AFRAID OF THE DARK
By: Violette L. Reid
Cindee Layne sat up in her bed, her body flinging up so fast that it seemed as if an invisible force was tossing her into the air. Her light was off! Fear and anger flooded her being for everyone in her house knew that the dark was her nemesis and that she kept the lamp on in the far corner of her room to guard against her overactive imagination.
Cindee was a vivid dreamer and if she opened her eyes to a black room, the evils of her cerebral would dance before her eyes as crisp and clear as television actors. Usually it was the same cloaked creature, sitting upon her dresser with its beady eyes burning and its crooked hands fondling its bent legs, waiting to ravish her with its perverse wickedness.
Luckily tonight was a dreamless one but the darkness woke her anyway, beckoning her out of her peaceful sleep like a potential lover nudging his sweetheart softly as she slumbered.
Light panic shortened her breath as her yellow brown eyes tried to make sense out of the shadows. With determination and a deep inhale and a shallow exhale, she bolted to the corner and clicked the lamp switch. Nothing. Heavy creases adorned her forehead. One by one the hairs on the back of her neck erected themselves like dominoes in reverse. She quickly unscrewed the light bulb and shook the small white glass close to her ear. A tiny tingling noise rattled inside of the thin glass. The bulb was blown. Cindee placed the bulb in her pajama pocket and bolted for the door as if an entity was after her. At any moment she expected to feel its hands upon her shoulders.
She reached the dark hallway and flicked on the light. The fear subsided just a bit as she rambled through the hall closet searching for a new bulb. She found nothing. Disappointed, she turned the corner and headed straight to her brother's room.
Quietly Cindee pushed open the door, her hands like bright gold against the mahogany wood. The light of the hall spilled into the room casting the messy chamber in a pale glow. She crept silently against the wall, careful not to wake her elder brother by tumbling over one of many objects he always failed to pick up, until she appeared before one of the many small lamps sitting on a long table connected to the wall.
Her tiny fingers slipped through one of the cone shaped shades and wrapped around the bulb. She twisted it quickly and dislodged it and switched the good bulb with the blown one. After making the permutation, she walked slowly back to her room, preparing herself to enter the darkness.
She needed to remain calm. She was nearly a grown woman and she knew her room like the back of her hand yet her fear of the darkness was crushing down on her like the foot of a giant. The uncanny feeling that she was not alone in the darkness made her crazy. So real was the presence, Cindee felt as if she could reach out and touch it. She imagined its beady eyes resting upon her as she neared her door; perched up on her dresser like a bird ready to swoop down and attack her with jagged talons.
Her fear elevated. Couldn't she just sleep in the hallway? The thought did not seem like a bad one but she put it away from her mind. She was being childish. No way was she going to give her siblings more ammunition to play cruel jokes on her. She could imagine them stealing the her bulbs on a nightly basis or turning the lamp off and jumping out of her closet when she got out of bed to turn it back on. No. She would not give them the satisfaction.
Cindee ran into her bedroom so fast that she nearly pulled her little toe off when she banged it on the edge of her vanity. She refused to fall to the floor, limping wholeheartedly towards the small lamp. Her aching foot dragged against the carpet feeling like a match getting ready to ignite.
Her skin felt like a cloak. She could feel it all over her. Chill bumps raced down her arms in currents of chilled flesh and prickly hairs. The darkness felt like a tangible blanket being wrapped around her tighter and tighter with every step that she took. Tears began to swell in her large oval eyes. Her long lashes blurred her vision as it caught tiny droplets of water. The faster she walked, the further the little lamp seemed and the closer she seemed to be coming to the thing that cloaked itself in the blackness of her room.
She froze. She thought she heard movement. A low whine escaped her lips. She sprinted now. Cindee could not afford to let her imagination get the best of her.
When her heart was on the brink of explosion and her mind tittering on insanity, the little lamp sat right before her trembling fingers. Cindee grabbed the little brass desk light with her right hand and retrieved the bulb out of her pocket with her left. Her fingers clung to the glass bulb so tight that she was afraid that it would shatter and bloody her clammy fingers. With a shaky exhale, she forced the bulb into the lamp and twisted it in with hard, wrist paining turns. She flipped the switch. The room blazed with soft yellow light. The fear crawled back into the recesses of her mind followed by the creature biding its sweet time.

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