The Empty Ones

Chapter Four- Goodbye

Something shot out and gripped Harriat's hand so hard he thought it might bleed. Beside him, Nia stiffened.

"Mummy." It was her. Soft and light, like the skin of milk over a cup of coffee, and so undeniably her. He shadow skittered through the gap beneath the door, expanded across the floorboards like a monster coming to eat them.

Nia stood, and Harriat grabbed her arm, pulled her down. She struggled silently, but with the force of a mad woman, beating at his chest, tangling her hand in his hair, snapping her teeth at him.

"It's cold out here," Billy whispered.

Nia fell still beside Harriat, but he could still feel the heaving of her chest against his.

"I heard noises. I'm scared, mummy. Why are you made at me?" Her voice was shaking, so full with a pain and fear no child should ever have, Harriat almost ran to the door himself. But he didn't. There was no little girl behind that door. There was just a nothing, a nothing wearing a rotting flesh suit that looked and sounded and acted like Billy. Like poor, dead Billy.

"I'm sorry," she hiccupped, and Nia screamed into his chest. "I'll never do anything bad again, I'm sorry."

Nia struggled again, and he held her down.

"Please don't leave me," nothing-Billy whispered. "Please."

He held Nia tighter, cold howling with laughter as it sank its jaws into every inch of his body, and suddenly the door was shaking, wood groaning, tiny fists banging against it. "Mummy! Mummy! Mummy! Mummy!" Billy screamed, the scream of a feral child.

Nia's whole body shook, and for a second her though she was having a stroke. He clasped his hands over his ears. And the screams got louder and louder, creeping through the cracks in his fingers, and just when he thought he was going to cry or scream or explode-

She stopped.

The monster-shadow faded away into nothing, and he could hear the smallest pitter-patter if footsteps getting quieter and quieter.

The breath rushed out of his body in one short, sharp gasp. The cold ebbed away. He let go of Nia, and something crashed against the side of his face. The world spun for a moment, and Nia stared at him, something dark burning beneath those dead eyes. For a second, the smallest of seconds, he thought -was almost sure- she was going to kill him. Then she looked past him. Out to the door. Hugged her knees under her chin and stared. His cheek burned where she'd slapped him. He stood, and the tingling snapped its jaws, threatened to devour him whole, and sent him crashing to the ground. He stumbled into Billy's room, and the dolls smiled at him in greeting. Wrapping himself in the pink sheets and smell of cherries, he sobbed, and when the sobs stung his throat and sleep crept up on him- like an old, forgotten friend- he drifted to the little wooden table, dolls smiling their plastic, rosy-cheeked smiles around him. And Billy was there. She put Edgar on the table and he sagged, his little head sinking into his stomach.

"Would you like some tea, Edgar?" she asked, and poured him a glass of ash. She looked up at Harriat, muddy eyes bright. "Would you like some, Hugh?"

He looked at the door.

"Don't leave, Hugh," she said, pouring ash into his cup. It filled to the brim and fell over the side, sending flakes raining down that disintegrated the moment they touched the ground. "Please don't leave me. Please."

Nia didn't eat. About eleven o'clock, the power went out. There was a sharp 'snap!' and Harriat knew what had happened even before he turned the stove on. They still had vegetables. And some bread. And a couple of tinned fruit and beans. He'd spent most of the day in Billy's room, and when he'd gone into the lounge, he'd made every effort not to look at her. He could see those knees hugged up to her chin anymore, that stare. Sitting on Billy's bed, he picked up one of the dolls- the blonde one- ran a finger over its smooth, icy cheeks. It stared up at him blankly. He ran the brush from the counter through its hair once, twice, three times, then put it back on the chair. Something shifted in the corner of his eye. He looked up.