Silence of the Full Moon

      Life is full of stressors. Monotonous jobs whose days make the worker feel as if trapped in a singular moment in time, bills that reach up to your neck, and, of course, the noise. When the noise can get so loud, and so invasive, it feels as if ants are crawling over the surface of your brain.

           That is what Sarah felt. She had moved to the big city just over three months ago with the promise of a new job. But lately, she felt that it was all becoming too much for her, and she decided to use her accrued days off and try out a silent retreat that had been advertised around town.

           She had looked into this place, and she thought it sounded exotic. This retreat was apparently an old mansion that was once occupied by a wealthy family up until the 90’s. Not long after the passing of the husband and wife who lived there, their son – named Dorian Crowley – inherited the massive house and, instead of living in it, had turned it into a silent retreat for anyone looking for such a luxury. Sarah couldn’t find much information on this latest owner of the mansion other than he seemed to live a reclusive life and had a mindset of what most would call a progressive – vegan diet, spiritual health, inner peace, and the works – at least that’s how she grasped it. Sarah wasn’t too big on that herself but didn’t fault anyone for that lifestyle. Besides, she was currently looking for that exact lifestyle for her getaway weekend, so maybe the owner of this retreat might be on to something.

           Sarah arrived at this rustic manor early in the morning on a Saturday, and she was struck breathless. The manor was Victorian style with what looked like several rooms, almost each with its own balcony for the tenant to step out and enjoy the fresh air – which was aplenty, as the building itself was surrounded by a thick and vibrant forest. Sarah couldn’t see the slightest sign of civilization peaking through these dense trees as they seemingly engulfed the property.

           There was an eerie quiet surrounding the place, but Sarah had to remind herself that this was to be expected as of the nature of this excursion. She realized that, though she’d grown to hate the constant noise and hustle of city life, she had also grown used to it, and would have to get over this irrational sense of unease in this place of silent tranquility and embrace it for what it was meant to be.

           She walked through the front door and she saw a wooden podium with a logbook resting on it. Behind the podium was a remarkably tall man – standing at least six foot seven – whose skin was so pale, that Sarah wondered if he had ever felt the rays of the sun. This doorman had a nametag on his red vest which read ‘Dorian’, and she thought about asking in a joking way if he had any relation to the Dorian Crowley who now owned this building, but after registering his stern expressionless face with the silencing gesture, she decided against it. She opened her mouth to greet him but before a sound escaped, this doorman raised a long and pointed finger to his lips. He kept an overall stoic expression as he did so, though his eyes grew big as they bore into her own. She stopped herself and nodded, and slowly closed the door behind her out of respect for the other guests at the retreat – though this produced the opposite effect that she had wanted, as it creaked loudly like an irate cat as it inched slowly towards the latch. She winced. Looking up at the doorman, however, his face didn’t move – not a single muscle – as the creaky door performed its symphony. He only looked at her in that expressionless, blank way with wide eyes, that finger stuck to his lips as if his boss had glued it there.

           Undeterred and remaining in character, Sarah tip-toed up to the man. “Uhm…” she mumbled, “Sarah Whitley, for Saturday at nine?”

           The doorman slowly lowered his finger. His finger moved so slackening down from his lips to the notebook before him that Sarah was starting to worry that she might expect a charge for checking in late, even though she had arrived half an hour earlier than scheduled. After Sarah felt like she had considerably aged, the doorman had written a checkmark in one of the blank boxes next to her name. He then raised his other hand (a little quicker this time, thank God) and made a gesture representing one corner of a box. Sarah raised an eyebrow at him, then gasped and mouthed right, at him. She produced her driver’s license from her wallet in her purse.

           The sluggish doorman peered at it and, in his own character, nodded very, very slowly in confirmation. He made a second checkmark on the sheet before him. He reached down into a compartment within the podium and produced a small piece of paper. Sarah took it, and saw it read, ‘Sarah Whitley, room #19. Third door on the right after climbing the stair.’

           Sarah certainly found this entire experience to be a bit odd and wondered if all silent retreats acted this way. Of course, she didn’t know, so she simply nodded at the doorman and mouthed thanks to this shallow doorman. She followed her small instructions as guided until she found her room in #19.

           The door thankfully closed silently behind her this time as she dropped her bag to the floor.  She decided to unpack that later, as she wanted simply just to plop on the bed in this decent-sized room and let out a long sigh, like in a movie – and she did just that.

           She let several moments pass by until she finally opened her eyes and observed her surroundings. She saw the room was mostly kept tidy and uninspired, but there had been various knick-knacks spread throughout the place that resembled the moon – some of them were half-moons, or waxed or waned moons, but the majority of them were full moons. She thought this was also a bit peculiar, but knew that the moon was symbolical for inner peace, and let thought nothing else of it.

           Most of that morning and afternoon was spent as the afternoon suggested – meditation, reading, and focusing on a hobby such as art. It truly was a relaxing day for Sarah as she found this to be exactly as unwinding as advertised. She stepped out on the balcony attached to her room and watched the sunset as it calmly rolled behind the horizon. Through all this time she did not utter a single word and heard nothing – from words to electronics to a simple sneeze – from any of her neighboring patrons here. It was in all ways she could imagine, a peaceful day.

           Later after watching the last flickers of light from the sunset, Sarah moved to the bathroom and relieved herself, washed her hands, and brushed her teeth. She laid her head down on the mass of pillows on her bed with a sigh loaded with tranquility. She lay there for a few minutes until she felt herself begin to drift off into sleep. But just before she drifted totally into a rem cycle, she heard her neighboring tenant snore loudly. That in itself wasn’t an issue, as it didn’t bother her, but what was unnerving was the animalistic howl that followed soon after.

           Sarah darted upright in her bed, looking out the window, wondering if she would spot the creature that made the noise. She now heard rustling in the room next to hers; someone just stood up and out of bed, and they accidentally knocked something over. At the sound of something that thumped on the floor in the neighboring room, the howl sounded again – only now Sarah could tell that the howl was inside the building.

           The sound of rushing, padded thumps raced up the stairs. A wolf broke into the building! Sarah thought frantically to herself. She expected to soon hear the sound of paws rustling against the door next over, but instead what she heard was a key jingling in a lock. Sarah held her breath, making every conscious effort not to make a sound. The neighboring door now swung open, and Sarah heard a blood-curdling scream come from the next room over.

           “No! No no no NO!” their voice pleaded. They were answered with a tremendous growl that made Sarah’s spine chatter from her pelvis up to her jawline and now understood why frightened characters’ teeth chatter in a cartoon. Sarah heard a struggle in the room beside her as she could hear things being knocked from shelves and shattering on the floor, and now a mixed sound of thump-thump-thump paired with what Sarah could only describe as something being drug through the doorway and out into the hallway.

           Sarah stood up from her bed and, despite all her instincts yelling at her to cease, she slowly turned the doorknob of her room. Quietly as she could, she peered her head out into the hallway. In the light of the moon piercing through the hallway window, she beheld a sight that she didn’t know how to comprehend. In the hallway was what looked like a wolf with red eyes that almost glowed in the moonlight. This wolf was standing on its hind legs, though it had an elongated torso that reached so far up its head almost brushed against the ceiling. Wrapped around the chest of this wolfish creature was a stretched and torn red vest, which had pinned to it a plastic nametag that read ‘Dorian’. Below this monster was the limp body of a middle-aged man with a round and plum belly with a bleeding laceration in his temple; this man whom the wolf creature was dragging across the floor by his ankles.

 Sarah gasped in astonishment then raised a hand to her mouth to silence herself, though she knew already she was too late. Her eyes bulged as she watched the wolfman’s eyes dart up to match her own. They stared into each other for what felt like an eternity, until the creature raised one gnarled claw to its mouth and made a sickeningly human ‘shush’ motion before it looked back down to its victim and continued to drag it down the hallway, and then down the stairs – the unfortunate man’s head making a nauseating thump with every stair it collided with as they both descended. Sarah coughed back a scream as she flew the door shut in front of her, and rushed to a corner in her room below the window.

Despite her hands which now cusped over her ears, she heard that reverberating howl around the thick trees outside, which was followed only once by a scream by the newly awakened victim of the wolfman – a scream that was cut short with a blood-curdling gurgle.

Chomp. Chomp. Chomp. The noises that followed. Sarah felt sick to her stomach, but was too terrified to move from her spot – part of her knew that was useless, as this monster had already seen her in this room, but the rest of her demanded that she stay perfectly still in this one spot, out of view – but out of scent?

There she sat huddled for the rest of the night. When the first light of the sunrise had peaked through her window, she gathered up her things and rushed downstairs, ignorant of the unwritten house rules of silence as her bag thumped down the stairs. Thump-thump-thump, it went, and with every thump, she thought of that poor man’s head as he was dragged down.

She made it to the doorman and sputtered quickly, “Checking out early thank you!”

But with her hand holding the door open she stopped in her tracks, swiveling her head around to look at the doorman, who hadn’t yet made a note of her early departure. It was the same man as yesterday, and instead of writing anything down in the notebook before him, he kept that same solemn and silent expression with the bulging eyes glaring at her, as he raised a long and gnarled finger to his lips, giving her the ‘shush’ gesture. Sarah glanced down at his vest, this one for today now a sky-blue, with a nametag which read ‘Dorian’.

Her eye twitched at him as her hand trembled on the door. She opened her mouth to say something, but all she could muster was a weak groan. She darted out the open door and towards her car. She could feel his eyes digging into the back of her as she ran, though she never looked back.

To this day, Sarah never went to another silent retreat yet had refrained from making a single sound at night – especially on nights like that one, where the moon was full, and the silence could be cut with a single howl.