Time of Death: 6:52pm | Short Story Monday 3

I looked down at my open palm, the wristwatch sat in it. I felt the cold of the silver as I brushed my thumb around the rim of the watch face. The white and silver of the hands popped in comparison to the round black dial below them. The time had stopped at 6 hours and 52 minutes. It had stopped the very second he had passed. The doctors had called his passing 6:52pm. My grandad had been rushed to hospital, a speedy ambulance ride after he had dropped to the ground clasping at his stomach. I had never heard him scream the way he had. My grandad usually didn’t show much emotion, very hard faced man, usually sarcastic in his humour, rarely spoke more than a few lines in any given conversation. We had gathered around the dinning table as a family having an afternoon tea with biscuits when he screeched, threw both his hands across his belly, rolled off the chair and on to the cold kitchen floor. He did not move. Face turning pale. His eyes wide. My dad ran to the house phone that hung on the kitchen wall and immediately called the emergency services. Twelve minutes later the ambulance had arrived and the paramedics ran in to pull grandad on to a stretcher.

Now, we stood huddled together in a waiting room. The smell of bleach and chemicals heavy in the air. The doctor before us held an apologetic gaze; sad eyes, a half smile.

“I’m really sorry,” he had said.

I tightened my hand around the watch as he turned and walked away. The tears began to pour.

It was now a day later and I lay on my bed starring at the ceiling. I felt numb. Eyes dry, red and sore. I felt dehydrated but didn’t want to move. I had been laying in the same position since we arrived home last night at around 11pm. I didn’t know what time it was but I had seen the sun come and go from outside my window. My room was dark, but not entirely black, the street lights outside spread it’s aura into edges of my room. I could faintly see the furniture around the bedchamber, everything lacked detail, mostly just shadows of things. I reached my left hand over my body and gripped the watch that now sat wrapped around my right wrist. One more tear managed to slip out and roll down the side of my face, on to my pillow.

The street outside was quiet, it was in the depths of winter, most people avoided being out at this hour. The most I had heard this evening was a couple talking as they walked their dog down the road and back again. They complained about the cold that pierced and froze their faces, whilst the dog barked for them to stay out just a little longer as he attempted to roll around in the snow.

“It’s too cold Roger, we have to go back in now.” The man had said.

“The snow’s starting to grip to his fur. Poor boy’s going to have to get in the tub when we get in,” The lady had said.

Their voices slowly fading as they walked further and further away, and then nothing. That’s when I flinched as something fell rapidly off my desk. I immediately reached to my bedside and turned on the lamp that sat on it. One of my school workbooks was laying on the floor. The cover was facing down, the book open to a random page. Bold, navy blue words jumped out at me “Algebra. Exercise 24”. My grandad had been helping me study those pages last week. The wooden chair sat beneath my desk began to lazily drag itself out from its original position. It screeched on the floor as it moved. My muscles locked, my eyes widened, my hands shock. There was creaking coming from the other side of my room, I slowly turned my head towards the sound I watched as my bedroom door now stood wide open. It had been ajar when I last looked. I starred out into the hallway, I could barely see anything. The only thing I did see was a hint of light coming up from the stairs as the front door of the house was parked right in front of them downstairs. I focused my eyes in that direction, I thought I had noticed something. Something that should not have been there. At the top of the stairs, on the floor, a shadow… a shadow in the shape of a foot. I followed the shadow upwards and noticed a dark figment of a hand next to a shadowy hip. I continued to follow the shape upwards with my eyes, but before I could finish the large dark shape plunged down the stairs and disappeared. Grandad? I thought to myself.

I waited a few minutes for my body to relax, so that I could finally move, before making my way downstairs. There was a tapping sound coming from the living room. I tip toed down the hall, down the staircase, and through the entrance of the house towards the living room. As I approached the open arch of the living room the tapping stopped abruptly. Something pressed down harshly on one of the piano keys. We had a plain old piano in one of the corners of the large living room, it used to be my grandads. And now, it played. It was playing Take Five by Dave Brubeck. One of grandads favourite songs to play. My parents came rushing down the stairs then. My feet froze in place, they refused to budge. The stood behind me as we listening to the piano blast the famous Jazz piece. Exactly the way he used to play it. My dad reached out his hand and hit the living room light switch. The piano ceased and in unison all the sheet music that laid on top of the back of the piano flew out and littered the living room floor chaotically. My mum screamed.

“Who’s there?” my dad yelled out.

Only then did I notice that he was holding a rounders bat in his hands. There came no response to his question. The TV turns on. Nothing but static, and thunder breaks outside. It begins to pour down rain, banging and splashing on the windows. It would have been a rather calming sound if the piano hadn’t been playing by itself just now. My dad went to go turn off the TV but the power went out then and we were thrown into darkness. Even the street lights outside had gone out too.

“Hang on,” my dad said.

I heard him open the drawer under the TV and fiddle around in search of the torch that we often left in there for potential emergencies. There was a torch in at least one drawer of each of the rooms in the house. Power outages were unfortunately a common occurrence in our area this time of year. We were prepared, and usually acquainted to the event. But right now seemed like an awful time for such an event. My dad flashed around the torch, searching the room for something. Anything. But there was just the three of us. We heard a massive CRASH, BOOM, BANG come suddenly from the kitchen. We left the living room and ran across to the kitchen to find all the drawers and cupboard doors open. A variety of pots, pans, plates, cups, cutlery and dry foods thrown about. It looked like a tornado had rampaged through the kitchen. My eyes happen to fall on the light coming from the oven. The digital clock above the door. It was 6:52pm!

Something giggled from our left. We turned to face towards it. On top of the kitchen table. Crouched down on top of it. Was a large, dark shadow. It was definitely not grandad. The wristwatch flung harshly off my arm and flew across the room and through the shadowy figure. Smashing right into the wall. Glass smashed and flew everywhere. The black mass of shadow slowly dissipated.