Eye-kea

Emily’s house was shrouded by an eternal shadow. Early in the morning, when the sun peeked its golden rays over the horizon, it was there, a looming figure that blocked the light from gracing her large bedroom window. All the way through to when the sun slowly blinked into darkness on the other side of the house, it stood tall behind it, daring the sun to touch the house, to warm the carpet, but it never did.

It was the Ikea across the street.

Emily didn’t mind it. The sun’s rays were so feeble in winder they hardly warmed her skin and in summer too scorching that blisters rippled across her face, soon to be replaced by dark brown freckles, like cinnamon dusting the tops of a white-frosted cake. Plus, her and Saskia often passed by the Ikea, with the smell of hot sausages roasting on a barbeque out front, slathered in sauce and onions and shoved inside a slice of white bread, which they often devoured.

They hung out there, too. After an exhausting day at school the two girls did not want to return to their own rooms, so instead they picked one of the myriad of display rooms that were perfectly neat with a large, soft bed that looked untouched by anyone before them, unlived in. Which it was. They were fake rooms where they made fake personalities and lived fake lives. A brief escape from stress, from hardship, from all the troubles that followed them home. It was something about the rooms being temporary –gone as soon as they left, never theirs to own, never theirs to maintain.

‘We should stay the night there, one time,’ Saskia suggested once, a mischievous grin playing on her lips. ‘I bet we could. We’d just hide from the employees.’

‘Uh huh,’ Emily scoffed. ‘And what are we going to do for dinner? What about the bathroom? Where are we going to sleep?’ She grilled.

Saskia stared at Emily with a face slack in mock-disbelief. ‘Bring our own, there’s a bathroom there, and there’s beds there.’ She said smugly. ‘Any more questions?’

Emily rolled her eyes. ‘There’s employees there, remember? What if we get caught?’

‘We won’t.’

‘How do you know?’

‘We’ll hide,’ Saskia informed her. ‘Under the beds. Until they lock the place. Then we’ll have it all to ourselves.’

Emily couldn’t tell if she was joking or not. She chuckled half-heartedly, but Saskia stared at her, coldly.

‘What?’ Emily’s grin faded. ‘You’re not serious, are you?’ Saskia shrugged, pursing her lips in the way she always did when she was about to get what she wanted. ‘Sas, they have cameras. We’ll get in trouble.’

‘Ugh, will you stop worrying! It’s all figured out.’ Saskia laughed. ‘Okay, fine, I’ll clue you in. The cameras aren’t working at the moment. Something happened, I don’t know what, but they’re all getting replaced. So they’re out of order for a while.’

Emily felt her muscles slacken. She’d ran out of excuses to reject her friend’s idea.

‘What about our parents?’ She asked. ‘Won’t they want to know where we are?’

‘Easy!’ Saskia said cheerily. ‘I’ll tell my mum I’m at yours, you’ll tell your mum you’re at mine. They’ll never know.’ She continued at Emily’s hesitance. ‘Come on, it’s just a bit of fun. Nothing’s going to actually happen. Don’t be such a party pooper.’

‘I mean, I guess that could work,’ Emily verbalised quietly.

‘Great!’ Saskia squealed. ‘I’ll meet you outside of Ikea at seven-thirty. Bring snacks. We can have a feast.’

‘What! No, Sas, I didn’t agree to this.’ Emily lowered her voice. ‘Haven’t you heard all those stories about people going missing in Ikea?’

Saskia’s eyes darkened, her mouth a tight line over her teeth. ‘Yeah,’ she replied softly. ‘Of course. They probably got eaten by vampires. No, werewolves!’ Emily’s heart sunk as Saskia transitioned from foreboding to laughing in an instant.

‘No, I’m serious!’

‘No, you’re seriously a cry-baby. Come on, I’ll meet you there at seven-thirty.’ Saskia laughed again, but Emily remained frozen.

The Ikea looked scarier at night. The tall, blue walls looked almost black under the moonlight, like the ocean in the twilight zone. Its yellow letters illuminated above Emily as she waited, shivering, her pockets stuffed with whatever sweet food she could find at home.

‘Em!’ Saskia called, waving extatically. A small backpack was slung over her shoulder. ‘What, you didn’t bring anything?’ She asked, her nose wrinkling in disgust. ‘You know what? It’s fine. Let’s go.’

A worker greeted them at the mouth of the store.

‘We close in half an hour, please don’t spend too long in here,’ she said, with a sort of snobbish infliction that gave Emily the impression she didn’t really care what they did.

‘Yep. We’ll be in and out.’ Saskia promised, earnest despite the lie.

The worker nodded and smiled as they entered.

‘Now what?’ Emily asked. The store was almost empty; a vast, barren land of furniture and rooms, like a hundred houses merged together.

‘Now,’ Saskia said excitedly. ‘We hide. Find a good spot. Meet me when the store closes. Okay?’

Emily sighed, ‘okay.’

Emily’s knees ached. Her neck was bent so it hung directly over her legs, which were criss-crossed in front of her, tucked as close to her torso as she could make it. Still, they pressed against the metal hinges of the wooden cabinet she’d stuffed herself into, after awkwardly pretending to gawk at its interior.

Warnings encouraging the last few shoppers to leave frequented the loudspeakers. The beeping of the automated checkout grew fewer and further apart. Workers traversing the hallways with heeled shoes that clicked against the slick, linoleum floors passed her cabinet many times but never discovered her. Emily’s stomach knotted with unease, but she squeezed her eyes shut until the footsteps faded to nil and the lights outside the cabinet blinked shut.

Carefully, Emily unfolded herself from the cabinet. She didn’t know how long she’d been in there, but her muscles felt stiff and her joints clicked as if she was a doll having its arms yanked off by a slobbering baby.

The Ikea was quiet. Deathly quiet. The sort of quiet that was unnatural and made a strange sense of dread gnaw at her gut.

‘Saskia?’ Emily hissed. No response. ‘Saskia?’ she repeated, a little louder this time.

Clicking footsteps. Lazy, unsteady. Emily’s heart leapt into her throat.

‘Sas?’ She called hesitantly.

Just then, Emily’s phone buzzed in her pocket. She dug it out, wiped the perspiration off the screen with the back of her sleeve, and read the message.

Enjoy your night in the Ikea!

Emily’s stomach dropped. It was Saskia. She’d left the Ikea. She’d left Emily to fend for herself, alone, for a night in the Ikea. Something that was her idea to begin with. Something Emily never even wanted a part of, but had been pressured into doing. Rage filled the hole in her stomach, but instantly evaporated when the footsteps returned.

‘Hello?’ Emily called. Her voice sounded feeble, even to her, as if it could vanish at any second.

No response. A lump began to form in Emily’s throat. Quietly, she folded herself back up and crawled back into the cabinet, leaving the door open a crack just as the footsteps passed her by.

‘The store is now closed. Please exit the building,’ A worker murmured as he stumbled past. Emily breathed a sigh of relief, but only half of the air left her lungs. It wasn’t a murderer. It was a worker. But it meant she had to stay hidden if she was going to stay out of trouble.

‘The store is now closed. Please exit the building.’ The voice repeated. Emily glanced through the crack again. A different worker, a man this time, staggered past her cabinet. As he drew nearer, Emily caught a glimpse of his face.

He didn’t have eyes. The worker stumbling through the store like a zombie didn’t have eyes. It was like his eyes had been gouged out and skin had grown over it, hastily patching up the holes, a child’s arts and crafts project.

Emily gasped. She clapped a hand over her mouth as the worker froze, as if sensing her presence.

‘The store is now closed. Please exit the building.’ He repeated, louder, hesitating as if scanning the area. Emily’s heart drummed against her ribcage. For a tense moment, she squeezed her eyes shut, praying that the worker left.

The footsteps soon faded away. Emily shuddered, the hairs on her arms bristling.

‘Hey. Psst. You trapped here, too?’ Emily’s heart backflipped in her chest. A hissing voice barely a metre away from her. A man dressed in uniform, but his pale blue eyes met hers through the dark as he peered through the crack of the cabinet.

Emily nodded hurriedly. Comfort momentarily smoothed her jumping nerves, like a weighted blanket –she wasn’t alone.

The man nodded grimly. ‘First time?’ He asked.

Emily nodded again, positive there wouldn’t be a second.

The man’s ears pricked up, and his head swivelled around.

‘Come on,’ he hissed. ‘We can’t stay here. They check this area later. I know a better place.’ A gush of cool wind made the hairs on Emily’s arms bristle as the man whipped the cabinet door open –and a vulnerability that made her keep her knees firmly tucked under her chin.

‘“They”?’ Emily squeaked. ‘Who are “they”?’

The man glanced behind him, sighing a stream of cold air. ‘The people. The staff. The ones you’ve probably seen wandering around. The ones without eyes.’ He sighed again. ‘Look, we’ve got to go. We’re exposed here. Come on. I’ll explain it later.’ Her grabbed Emily’s hand and wrenched it out of the cabinet. Scanning the area like a pedestrian before crossing a busy road, the man dragged her across the dark aisles, avoiding the mumbling eye-less staff, occasionally pressing a finger to his lips at her.

‘They can’t see us,’ he mouthed. ‘But they can hear us. They can smell us. And they can feel our souls within the store. They know we’re here.’

The man dragged Emily to the back of the store, where boxes were stacked on looming metal shelves in rows that seemed to extend forever, the ends on either side shrouded in darkness.

‘In the middle,’ the man hissed. ‘The shelves are four or five boxes deep. The staff rarely come back here. If they do, they won’t be able to find us. These boxes distract them too much.’

Emily gingerly ducked her head and squeezed through the boxes, burrowing her way through until brown cardboard had walled her in. The next shelf was barely high enough to for her to fit, even with her neck craned down like a screen-addicted teenager. The man wedged himself in beside her, shuffling down until he was on his back with his legs pressed against some of the boxes.

‘If they come, be quiet,’ the man said. ‘Don’t move. Don’t think. Don’t even breathe. Any sign of life, they know it.’

‘Who are they?’ Emily whispered huskily.

‘They’re the staff,’ the man replied. His eyes suddenly seemed watery, vacant. ‘They’re just like you and me. Except they never made it out.’

Emily shuddered. ‘What do you mean?’

‘They’re the ones who didn’t survive the night. They were trapped, and their souls were consumed by the store through their eyes. Now they’re just zombies, mindless, patrolling the store at night, trying to take anyone who gets stuck after closing time.’ He sniffed. ‘My, uh, friend is here, too. Coworker. From the first time I got stuck here overnight.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘That’s okay. It’s not your fault. Just try to relax; we’re going to be here a while. The boxes confuse them. We’re safe.

There was a pause.

‘Thank you,’ she said, ‘for helping me. You saved me from them. And I don’t even know your name.’

The man paused thoughtfully. ‘Rhett,’ he said. ‘And no problem. I told myself I’d never fall asleep past closing again, but I’m glad I did. I found you. Why are you here? Was it a dare?’

‘How did you know?’

A brief, dying smile flickered across Rhett’s lips. ‘Most of the staff are young. It’s horrible to see. Young, rebellious, full of life, daring. Trying to stay here overnight. Worst decision any of them ever made.’

‘Yeah, I’m starting to see that now. It was a dare. My friend –Saskia –and I were going to stay here overnight, but she ditched me. I get the feeling she won’t believe me when I tell her what happened.’

Rhett finally laughed. ‘Yeah, most likely. No one ever does –only the ones who have survived it, and posted what happened on some dredged-up reddit thread.’

Emily opened her mouth, but the words came from somewhere else.

‘The store is now closed. Please exit the building.’

Stumbling footsteps. Emily could see the grimy leg of the Ikea uniform pants stagger past through the boxes.

It was going to be a long night.