A Stirred Silence

Leo Sparry

It was late when he woke, and morbidly cold. There was no blanket surrounding him, for it was on the ground. He leaned off the couch and grabbed the wool quilt on the ground. The alarm clock on the coffee table displayed a late evening. He stood over the couch glaring out the window into the driveway. There were no familiar cars. He walked out of the living room and to the phone on the wall. He dialed his mothers phone number and waited. When there was no answer, he set the phone back on the wall.

Leo Sperry's headache had ceased its sharp pains, and he regained his balance and his vision unblurred. He turned the dining room light on and sat at the table, looking at his hands. He thought about his mother, old and lonely. Waiting to die. She told Leo she would call him when she got back to her home in Seattle. That had been three days ago. Leo had no friends, no television, no hope, no life, no past, no future, and evidently no present. He was just another human being that existed. He did not care for anyone, and no one cared for him, all except for his mother. He contemplated this sudden thought at the table, and went to grab the bottle to repress it.

In the kitchen the moonlight came in through the window and illuminated the room, giving it a pale, gloomy color. He went to the fridge and opened the freezer side, which consisted entirely of alcohol. He stocked up on this product after his wife left him, and ever since had been his only friend. He chose a bottle of vodka, his fingers melting away the ice. He opened the cabinet and stood for a minute in the cold, dark kitchen, deciding which glass to choose. He finally decided against a glass and went to the table, throwing the cap at the chair. 

He sat on one of the fine leather chairs and drank with a grimace. He set the bottle down and ran his damp hand through his hair. He touched his cheek, just to feel his cold palm. He waited for the spark to ignite his soul. He was impatient so he downed the rest of the bottle. He stood up, turned off the dining room light, and sat back in his chair. He knew he wouldn't be able to sleep now, not after he woke up. Especially now that he was drunk. His vision blurred and his balance left his body, just as soon as it had returned. Leo Sperry was a mess. He was a paranoid, worried drunk, with no sense of sobriety.

He touched his face again, felt the stubble of his facial hair tickle his palms. He rubbed his eyes and kept them closed. He laid his head on the table and suddenly felt the alcohols warmth in his stomach. He sat back in his chair and decided to go outside and take a piss. He stumbled over to the bedroom where he put on a jacket and slipped on his shoes, both with some difficulty, left on right and right on left. Once he got his shoes on he attempted to zip up his jacket, and after three minutes of failed attempts, stopped trying and left the room, tripping on nothing. 

Outside his breath emerged from his face like smoke. The moon glared down on him while he pissed and he glared up at it, showing it his middle finger. As he was urinating, Sperry realized that his shoes were still on backwards, even after switching them. He finished his hourly ritual, and walked back to the front door. He grabbed the brass doorknob, squeezed it, really felt it, caressed it with his fingers, felt the cold night linger on the gold knob. Before he turned it he heard someone behind him scream.

  The scream was an ear splitting shriek that cut the night air in half. He felt hot beads of sweat race down his back and soak in his boxers. At first he panicked, turning toward the scream with a jerky, twisty motion, and falling against  the front door. He grabbed the knob and squeezed it, only to find it locked. His face dropped in horror. Black clouds obscured the moon away from Leo Sperry, who cowered to the ground, sprawled out in front of his door in complete guilty shame. His intention was to get inside and hide in the dark, and decide whether or not if he should call the police.

His head filled up with a pressure unlike anything hes ever experienced. His eyes numbed up and blood dripped from his nose. The piercing night cry scared him immediately out of his drunken state, and he seemed to sweat the alcohol out of his system. He stood up, and  suddenly another shriek slit the air, as if air was a bag filled with fear. The scream came from directly across the street, the house in front of his. He took one last look at his brass doorknob and ran across the street, his feet slapping the concrete with loud thuds. All of his senses seemed to enhance suddenly, and his first thought was an adrenaline rush. In his neighbor's yard he found a baseball bat on the lawn and he grabbed it. He encroached very slowly to the front door. The door was ajar, but he stood outside it, squeezing the wooden bat. He went in.

A single lamp illuminated the room, revealing an obvious burglary. The room was trashed, and objects lay scattered on the ground, picture frames sideways, a crack in the TV, all the cliché signs of a burglary. Leo stalked gently to an open bedroom door with a faint light spilling out on the floor. He poked his head over the wall and saw a unfortunate  woman lying dead in the bed with a red, wet towel duck taped around her face. At first Leo thought the red in the towel was its natural color, but as he got closer to the body he realized that it was indeed blood because it emitted a scent familiar to that of a bloody nose. Leo jumped back shocked, trying to keep the scream from pressuring out his mouth. He stared at the dead body in complete awe, it was indeed something he had seen for the first time, and the baseball bat dropped from his limp, cold hand. His eyes watered and sweat beads raced down his neck until sweat was visible on his shirt. 

He stared at the dead girls small hand, aware that she was very young just by looking at her body, and felt shameful melancholy build up in his head until his ears burned. Leo didn't notice the window was open and the soft wind was tickling the blood red drapes, dancing with the moonlit wind.

He brisked away a single tear and walked out of the room. Walking down the very dark hall, his feet padded the very soft carpet, creating a footprint in the shag. Moonlight bled through the glass windows onto everything that lay scattered around the floor. The television screen was completely bashed in, and Leo Sperry noticed that the glass was bleeding. 

The house was dead. A quick glance in the kitchen at the shattered china dish in pieces on the tiled floor sent Leo dashing towards the door. His sweaty palm made contact with the cold brass and he failed at twisting the knob, his damp palm slipped around it nervously. He dried his hands on his pants and a sudden loud, but hollow bang sent his head shooting to the side. He spun around and squinted in the dark house, looking desperately for the source of the noise. A bead of stinging, salty sweat invaded his left eye, clouding his vision through a prism of tears and sweat. Leo's body jolted in fear at the sudden obscurity of the blind black house. He pushed his back against the door and and the wall shook violently. Leo froze against the vibrating sound he created and strained his ears for any other sounds. He heard whispers and the startling sound of shattering glass in the night. He felt his heart drop into his 

stomach and the sprouting of sweat out of his pores.

Someones in the house.

The sound came from the room with the dead girl lying on the bed.