The Staircase

122 5 6
                                    

Darla was up on the third floor when she glanced at one of the hotel rooms. The previously locked door was now wide open, and she saw the silhouette of a man standing beside the open window. The curtains behind him blew softly from the wind, and the room was nearly pitch black.

Knowing the figure was too small to be Charlie, she naturally assumed that it was Anthony. She waved her hand to get his attention and asked what he was doing.

The shadow stayed completely still. Darla couldn't even see him breathe. She asked again, "hey, Anthony, what are you doing? Please come out."

Then, the figure moved. He took a step back and fell out of the window. Darla screamed and raced into the room and heard the petrified screams of the shadow falling down to the cement terrace below. She stuck her head out the window with tears streaming down her face. She already lost one child, and couldn't live to lose another.

Her breathing slowed when she didn't see anything on the terrace below. Not even the stain from the first time that happened. The bedroom door slammed shut which brought Darla back into the room, and she raced to the door and yanked on the golden door knob. She couldn't tell if it was sticky or stuck, but she was frantic to get out of there.

She whipped the door open so fast, the knob busted into the thin drywall. She ran out into the hall, and when she turned a corner she was met with a woman.

This woman had dark, messy hair and clutched a knife in her tight fist. She wore a beige turtle neck under a green and plaid checkered shirt, with brown overalls and a purple robe over it. Her eyes were wide and dark with dark circles around them, with hollowed out cheeks. Darla's eyes darted from the knife to the frightened look on the woman's face, and she somehow felt safe with her. But they were both terrified.

Wendy Torrance gasped and looked straight through Darla, with fear trickling down her neck and back

Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.

Wendy Torrance gasped and looked straight through Darla, with fear trickling down her neck and back. She warned her in her quivering voice, "he's coming."

Darla's eyebrows knitted together in confusion and she wasn't sure what that meant. Who was coming? Who is this woman? She turned her head when she thought she heard someone coming up the stairs. She turned back to Wendy, and she was gone.

"Darla!" Charlie's deep voice called out, chilling her to the bone.

Darla spun around in the direction of her husbands voice, and she noticed a cracked baseball bat leaning up against the wall. They had been living at the hotel for weeks, and she had never noticed it but there was a voice in her head urging her to take the bat. She grabbed it, and slowly began making her way to the stairs.

She got to the bottom of the staircase and she gripped the bat in her hands. She was breathing heavy, and she looked around to try to find Charlie. He lurked out of the shadows, and she clutched the bat to her chest when she looked into his eyes and didn't see her loving husband.

"I've been trying to find you all day," he said with a low hiss in his voice.

He slowly walked up to Darla, but she slowly backed away from him. "Charlie, I think it's time for us to go."

The ShiningWhere stories live. Discover now