this figure. Also, Brenda can never tell which way the figure is looking and when she gets near it, it vanishes and ends up in another place.

She doesn’t trust her daughters anymore. They always insist now that she takes the pills. She can’t even refuse, though, they always find ways to make her take it. they put them in her food, drinks, and even her dentures. They won’t leave her alone.

Can’t they just leave me alone.

She still hasn’t investigated the closet. Something is in there that may have all the answers to what is happening to her. Maybe it can be the way out of her misery.

And besides, the kids won’t be home from school for some time yet. She has time. The figure is now in the kitchen.

***********

Sherry grabs the food from the passenger’s seat and gets out of the car. she walks to the door and knocks on the door. Some minutes go by with no answer. She turns the knob and notices that it’s unlocked. She opens it.

************

Last night……

She knows what is in the basement now. Everything has come to this. She walked down the long stairway that led down there. She found answers. She saw things she never thought she would see. But that doesn’t matter right now. Her mind is set on one goal. She knows she cannot forget it.

That figure. It laughs now. It even talks. She knew that figure was up to no good. It wants her. And how does he do that.

He slips her the pill in her sleep.

She knows this thing is nothing but trouble. It must be destroyed. It stands in the kitchen now, laughing. It’s cutting up something. It’s too distracted.

Damn it, what did that man with the black eyes tell me to do. He held that thing to my chest and filled me with and icy cold feeling.

What was it? What the fuck was it!?

It’s too distracted. She must do it. She grabs the knife she’s been hiding under the cushions. She gets up and starts toward the figure. It laughs. She raises the knife over her head. The laugh starts to grow louder. She’s right behind it. She can do it. Right now.

The figure turns around and laughs in her face. She plunges the knife into its head. It screams and hits the floor with a thump. A black liquid flows from the wound. The knife still inside.

She stands over the thing. She should feel overjoyed, but now she feels even worse.

In the dead of night, as she is about to go to bed, the voices start again. She cannot go to sleep. It should be over? Right?

No. And the voices grow louder and form a harmony. Children. Women. Men. Animals. Everything.

She looks at the ceiling and screams out.

“WHY!?”

************

Later that night, as police officers step over the spilt breakfast on the kitchen floor, Sherry and Kelly sit by each other at the foot of the garden they would tend to. No flowers grew here anymore. They died.

Barbara was dead. Brenda had stabbed her in the head with a steak knife at some point in the night. When police found her, she was huddled in her husband’s closet. She was whispering about some man with black eyes.

Sherry can’t take it. Neither can Kelly. Eventually, they agree that it’s best she goes into the care of nurses and doctors in the mental hospital that sits out of town.

***********

Six months ago……

The three sisters walk out of the doctor’s office. The doctor looks out of his window and watches as they walk down the hall to a room on the left.

He walks to a nearby table and picks up his cell phone. He dials a number and waits.

Someone picks up the phone.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Don, I gave them the pills.”

“So we wait now?”

“Yes.”

“Man, I’m excited. So no one knows we’re doing this, right?”

“Yes. As long as you keep your mouth shut. No one has ever experimented with drugs like these on a human before.”

“Okay. Good. Thanks for letting me know.”

“You’re welcome. Goodbye.”

He puts the phone back on the table and leaves the room.

Credit To: NL60