Them

                I entered the numbers slowly, glancing from the road to my phone and back, 9-1-1. My thumb hovered hesitantly over the green button on the screen. “She told me not to call” I said out loud to myself before clicking the lock button and slipping my phone back into my pocket. I pressed the accelerator down further as I felt the car downshift and speed faster down the freeway. Only two exits away. It was late, so there wasn’t any traffic. I kept an eye out for police; I wouldn’t be hard to spot at this speed on an empty four lane road.

I trust my wife, we’ve been together for 10 years, and we’ve been through a lot together. Still, I couldn’t shake the feeling from the pit of my stomach that I was making a mistake by not calling the cops. What did she expect me to do? If she was in trouble, the police station is 5 minutes away. It would take me at least half an hour to get home. I turned my blinker on instinctively pulling over onto the exit ramp as if the police would forgive my violation of the various other traffic laws I’d broken on my way home by following this one.

                All the house lights were on. As I pulled into the driveway, I felt something. Not a sound or a vibration in the traditional sense of the word but just… something. I slid my key into the back door lock and twisted the handle. The deadbolt was locked. She never locks the deadbolt. I unlocked it and leaned into the door. It swung open slightly, and the chain lock snapped tight. I backed up a step and lunged forward into the door with my shoulder, breaking the lock free from the doorjamb.

                I scanned the kitchen frantically for any sign of Melissa, not finding her. “Honey!” I shouted into the interior of the house. “Where are you?” I walked down the hall to the living room and up the stairs. She was sitting in front of the linen closet door in pajamas with her knees pulled tightly into her chest.

                “Honey”, I said softly as I walked slowly towards her, checking the lit bedrooms to my right and left with peripheral vision. “What’s going on?” Her wide eyes darted right and left quickly but her breathing was strangely calm and controlled.  I knelt down beside her and placed my hand on her shoulder “it’s OK, just tell me what happened.”

                “It was a light… or a shadow… I’m not sure. It covered the bedroom and they came out of it.” In my ten years of marriage to Melissa, I’d never seen her like this. She was never one to give in to irrational panic. “Honey, I don’t understand. Who are ‘they’? Are they in the house?” “No” she said, visibly relieved as she said the words, but only slightly. “They left. I don’t remember waking up. I couldn’t move. The wind stopped. They were cold. They took my clothes. It was so cold.” I grabbed the fabric on her shoulder between my thumb and forefinger, “Honey, you’re wearing your pajamas. Are you sure you didn’t have a dream?”

                “Yes, it was a dream. They made me see it. I didn’t want to see it but they made me.” Her eyes stopped moving and focused on me. She calmly stood up and turned towards the master bedroom. She walked to the window next to our bed and looked out towards the back yard. “I saw it but I didn’t want to. They made me see it. I didn’t want to see it.”

                I stood up and began to follow her. “Honey, Melissa, please. You’re scaring me. What did you see? Who are they?” I felt the same feeling I felt when I pulled in to the driveway. It was as if I was being overcome by some gravity. The lights in the house dimmed. Melissa turned calmly towards me, locking her gaze to mine. “I don’t know but they’re back. They want you to see too.” I felt a weight on the floorboards behind me as I heard them creak. Their breath was cold.