Shoreview, Jordansberg: A Collection of Short Stories

Movie Night

I fell asleep in the theater. Or at least I think I did. The theater screen was so blue. I don't remember this bit. A movie was playing earlier. To my left came a shrieking laugh. So startling it was that I jumped out of my seat. The laugh stopped and the only sound was the echo my seat was making. The echo went on longer than it should have, the chair had long stopped moving. But the echo went on. I noticed a yellow glow appear over my left shoulder. A door to the side of the theater had opened and the color of gold was glowing in the doorway. I stepped out into the aisle still looking at the door. I debated with myself in the middle of the aisle about going any closer to it. A white glow came out of the gold light. It ran in slowly in front of the screen up the aisle to me. It was a naked woman. A ghost woman. She moved right through me. I turned around to still follow her with my eyes. But behind me was a girl with an open flannel shirt with a white tank top and torn light blue jeans. She had her hand out to me, looking me in the eyes.

"Let's go," she said.

And I followed. The blue screen disappears the more we go up the dark aisle. It becomes so dark that the only thing I make out is a cardboard box on its side, open to us. I follow her lead and we crawl into the box. And we crawl further down the box. We have been crawling for some time. But my eyes register that we are not crawling, but that we are wiggling on our sides, moving like worms.

I think I blacked out in the cardboard box. I had to have blacked out. The hallway I was in was lightened by a gold color. I had no idea where the gold was coming from. The girl was in a corner far down the hall sitting down all balled up with her head down.

"Hello?" I said as I approached.

She appeared to be farther away but it only took me seconds to get to her. She looked up and I met an abnormal face. Her chin was proportionally longated and went past her neck and was sharply pointed at the end. It looked like a weapon. I backed up in horror. One blink of my eyes and she vanished. The shrieking laugh came again. I was the only one in the hall. Something in the wall caught my attention. I didn't notice that the room's lighting was turning to a pink color. The gold lighting was changing. There was a painting on the wall. It looked familiar. All I know was that it was a famous painting of Salvador Dali's. I forget the name. But there were clocks melting in it. Something made me look down at my hands. They too were melting. The walls were now melting. The painting was melting. I turned into a puddle of myself on the floor, staring up at the ceiling. The girl in the flannel was on the ceiling. Her head was spinning slowly all around, even upside down. Then there was a loud sound, like a bell being struck. I was no longer a puddle but instead my 5'10" self. I was no longer in the hallway. The girl was nowhere to be seen. I was back in the theater. The screen was still blue. So blue. The echo of the chair sounded again. I looked up to the ceiling of the theater. Chairs came raining down on me. I ducked but none of them touched me. They started to pile up in the theater. Something told me to run to the door that was glowing in gold earlier where the girl came out of. The door looked solid and was closed now. I ran for it anyways. Pulling the door open I entered. It was the theater. Sixty people or so had to be sitting at the seats and watching the screen. It was the same theater. I saw myself watching the screen. I walked up to myself and stared at me. I was eating popcorn and staring at the screen. It was me on the screen. I was melting on the screen along with the painting of Dali's and the walls. This already happened. But was any of it real? I moved my hand in front of my other self and got no reaction from him. But surprising me, he slowly looked at me. He started to smile and then the shrieking laugh came from him. His chin started to get longer and pointier like the flannel girl's was. I backed away more and more. I tripped backwards and started to roll down the aisle. I seemed to go rolling on forever. Until I landed in a stank room. It was dark and hard to see much but I could tell that this was some sort of torture room. The walls looked a dark red and black. My first guess was blood. I heard a startling noise and then he came at me. Frantically, I crawled away from his chainsaw that he was swinging at me. He laughed wildly and seemed to really be enjoying himself. I think I was screaming, but I couldn't make out my own voice. He managed to miss me every time, I figured that this was luck. I got up and ran into the dark. I stopped when I heard my name.

"Rick?" There was a whisper.

I looked to the left where I heard the sound come from. It was Marie. My friend.

"Are you okay? You had a weird look on your face."

I looked all around. I was back in the theater with about sixty other people. I looked at the screen and it was just a regular scene. I'm awake. I look over at Marie.

"Was I asleep?"
"No." She shakes her head in confusion. "You were looking at the screen. You just had a weird look on your face, as if you were watching a different movie."