305 Sucker-Punch

"The ghoul in the window came again," Marlena reported. Andrew just shook his head, making her feel foolish. For months she had stood vigil at the picture window facing the street. She'd begin at dusk and wouldn't stop till midnight.

"Midnight's another day," she would say, as if no one could get to her until the new night of the next calendar day. Why midnight till dawn was exempt, he couldn't understand. But when you're gaslighting someone, you expect irrationality—so you play it.

Andrew worked nights, so was not there for her each night. He arrived at the usual morning time to find her fixing breakfast, like nothing strange had happened.

"We have a security system now," he told her.

"Doesn't matter. He still comes. Why does everyone deny him?"

"Because, Marlena, since your aneurism, you imagine things."

"This ghoul's real," she said. "And it means me harm. I can't take it much longer." This was music to his ears.

"I believe you," he consoled, although giving credibility to imagined threats isn't kindness, but complicity. "Why you? And when do you think he'll attack?"

"Don't know, Andrew. Just biding his time... Trying to get the jump on me when I'm not looking. That's why I keep watch. It's the punch you don't see coming that knocks you out. That's what prizefighters say. As long as I'm watching, I can brace for it, splint against it, survive anything someone can throw at me. I just don't want to not see it coming."

He wondered how long it would take before she could be institutionalized. Then Celine could spend the night.

"Why don't you just divorce her?" Celine asked.

"That's cruel. She'd never see it coming. I need it to be all her."

"It's not cruel. It's being a man."

That night, he figured he'd step up his game. Approaching the window with his ghoul mask; jiggling doorknobs; kicking at the door: it might be all it'd take.

That it was she gaslighting him, he never saw coming. That she'd buy a gun, he never saw coming. And the bullet through the door being kicked—he never saw that coming, either.

Too bad they didn't come together, she thought.

_______________

AUTHOR'S NOTES:

For Halloween, Thursday, October 31, Day 305 of the 2024 Story-a-Day Challenge

FINALLY. THIS MONTH IS OVER! NOW I CAN FINALLY GET OFF THIS HORROR KICK. GET BACK TO MY HOPELESSLY ROMANTIC WAYS.

366 WORDS (without A/N)

61 DAYS TO GO! THIS CHALLENGE TERRORIZES ON, 366 THRILLS AND SPILLS A DAY.

There are currently three very frightened Vocal writers in this 2024 Story-a-Day Challenge:

• L.C. Schäfer ("Tricky")

• Rachel Deeming ("Treaty")

• Gerard DiLeo (Screaming his head off but he's miles away from where anyone can hear him!)