SATe [✔]

[1] abditory

My grandma always loathed me making too much noise.

The slightest creak on the floorboards would have her yelling up from the kitchen, the room in the furthest possible corner in her adequately sized house, up to the attic that I spent many of my visiting days, "Bastian you're too loud, you're hurting my ears." She always said it on the airy side, but I could tell she wasn't entirely joking.

I'd spent most of my summers in that house, and I'd learned that dropping even a small toy car would get me a yelp of disapproval. And even when I thought I was safe because she was outside doing the weeding, she'd still manage to find a way to complain about the noise, "Bastian, we don't slam the doors. I can hear it from outside!" or "Bastian, I can hear your feet stomping from all the way out here, what are you, an elephant?"

That's all that comes to mind when I hear the high-pitched screech ring through the hallways. It's a noise that goes straight through to the core of my body. Every time I'd been yelled at, I thought I could feel my heart in my stomach, pounding away and making it hard to swallow, but nothing compares to this moment, right now. I could barely breathe; everything was clenched so tightly, ready to give out at the slightest of movements.

All I know is that I must get out. I didn't have a breath of time to consider any other possibilities, I need to get out of the house now, or I'll be screaming too. I can't ignore the pleas of my mother. I can't do that. Not now.

It was silent when I reached the landing; the screaming had stopped. I found myself hesitating; maybe Dad had stopped it? I turned slowly to look up the stairs; everything was calm. The hallway was completely still; the only anomaly was the skewed picture frame on the wall that hung above a long scratch mark in the wallpaper. A fresh scratch mark that left long strips of the blue paper on the navy runner than ran over the staircase. It ran from the bottom step all the way to the top, clawing away at the plaster beneath and littering the wooden steps with dust; the brand new ballerina shoes my mother had bought this morning completely covered in the white speckles. She'll be so upset.

The low, erupting growl resonating from the top floor made my breath hitch and my feet start to run again. I opted for the backdoor through the kitchen. The latch on that door had never given me trouble before; I could run up to it and be out of the house in three seconds. But now my hands were shaking and covered in sweat. It took all my might to stumble towards it, avoiding the corner of the table that had given me a sizeable bruise earlier in the day that only made my mother fret over me.

I could hear it on the stairs. Slower than I thought it would go; like it was toying with me. It had run so fast before, a barrage of movement that came towards us without hesitation. Why was it doing this to me now?

The latch had only cooperated long enough for me to open the door before I found myself running into the gut of a woman. A woman that was double my size. A woman that looked down on me half-coldly, rubbing her face into the denim collar of her jacket. She didn't falter for a moment, shaking her arm for a second before glaring down at me. A second long enough for me to notice the black mass she had gripped in her hand. A second long enough for me to fear for my life.