YTZ#16:
The Fear Grips Again
My ongoing writings cited for future use as a graphic novel. Enjoy.
Start from the beginning.
What follows is a fictional account.
The Fear Grid, Part 5
“
“Purity! Purity!”Grace’s voice kept shouting at her friend. But Purity was lost in a dark, fearful trance.
The clerk had run off in fear of something above Purity’s head, and so she was desperately trying to look towards what it was. As she attempted to do this, her head moved abominably slowly. Tick by tick it turned, trying to pry itself into lifting up. Purity couldn’t understand what was happening, nor could she release the feeling of terror consuming her mind and body. Her hands were clammy, her heart beat like a racehorse, and her eyes were as wide as if someone had taped them open.
Still she could not manage to see what had frightened the clerk so much. She could not see whatever was above her. The thing she began to feel and perceive as there, lurking about, looking down at her. She knew something was there. She just wanted to know what it was!
“Purity! Wake up!” called Grace so loudly and with such a violent shake that Purity could not withstand any longer. Immediately she was back in the mall, as it had been before the fear gripped her. The dark colors faded, the feelings subsided. She could see and move normally again.
The urge to spot the thing above her still held sway, and though she felt as though the opportunity had passed, she tried anyway.
She turned to look up and behind her, straight towards the space above and even to the tall ceiling of that Stacy’s department store.
Nothing.
“Purity, are you ok?” Grace asked. “What happened to you?
“I don’t know,” Purity started, finding words hard to come by. “Did you see anything?”
“What are you talking about?” Grace looked very worried. “What are you looking at?”
“Nothing, Grace. Let’s just get out of here. I don’t want to shop anymore.”
“That’s understandable. Why don’t you just go home and I’ll get these dresses for us.”
Purity nodded dumbly and walked towards the exit. She felt like a zombie, moving as though she had no energy in her body.
The mall patrons watched in a mix of shock, confusion and sympathy.
*****
Purity was at home for dinner. She barely touched her food. Her parents were at first too engrossed in their own conversation to bat an eye.
But at last her mom noticed, “Purity, what’s wrong? You’re not eating.”
“It’s nothing, just not hungry.”
“Come on sweetie, it’s your favorite. Shepherd’s pie with chunky mashed potatoes, which you accidentally fell in love with.”
Purity attempted a small bite to humor her mother. But she didn’t seem thrilled about it.
Her dad chimed in then, “Pure, what’s going on with you? What happened at the mall?”
“And in history class?” her mom added.
“Mom, dad!” Purity cried, agitated. “Does everything that happens around here get insta-tweeted to the whole town or something?”
“Honey, we don’t know what that means,” her dad showed signs of his generation. “But I can guess. Your teacher called us only after people heard what happened at Stacy’s. You must know that a lot of people saw these two incidents today, so it’s not secret. We are just concerned, that’s all.”
“We’re worried about you, sweetie,” said her mom. “Is there something going on? Are you nervous about school, about someone at school or something? Is this about Gavin?”
“God, there really is nothing secret in my life, is there? You guys just don’t get it!”
Purity promptly got up from the dinner table and stormed off to her bedroom upstairs.
“Purity, you come back here this instant!” shouted her dad after her. His rage had a way of flaring up unexpectedly. “You don’t leave the dinner table without being excused! We are not finished discussing this!”
She ignored his rant as she climbed the stairs, rounded the corner, and slammed the bedroom door behind her as she launched herself into her bed. Tears streamed from her eyes as she let out a strong sob.
Through the floor she heard her father end with one last admonition: “And do not slam the doors in this house!”
“Dear, calm down, would you?” her mother tried to soothe her father. Then their voices eased into a low murmur that was unintelligible, especially over Purity’s fit of crying.
Purity released the emotions for a bit, then wiped her face clean with tissues. She spent some time after that thinking back on her day.
She had woken up with a start and had had the first episode of this strange fear feeling overcome her and color her world in black and blue. But it had passed when she remembered the exciting feeling of her plans to ask out the boy she liked.
Then in history class she froze up over a question and found herself again locked in this uncontrollable feeling of dread. She knew from the outside looking in that she must really have looked like a freak. Though to her the feeling had been overwhelming.
Plus there was that strange scene with Bobby Finn in the cafeteria…
But most overwhelming of all had been that last episode she’d experienced in Stacy’s at the mall. It had this added element of another person being affected. The clerk had almost seemed more scared than Purity in that moment, running away from the scene entirely.
What boggled Purity’s mind was how the clerk had been able to run, but how she herself could not even lift or turn her head fast enough to look around in that weird other place of darkness. She had just wanted to see what was there. She had felt such a strong sensation, like a presence. It had felt menacing and wicked. But she had not had the good fortune to actually witness it.
Part of her wondered if maybe she was actually more fortunate to have NOT seen it. Maybe in seeing it she would have been filled with more terror, more concern for the reality of what was there. Or what had felt like some sort of reality…
Yet she knew, deep in her being, that something had been there.
She just didn’t know what to do about it. Any of it.
“
Please comment and share.
Thanks for reading.
Blessings to you,
Matthew