The Ringing
Sometimes I feel him hovering over us, watching us sleep from the darkest corner of the room. Other times I hear him calling the dead phone line strung to the basement of our house. It rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and then it stops. The lull between them is shallow. Contagious. Stressful.
I feel the withering when he’s there.
When his pallid presence penetrates us, I pretend that I’m sleeping. I don’t even open my eyes. I couldn’t if I tried — fear glues them shut. But I can sense his aura, translucent and calm from the corner like a ravenous vulture. Every time.
When he calls, most nights around dinner hour, I hear the line buzz before it even gets there. It runs up the walls, into my eardrums and rattles my spine like an infection. My wife swears she doesn’t hear it. But I can see my dog’s facial expressions in the resonance. He looks like I feel. He knows too.
My wife says she doesn’t see him. Funny that you mention it though, because I’ve felt him before, she tells me. But I know she’s lying.
There isn’t a phone number registered to my house. We’ve used mobile and opted out of that package when we bought the place last year. He remembers the number though. He knows when to call and when to stand over our bed with those jaundiced eyes.
