The Dark Place (#FrightFest2016 Gold Winner)

The Dark Place - Chapter Three

Chapter Three

1

Tamicka had hardly touched her evening meal. Mrs. Hughes had gone to a lot of trouble to make the shepherds pie and it was lovely but Tamicka couldn't manage to rouse her appetite. Absent-mindedly, she played with her food, separating sweet corn, garden peas and pieces of diced carrot from the cheese and potato topped mince with her fork.

"Come now little one. Surely it can't be that bad."

Tamicka looked over at the old woman who was busy chewing the last mouthful from her own plate.

"There's little wonder you're only skin and bone," Mrs. Hughes continued, rising slowly to her feet. "I can see I'm going to have to feed you up young lady, you hardly eat enough to make a sparrow happy."

"Sorry," Tamicka replied timidly. "I guess I'm just not very hungry."

"Are you sure you can't manage just a tiny bit more?"

The little girl forced her lips into a tight smile. She didn't want to hurt Mrs. Hughes' feelings but she really couldn't manage another morsel. Without saying a word, Tamicka got to her feet and started to clear the table.

"After my job again are you?" The housekeeper asked.

"No, I'm just helping," Tamicka said as she collected Mrs. Hughes' plate.

"But you don't have to, that's what I'm here for."

"I like to help." Tamicka's smile became effortless when she looked into the old woman's kind eyes.

Tamicka washed while Mrs. Hughes dried. Neither said a word to the other, content in each other's company. They both stood at the sink, half watching the storm outside the window until they had finished the washing-up.

"Oh dear, I knew I should have left earlier," Mrs. Hughes finally said when she dried her hands on a tea towel. "Looks like this weather's in for the night."

"Well, why don't you stay here tonight?" Tamicka asked, hoping that the old woman would say yes.

"Oh, I couldn't possibly do that little one; Mr. Hughes will wonder what happened to his tea."

"But how will you get back."

"I was hoping that your dad would drop me home," the old woman smiled.

"Please stay the night." Tamicka didn't try to mask the fear in her voice. She reached out and grabbed Mrs. Hughes' freshly dried hand with her two wet ones. There was a long pause while the woman looked deep into Tamicka's eyes with a look that the girl hadn't seen in quite some time. It was an expression of genuine concern.

"Look, if you want me to stay I will." She gave Tamicka an affectionate stroke on the cheek. "I just have to make sure that it's all right with your father. Mr. Hughes will just have to fix his own tea tonight." With this, the old woman left the kitchen.

Tamicka felt better already.

2

Tamicka wanted to sleep, but she couldn't. The only thing she could do was lay there in the huge four-poster bed and stare blindly into the blackness. It was so dark in the room that she blinked her eyes just to check whether they were still open. At Munford House, so far away from town, there wasn't even the comforting, yellow glow of a street lamp to break up the blackness outside her window.

She reached under her pillow, pulled out her tiny flashlight and cast its beam over the face of her bedside clock.

9:45 p.m.