CRACK CRACK POP

“DAD! The power’s out!” Jayden screamed as he sat in his room. He was supposed to be asleep an hour ago, but his book kept telling him, “one more chapter. Just one more chapter.”

“If you were asleep when you were supposed to be, then you never would have known,” his dad, Rob, told him as he sat down on the bed next to him.

“But I wasn’t tired yet. I’m ten, and all my friends can stay until nine. I don’t understand why I have to be in bed at eight,” Jayden argued.

     Rob sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. Without the street lights on, he couldn’t even see his hand in front of him. 

“Can you please get me a flashlight?” Jayden asked as he noticed his dad’s frustration.

“No can do. Your mom and Lucy took all the camping gear when they left on the scouting trip yesterday. With everybody running their air conditioning, it probably just tripped up something along the power lines. I’m sure it will be on soon,” Rob tried to soothe his son. “Try to go to sleep.”

An hour later, the power still wasn’t on, and even Rob was getting bored, and now hot. He tried to open the windows to entice a breeze, but he was convinced that it was hotter inside than it was outside. Grabbing his engraved metal lighter and his cigarettes, he headed out into the backyard. He sat there thinking of his book, and how that wouldn’t help with no lights. What was the point of spending all that money on camping gear, if he didn’t have any when he needed it? It was something he’d rectify the next time they went shopping. 

Glowing eyes distracted him from his bitter thoughts. “Ah, the tiki statues and they went with the tiki torches,” Rob said with a flash of a grin. 

He carefully made his way down the two steps off his patio and groped thin air until he found what he was looking for. It took a few tries, but eventually, he got the first one lit. From there, it was easy to see the outline of the other eleven outlining the patio. Once they were lit, Rob saw the shed was barely visible in the low lighting, but he’d have to make it work. It took a few moments of fumbling around in there until he found the gallon bottle of fluid to refill the usually decorative lamps. 

“Dad?” Jayden asked from somewhere near the door.

     “What are you still doing up?” He questioned as he moved back over towards his son.

      “I couldn’t sleep. It’s too dark,” he stated.

      “Well, we do sleep at night,” Rob told him sarcastically.

      “Can I sleep out here with you?” Jayden asked.

      Rob sighed, but couldn’t think of a reason to say no. “Sure, go get your blanket and pillow.” Rob followed him inside and grabbed the throw and the pillow off the couch, and made his way back out to his wife’s sunbathing lounge. He tossed the blanket on it longwise and pulled the recliner back until he was close enough to the torch to read. His son followed suit with two of the chairs from the table.

 “Thanks, dad,” Jayden said as he opened his own book.

     “This isn’t so bad,” Rob thought as he turned the page.

     CRACK!

      “What was that, dad?” Jayden squealed.

      SPLASH!

      CRACK!

      “I don’t know,” Rob whispered as he stood up. He tried to look past the tiki torches, but couldn’t see past them. He moved towards the stairs, but the light didn’t extend past the shed. If he didn’t know he owned a pool for the last five years, he wouldn’t have known that he couldn’t see it in the dark. As it was, the rest of his backyard appeared as if he was looking into a black hole. There were no outlines, light spots, or even darker spots. It was one continuous black curtain.

POP!

     Rob jumped but didn’t make a move. The noise was coming from the direction of the pool. His lighter weighed heavy in his pocket, but the idea of walking towards the noise with only a lighter was something one made fun of in horror movies. It was the dumb move that showed something horrific, or they wound up dead.

     His decision was cemented when he heard splashes of water. No. He was not going over there, and no amount of money would have changed his mind. Rob backed up slowly until his heels made contact with the wooden stairs. He felt a splinter stab his calf but made no move to inspect the damage. His eyes were trained unseeingly into the now seemingly vast yard.

     “Dddad?” Jayden stuttered.

     “Shh!” Rob whispered.

     “Dddad?” He whispered back, scared.

     “What Jayden?” Rob asked, agitated as he turned to look at his son, but he couldn’t see past the fires.

     CRACK!

     CRACK!

     Rob whipped his head back towards the nothingness.

     POP!

SPLASH!

Rob quickly made his way back up the stairs and over to where Jayden had set up his impromptu bed, but his son wasn’t there.

“JAYDEN!” He roared.

CRACK!

SPLASH!

He whipped around, but no one was there, even his son. Rob ran back into the house, calling for

Jayden, but he didn’t answer. Room by room, he searched, but it was fruitless. His son wasn’t inside, either.

He rushed back outside and yanked the closest torch from the ground.

CRACK! 

     POP!

     SPLASH!

Rob’s legs weren’t moving fast enough. He pumped his muscles until finally, the privacy gate for the pool was in sight.

Whatever horrors, he mentally prepared himself for did not help when he saw what was going on. His neighbors were swimming with glow lights around their necks, and a couple sat at the bottom of the pool, illuminating it from below. And their son was shooting those blasted foam darts at Jayden from a plastic gun.

Rob sighed heavily as he leaned forward, waiting for his heart to stop racing. He ran his fingers through his hair as he tried to relax.

“You okay there, Rob?” His neighbor, George, asked as he got out of the pool.

“You scared the crap out of me!” Rob yelled at George. “I thought someone was being murdered and thrown into the pool!”

“Sorry, Rob. It just got hot in the house and all. I should have knocked on your door first, but I didn’t want to bother you if you were sleeping. I figured you wouldn’t mind,” George told him sheepishly.

“Crap, George!” Rob yelled again as he waved the tiki torch around.

“We are really sorry, Rob,” George’s wife said, making her way over.

“No, I overreacted,” He admitted. “You’re right; I wouldn’t have mind. You guys enjoy yourself. Come on, Jayden. It’s well past eleven now.”

Rob led Jayden back up the yard and put the torch back in the hole. He collapsed onto the lounge and reached for his book, knowing he wouldn’t be able to sleep anytime soon.

“Night, dad,” Jayden said.

“Night,” Rob said before he eyed the title of the book. He tossed the scary short stories anthology onto the porch and stared out into the yard.