St. Robert’s very own Creative Writing Club recently hosted a contest. Here’s the first place winner, H. L.’s entry!
Every day, I go to the basement, down the creaking stairs and across the hallways filled
with dripping ooze and old papers, and I feed the Void.
I hit the bottom of the steps, looking down the long, dark, hallway to the basement door. I see the piles and piles of paper, endlessly spewing from the machines which line the basement walls, all printing the same sheet of paper over and over again in red ink – “ Is this enough time?”
I reach the basement door, seeing the scratch marks on the walls and the black ooze dripping from the ceiling, staining the papers. It’s almost silence, no ringing from the machines or the plink plank of the ooze as it drops. All I hear is the sound of my footsteps, and the wriggling of the worms. I walk to the door, and place the key into the knob before turning the lock, hearing it click into place and then looking in and seeing the empty darkness.
It’s like a portal to another world, with the door so small but the room so large and filled
with nothingness. It’s a black void with no end or beginning, an empty gap in reality which no one dared to fill in.
I can feel the beast’s presence, almost sense it, an uneasiness where you know that
something’s there but you can’t see it. My hands, knuckles white and palms sweaty, clutch the bucket of worms, still wriggling and squirming inside.
It places a hand around my neck, squeezing so hard that I begin to choke, gasping for air
as my vision begins to blur and my eyes bulge. I throw the bucket onto the ground.
“Is this,” I gasp, struggling to breathe, “enough time?”
It’s only a few moments, but it seems like hours, and finally, it releases its grip on my
neck before dropping me to the ground. Its hand snakes behind the door, slithering back into the abyss before slamming the door shut.
Sighing, I pick myself up, and then walk back up the creaking stairs, the rotting wood and
the hum of the machines still ringing through my ears. I go to my room, looking out the window, but it’s only darkness outside, and it’s only ever been darkness. When is it day, and when is it night?
Every day, I go to the basement, down the creaking stairs and across the hallways filled
with dripping ooze and old papers, and I feed the Void.
Every day is the same as the last, a cold, dark winter morning, where I walk downstair and feed the Void.
It’s been so long, I don’t know anything, except that I need to feed the void.
Why am I here, and when do I get out?
Is this enough time? Can I get out now?
Because something has to change. What if I stop going to the basement, stop what I’ve
done for my entire life?
Something must change.
So I walk downstairs, down the creaking stairs and across the hallways filled with
dripping ooze and old papers, walk across the long, dark hallway to the basement door, and open it.
But this time, instead of waiting, I run inside. I keep running, hoping something new
happens, hoping that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. I hear the Void as it runs towards me, shaking the entire house as it travels. It takes a swing, crippling me, and I crawl, hoping that there’s an exit. But my vision begins to blur, and I black out.
I wake up, and I’m back in my room. But this time, there are no machines, there is no
black ooze, there is no basement. And when I look out the window, I see the sky, and the trees swaying in the wind.
Every day, I wake up, brush my teeth, wash my face, and go to school. I come back, do
my homework, and then go to sleep.
Every day is the same as the last, and I wonder: when do I get out?
But now I know the answer.
I get out now.