Through Glass: Episode Four by Rebecca Ethington Page A

believe in and my mind still
craved. Even though I knew it was only the illusion of safety, I
wanted it.
    Even though I knew better. Any safety
you could find was always shrouded in the fear of what could still
be on the other side of the door.
    In a way the scary stories had come
true.
    Travis walked past me and toward the
old door that hung awkwardly off its hinges, the ominous feeling
the house was giving me not seeming to affect him, even though his
shoulders seemed a little more tense than usual.
    I grit my teeth as I watched him move
away, trailing after him as I followed the light, subconsciously
keeping myself out of the shadows.
    The light cast over the bald dirt as
we walked across the yard, the wrought iron fence that was once a
grand decoration to the old house left twisted and strung through
the front yard as if someone had dragged it away in their attempt
to survive.
    My hand gripped tighter against the
bright green gun I held as I walked closer to the door, my heart
thumping the closer we moved to the maze that we hoped would
include some food and possible shelter for the night.
    I took one last glance back toward the
dark, destroyed world that surrounded us, and regretted it
immediately. The muscles in my back tensed and flexed as the same
grey shape I had seen before ran through the edge of the shadows
before disappearing into the night. My heart thudded wildly at
seeing it there. The pain of fear only growing as I followed Travis
into the house, needing to get away from what was haunting me while
knowing the dark world would grow closer once I moved beyond this
door.
    Travis was right. No one had ever
tried to survive in this home. Everything was covered with dust so
thick that I couldn’t define the floor from the large piles of
trash that had washed up against the walls like waves. Everything
here was grey, the grey only deepened by the bright light that
Travis held.
    The light shone over the peeling
wallpaper and fading paint of what had once been a very upscale
home. Plush furniture sat torn and ripped around a flat screen
television the size of a truck, the screen black as it reflected
our gaunt figures back at us, the bright red of my hair looking
alive before I defiantly looked away.
    I walked past it quickly, not wanting
to see the haunted look and emaciated body that would stare right
back at me. I tightened my grip on the gun as we moved deeper into
the dark, distraught belly of the house. Each step we took sent
billows of thick grey dust into the air, leaving us walking into a
dense cloud of dirt and who knew what else.
    I covered my face with the sleeve of
my leather jacket in an attempt to keep the dust out of my body as
well as to keep our presence silent. I didn’t know why, but
something about this house screamed danger, the ruins creeping up
my skin and screaming at me to be quiet, that this was a place
where I wouldn’t want to be found.
    As we passed the once elegant kitchen,
my eyes scanned the ground for food even though I already knew
there wouldn’t be anything there. The Tar had taken all the food
from the obvious places; it was the non-obvious places like
department stores that we could raid.
    It was probably a good thing we were
here for more than just food. We needed sleep, too.
    I only took one glance at the granite
counter top that had been seared down the middle before continuing
on, my footsteps muffled by dust as we began to proceed down the
stairs into the dark belly of the massive building.
    One step down the long tunnel and my
muscles tensed in erratic fear, my heart pounding as I looked past
the light Travis held and into the seemingly endless abyss we were
now to heading into. The claustrophobic cavern was hung with
cobwebs, the dust covered fingers stretching to the ground like the
ripped lace of an antique gown. They drooped and sagged as we moved
through them, our movements sending them from where they had
perched for the last eight years to drape over us, covering