The Painting Read online

  He leaned in towards the painting. Between the trees, three black silhouettes, almost half the size of the trees now. Two, three inches. When he’d first seen them there were six—there were definitely six—and they were only an inch high. They were growing. Something was changing.

  We’rewatchingwe’rewatchingwe’rewatching.

  The three boys, tapping the air in front of them.

  Three figures.

  An overwhelming sense of foreboding intensified in Donny’s stomach. What if the figures were the boys? What if the three that were missing were… were the three boys he’d seen? He tried to cast his mind back to earlier, clenching his eyes together. Were there only four figures earlier when he’d seen the two boys outside? Five? The more he pondered it, the more insane he felt. You’re hypothesising about a fucking painting. Get a grip and write your book.

  He shook his head and squeezed the bridge of his nose. This wasn’t going to work. He’d spent hours awake, hours jotting away in his pad, and he’d got some really solid ideas down. He could take his pad home and work on them. He could get them typed up on his computer and then he’d really have something to work with.

  He looked up at the painting and the butterflies fluttered inside him. But what if I stay? Perhaps he was insane. Perhaps he was just going completely mad and the lack of sleep was causing him to go crazy, but a niggling series of ‘what ifs’ plummeted around his skull. What happens if the figures grow larger? What if another figure disappears?

  What if I stay for one more night?

  His chest tickled with boyish excitement as he walked over to the bedside cabinet and picked up his phone. He’d always been eager to discover, right from a very early age. His mother used to tell him it would get him into a lot of bother one day but Dad always quietened her and encouraged him to ‘find his treasure’.

  What if this was his treasure? Instead of ‘inspired by real events’, what if he documented the real events?

  He pictured himself on the TV screens on a Friday evening. Well, I guess that mad part inside me just made me want to stay there and write on. He could be the Bear fucking Grylls of the supernatural world, blurring the lines between fact and fiction.

  And Sara. Sara would be so proud. They could get that house together. She’d have faith in him. No more uncertain looks, no more ‘you’re living in a dream world’ expressions or confidence votes of pity. Just him, her, and his writing. He could do this.

  He keyed her number into his phone, noticing a lone signal bar. He’d told her he’d be the one to ring her. Writer’s distraction code demanded that the writer was not interrupted during his work. He bit his lip as the dial tone kicked in.

  One ring.

  He wouldn’t tell her about the painting. He wouldn’t tell her about the boys or the room. He’d just tell her what she needed to hear. She’d be so proud.

  Two rings.

  “Hel— Donn—?”

  The static crackled through her voice on the other end of the line.

  “Honey, it’s me,” Donny said. “I don’t know how well you can hear me. You’re breaking up—”

  “You —kay?”

  “I’m okay. I’m really good. The book is going really well.”

  Muffled voices and more crackling static.

  “Hun, I’ll text you,” Donny shouted, elongating his words for clarity. “I should be ready to come back tomorrow.”

  White noise on the other end of the line. A low crackling, like a voice somewhere in the distance calling out.

  “Hun, are you—”

  “WE’REWATCHINGWE’REWATCHINGWE’REWATCHING.”

  Donny threw the phone out of his hand towards the other side of the room.

  The figures were huge. The trees were gone—just darkness. Filthy darkness and eyes—piercing eyes.

  TAPTAPTAP.

  A woman’s voice: YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO STAY AWAY! It was crying, screaming out in the back of his mind.

  Donny pulled the red bed sheets over his head and squeezed his eyes shut, his heart racing and breathing rapid. Please. Please. Please.

  A beautiful singing. Choir voices. He heard them in the room—out of the room—inside the bed and inside his head and they were so soft and beautiful as they worked their way up and down his body.

  And then they were gone and everything was silent.

  He tried to breathe deeply. He tried to think but he couldn’t get the images out of his head. His entire body shook as he clenched the bed sheets, his untrimmed nails cutting through the cotton.

  Deep breaths. Keep it cool. All over now. All over—just get up and go. Get up, get your phone, and go.

  He pulled the bedding out the way of his eyes and stared up at the ceiling. The room was completely silent again. Somewhere at the other side of the room, he could hear Sara’s voice coming from his phone, so far away.

  “Donny? You there?”

  So clear. So far away.

  If he could just talk to her. It’s okay. It’s okay.

  When he lifted himself up from his bed, he froze.

  They were in the room, tapping the thin air. The painting behind them was completely covered in bubbling black ink and bleeding out down the walls. Three boys and three dark, blurry silhouetted figures, right in front of him.

  Tap, tap, tap.

  He let out a scream and tried to run towards the door. The last thing he remembered seeing was their glowing, beaming eyes as the painting exploded and sent a torrent of thick, black slime into the room.

  Then the soft singing, the melody drowning his body…

  Then sleep.

  II

  “Mister? You okay, mister?”

  He felt the cold air brushing against his skin as he opened his eyes. What had…?

  A man stood above him. He had a balding head with long strands of hair growing behind his ears and a bushy moustache sitting atop his upper lip. He stared down at Donny with concerned eyes. “You okay, mate?”

  Donny lifted himself up and looked around. He was outside, lying down by the side of the road. There were no cars in either direction—just the chubby man and his walking stick. He lifted himself to his feet and winced as a sharp pain shot down his back.

  “How… what?” Donny said, looking around and trying to orientate himself. Why was he out here?

  “I think I should be the one asking you the questions,” the man chuckled. “I was just out here on my—my walk, and I see you lying there. Almost called the ambulance; good job you woke up when you did.” He shuffled his feet and eyed Donny up, head to toe. “I’m guessing you’re er, you’re not from around here, eh?”

  Donny’s face heated up. What did he tell him? Did he admit he’d been staying at the house?

  The house. The painting. The boys and—oh God, the singing. His breathing grew more intense as he leaned towards the floor and heaved from the bottom of his gut.

  “Oh heck,” the man said, patting Donny’s back. “I think we should get you to a doctor, don’t you?”

  “No,” Donny said, raising his hand. “I… I just need to get back. I’ve been staying here and I need to get back to… I need to get back to the house and I need to go home.”

  The man crinkled his eyebrows. “You’ve been staying round here? But there’s no house for miles. Listen, why don’t I get you to my place? You can have a kip on the sofa if you need. You look like you could use one.”

  “But,” Donny said, his head spinning with confusion. “Manny Bates’ house. The house with… the house where she went mad. It should be…”

  The man’s face turned, his eyes widening as he took a step back. “I… what did you say? Did you just…” He stared at Donny, lines forming on his forehead as he frowned, eyelids twitching. “It—this can’t be… it can’t—”

  “What can’t? What’s… what’s happening?”

  The man looked distant and lost, as if he’d woken up in a world he didn’t recognise. He stared at Donny as if he were ‘other’.

&nbs
p; “Please,” Donny shouted. “Just tell me what’s—”

  “Okay, okay,” he said. “Just calm down. I need you to calm down first, all right? Okay?”

  Donny tried to breathe normally. What was happening to him? “Okay. Okay.”

  “Right, well,” the man said, edging closer towards Donny and shuffling in the pockets of his blue raincoat. “The thing is—” He pulled out a white cloth and, before Donny knew it, he was pressing it up against his mouth.

  He struggled as he fell to his knees, the bearded man grabbing his arms. “Just keep calm,” he was saying. “Just keep calm.” But the more he breathed, the more he felt his muscles loosening as his knees scraped against the concrete and his body shook violently in protest.

  When he was on his back, he stared up at the sky as it began to slip away, the old man standing over him and shaking his head. He lifted something to his ear as Donny’s vision grew blurrier and his muscles locked into place.

  “Alice, I need you to get down to Crescent Way right now. We’ve got a gap.”

  Then silence.

  The children. The painting exploding with ink.

  The man.

  “We’ve got a gap.”

  Donny gasped as he returned to his senses, the air stinging the back of his throat. He opened his eyes and looked around as the nausea welled in the bottom of his stomach. He was lying in a bed—no, on a sofa. He was covered in a thick, white, cotton blanket, an open fire crackling at the other side of the room. On the fireplace, pictures of the man with another woman. The man. He’d grabbed him, drugged him, and brought him here. What did he want?

  No sooner did the thought enter his mind than the door in the far corner of the room opened. The man, now dressed in a black, V-neck cardigan, nodded at Donny, who edged back against the sofa. He had to make a run for it. He had to get back to the house, get his novel, and go.

  “Now before you get all flustered, at least have a biscuit,” the man said, offering Donny one from a half-empty carton. They looked like Jaffa Cakes but he didn’t recognise the brand.

  Donny’s jaw dangled. “What—just please, what’s going on? Why am I here?”

  The man held the carton in Donny’s face and sighed, pulling it away and stuffing three of the biscuits in his mouth. “Problem with Soft Oats is they aren’t really biscuits, are they? They’re like little cakes. So light you get through a full packet in no time.”

  Donny’s head spun. Soft Oats? What was going on? Why was he in here, lying under the blanket of a stranger who had drugged him in the road?

  The man picked the poker up from beside the fire and shoved it inside, rearranging the flaming wood. Donny moved further back into the sofa. The man must have clocked him because he shook his head and placed the poker back down. “Don’t worry. Not gonna brand you or anything.” He sat down on a chair by the fireplace and lifted his colossal feet onto a footstool, dangling them in front of the fire.

  Donny could only watch.

  “D’you have a name?” the man asked, shoving another Jaffa Cake imitation into his chubby mouth, crumbs dribbling onto his lap.

  “I… Donny. Donny.”

  “Donny. Nice to meet you. I’m Reginald.” He held his hand out and shook the air, gesturing it in Donny’s direction. “First off, I just wanna say sorry for the shock back there.”

  “You mean for drugging me?”

  Reginald sighed. “Look, it’s just I—we haven’t had a case like this for years. We thought we’d closed all the gaps but… Well, we haven’t, have we? I always… I always have a cloth with me. Just in case, y’know?” He shuffled his feet together as they glowed in the heat of the fire.

  The words shot over Donny’s head. “The gaps? I—I just don’t understand. I don’t get it.”

  Reginald leaned forward and a burp sneaked out of his throat. “I know, I know, and I’m sorry but… but you gotta realise that what I’m gonna tell you—it ain’t gonna be easy to hear.”

  Donny thought about the house, about the painting and the children. Tap tap tap. “Believe me, after the two days I’ve had and the things I’ve seen, I doubt I’ll have much trouble.”

  Reginald scoffed and cleared his throat. “Well, all right, but you might wanna grab a sick bag if your stomach’s as bad as it was down on the road.”

  Donny waited. How bad could it be? Was he in trouble about the house? Fuck—maybe the council had repossessed it and he’d lost his novel in progress. He knew he should’ve carried his notepad with him at all times. He knew he should’ve kept it by his side.

  Reginald took a deep breath in and exhaled through his mouth. “Well, you’ve… y’see, there’s these portals. These gaps, and we thought we’d closed ‘em all but we’ve—”

  “Just stop talking about portals and gaps,” Donny said, shaking his head. “Just tell me what’s happened. Just tell me what’s going on, please.”

  Reginald bit his lip and tilted his head to one side. “Well, you might think I’m completely mad but this world—this house and this place you’re in right now—it’s kind of not… it’s kind of not your world.”

  The room was completely silent but for the crackling of the fire and Reginald’s hands rubbing up and down his legs.

  “What do you mean—it’s not ‘my world’?” Donny asked, a slight laugh to his voice. Was this man crazier than he was?

  Reginald shook his head. “Look—I knew this would be tough to explain on my own so that’s why I… Listen, would you mind if I let somebody else join us?”

  Donny’s skin tingled. This had to be some sort of joke, right? Some sort of local practical joke? He’d watched a Derren Brown show once where they tricked one poor guy into believing it was the zombie apocalypse. That was all this was—an expensive practical joke. If he said a few things—I’m a changed man, I’ll never watch pornography behind my girlfriend’s back again—then television would have its moral to the story and he could live happily ever after.

  Besides, he’d always fancied a pint with Derren Brown.

  Reginald cleared his throat to capture Donny’s attention. “Well?”

  “Sure,” Donny said, a smile twitching onto his face. “Sure—just do what you want. Just bring some more people along to laugh at me. Is that what this is? Some kind of joke? Well, ha-ha. I’ve had a real fucking laugh. Fucking laughing my guts up over here. But as a matter of fact, I have a novel to write. In fact, I was doing just fine until you lot came along with—with your fucking horrible special effects and sick jokes and, and… Just what’s going on?’

  Reginald sighed, turning his eyes away from Donny. “If you let my friend join us, I can explain, okay?”

  Donny’s skin was on fire. He tutted and shook his head, throwing the blanket from over his body and leaning forward. “Whatever. Do whatever you’ve got to do.” There was no time for messing around. He just needed to let this madman do his rambling and then get back to reality. Get back to Sara and the novel—that was it. Sara and the novel.

  Reginald stood up and walked over to the door from which he had entered. He raised his finger as if to say ‘just a moment’ and disappeared through it. Donny heard his footsteps patting down the hallway, then whispering, and then the door opened again.

  Reginald held the door open and nodded at Donny. “Donny, I’d like you to meet my good friend Alice and her friend Yelp.”

  A woman walked through the door. She was around Reginald’s age, her hair grey like a badger’s. She smiled at Reginald and nodded her head.

  But it wasn’t the woman who captured Donny’s attention.

  In front of her, there was an Alsatian dog. The woman was holding its top legs in her hands and gently pushing it forward as it walked on its two back legs. She edged it into the room with a synchrony and coordination that suggested she moved it around in this absurd manner quite regularly. The dog’s tongue dangled out, saliva dribbling onto the woman’s pale green cardigan.

  “Come on, you,” she said, as she nudged the dog further
into the lounge. “Come on and show this gentleman your manners.”

  Donny watched the woman move the dog over to the sofa he was sat on. She’s not expecting me to… He shifted his legs out of the way as the woman lifted the dog onto the chair and positioned it perfectly upright like a human. Donny shifted himself further away from it as it looked around the room inquisitively, not paying much attention to him.

  “He’s growing up, isn’t he?” Reginald said from the other side of the room.

  “It’ll be three years since he stumbled along in a few weeks. Where does the time go?” She sat down on her knees in front of the fireplace as Reginald returned to his seat. Donny looked at the three of them in puzzlement. What the fuck?

  “Anyway, my apologies for being so rude; I’m Alice, and this here is Yelp.” She extended a warm smile in Donny’s direction.

  Donny turned to the dog, which remained perfectly upright, then looked over at Reginald and Alice.

  “Bloody ‘ell, you’re acting like you’ve never seen one before,” Alice said.

  Donny scratched his neck. “Yeah, I… I just don’t think I’ve ever seen one treated like this before.”

  Alice and Reginald both laughed. “Oh, well, we’re all learning, aren’t we?”

  “Look,” Donny said, firmly enough to snap them out of their jovial stupor. “I don’t mean to be rude but I just want to know what the hell’s going on here? One minute I’m… I’m in a house writing a book, running away from all sorts of crazy stuff, the next I’m sat on a sofa next to a—a fucking humanoid dog.”

  Reginald and Alice both looked at each other. Yelp turned to Donny, as if he’d noticed him for the first time, and started panting.

  “He really is from the other side, isn’t he?” Alice said.

  Reginald nodded. “Just as stubborn as the rest of ‘em.”

  “Well, Donny—I understand you’re obviously a bit confused right now, but I’m afraid your evening’s about to get a little more confusing.”

  Donny rolled his eyes. “Just tell me what’s going on. I’m absolutely sick of hearing the same old warning after war—”