4338.209.8 | When the Door Opens Itself

The peaceful embrace of sleep shattered like glass, splintering into a thousand jagged shards. My eyes flew open, heart racing, as The Silence of the Lambs tumbled from my lap with a loud thud that echoed unnaturally through the silent house. For an instant, I was frozen, caught between the fading edges of my dreams and the unsettling reality waiting in the twilight.

Blinking rapidly, I scanned the room, struggling to reorient myself. The late afternoon light that had once bathed the living room in warmth had disappeared, replaced by the dusky gloom of encroaching evening. Long shadows stretched across the Tasmanian Oak floor, their shapes warped and unfamiliar, as though the room itself had shifted subtly while I slept.

I rubbed my eyes, trying to banish the fog of sleep that clung to me like a heavy veil. A dull ache in my neck demanded attention, and I tilted my head to the side, wincing as a crackling release of tension broke the silence. The sound felt deafening in the oppressive stillness, each creak of my joints amplified tenfold. I found myself holding my breath, straining to hear anything else—the comforting background noises of our home. Sammy’s laughter, Buffy’s playful barks, Nial’s familiar footfalls—all were conspicuously absent, leaving only an eerie void.

“Oh dear, I must have dozed longer than I meant to,” I murmured, my voice raspy and disoriented. The sound of it startled me, as if it didn’t belong in the thick quiet of the house.

I reached up to knead the tight knot that had formed in my shoulder, wincing as my fingers pressed against the tender muscle. My gaze drifted toward the curtains, the last remnants of daylight filtering weakly through the fabric. Everything seemed muted, dulled, as if the house itself were holding its breath.

Finally, my eyes locked onto the clock on the far wall, its faint ticking cutting through the silence like a metronome of unease. The hands stood resolute: 5:15. My chest tightened as the realisation struck.

“Crap!” The word burst from my lips in a panicked exclamation, loud enough to seem almost inappropriate in the quiet room. My mind raced to catch up, spinning through the implications of lost time. “It’s quarter past five—I’ve completely forgotten to put the chicken in the oven!”

I bolted upright, the sudden movement sending a rush of blood to my head. For a moment, I stood there, caught between action and inaction, my heart pounding with a mix of urgency and frustration. The thought of dinner derailed felt absurdly mundane against the backdrop of the unease that had plagued me all day, but it was something tangible to focus on, a momentary distraction from the growing shadows in my mind.

"Maybe I can convince Sammy and Nial to finish off the frozen lasagne instead," I muttered, forcing my voice to sound light as I tried to salvage the situation.

I bent down to pick up the fallen book, my fingers tracing the well-worn cover. Its familiar texture should have been comforting, a reminder of countless evenings spent lost in stories. But tonight, it felt foreign, at odds with the air of unease that clung to the room like mist. I placed it back on the side table, the act more deliberate than it needed to be, as though giving it back its place could restore some semblance of order.

I reached for my smartphone, the smooth, cool surface a jarring contrast to the worn leather of the book. My fingers unlocked it out of habit, the glow of the screen casting pale, unnatural light across the dim living room.

I squinted, my eyes adjusting to the brightness as I scanned the screen. My stomach churned, the absence of notifications glaring back at me with an almost accusatory silence. No missed calls. No messages. Nothing.

A pit formed in my stomach as I stared at the screen. “Hmm,” I murmured, my voice barely above a whisper. The note of worry in it betrayed me. “Still no message from Nial.”

I stared at his name in my contacts list, the icon beside it unchanging, unmoving—a stubborn reminder that he was out there somewhere, unreachable. The thought tightened the knot in my chest, dread threading through it. Where was he? Why hadn’t he called?

Setting the phone down, I forced myself to breathe deeply, exhaling slowly as I tried to shake the unease. The house had grown colder, or perhaps it was just the weight of unanswered questions settling heavily over me. One thing was certain: the clock’s steady ticking wasn’t the only thing counting down.

The unease that had been quietly simmering throughout the day now boiled over, impossible to ignore. It felt as if the house itself was conspiring to magnify my growing dread. Each step down the hallway toward Nial’s office felt heavier than the last, the floorboards groaning underfoot as if lamenting my approach. The familiar family photos lining the walls—moments frozen in happier times—no longer offered comfort. Instead, they felt like a collection of accusatory stares, their frozen smiles twisting into something foreign in the dim light.

“Nial?” I called, the name catching slightly in my throat, my voice quivering in the unnatural stillness. The only response was the echo of my own words, swallowed quickly by the house’s oppressive silence.

As I neared the office, my breath hitched. The door stood ajar. I was certain I’d closed it earlier, nudging it firmly until I heard the reassuring click. Yet here it was, open just enough to reveal a sliver of shadowed interior. My pulse quickened as I frowned, confusion giving way to unease.

“Are you home?” I asked, though the emptiness of the house made the question feel absurd. Still, I hoped for an answer, some sound to ground me. Nothing came.

Reaching for the doorknob, my hand trembled, the cool metal sending a jolt through my palm. My grip tightened as I hesitated, steeling myself before easing the door open. The familiar squeak of the hinges seemed louder than ever, grating against the fragile quiet.

“Nial?” I ventured again, stepping into the room, my voice barely audible above the pounding in my chest.

The fading light from the window spilled across the room, elongating shadows and twisting the space into something unnerving. The air was heavy, cold, and it carried an unsettling stillness that prickled at my skin. Nial’s desk, usually so organised and indicative of his meticulous nature, was almost bare, its emptiness stark and wrong.

It hit me like a blow: his laptop was missing.

The sight of the cleared desk turned my unease into a sickly dread. I lingered in the doorway, unable to move, as if the room itself were holding me in place. My eyes swept over the space, but there was nothing out of place save for the desk’s unnatural vacancy. The absence of his things made the room feel unfamiliar, hollowed out, a shell of what it had been just this morning.

Why would Nial clear his desk? And if he had, why hadn’t he mentioned anything?

I crossed the room hesitantly, my steps muted against the rug. The faint trace of Nial’s cologne hung in the air, an almost mocking reminder of his presence—or absence. It was as though he had been here, tangible and real, only moments ago, and yet now felt impossibly far away.

The window overlooking the driveway caught my eye, and I turned toward it instinctively. The empty space where Nial’s ute should have been was glaring, its absence magnified by the growing shadows of the evening. The encroaching darkness outside pressed against the glass, its weight mirroring the one growing in my chest.

My hands brushed over the desk, fingers trailing across the barren surface as if it might offer some explanation. It didn’t.

I pulled my phone from my pocket, the smooth device cool against my shaking fingers. Dialling Nial’s number felt both necessary and futile, the familiar motions grounding me even as I prepared for disappointment.

The ringing began, each tone stretching out interminably in the heavy silence. The soft glow of the screen illuminated the desk, casting faint, jagged shadows that danced across the walls like spectres.

“Hi. This is Nial Triffett. I’m busy at the moment, but if you—”

The voicemail cut through the stillness, its sterile cheeriness a cruel contrast to the fear clawing at me. I ended the call sharply, my thumb pressing the screen with unnecessary force.

It hadn’t even rung properly.

My breath caught as the reality of that small detail hit me like a punch to the gut. The phone hadn’t connected. Nial’s number wasn’t reachable.

Something was wrong. Terribly wrong.

A chill spread through my body, starting in my chest and radiating outward until my fingers felt numb. I dropped my hand to my side, gripping the phone tightly as if it could somehow anchor me. My gaze drifted back to the window, the darkness outside a reflection of the encroaching panic within.

“Nial, where are you?” I whispered, my voice trembling with the weight of unspoken fears.

The office felt colder now, emptier, the walls seeming to press closer around me. Every logical explanation I tried to summon crumbled beneath the relentless weight of my instincts. This wasn’t just a misunderstanding or a case of bad timing. Something was very, very wrong.

I staggered back from the desk, my legs threatening to buckle beneath me. The room, once so familiar, now felt stifling, its silence heavy and suffocating. Each breath came shallow and strained, the air thick with an unnamed dread. Reaching the doorway, I clung to the frame as though it might hold me upright, my fingers pressing hard into the wood as if crossing the threshold could provide some kind of escape. But the unease followed, a shadow clinging to me, refusing to be left behind.

"Sammy," I called out, the sound of my own voice cracking in the stillness, reverberating through the hallway. Each syllable carried my growing fear, trembling at the edges. "Sammy. Time for you to wake up now."

No response.

The silence that answered was too deep, too absolute. My pulse quickened, my heart hammering against my ribs as if trying to escape. I stepped away from the office and into the hallway, my pace quickening with each step.

The hallway stretched before me, impossibly long, as though it had become a corridor in some surreal nightmare. The familiar family photos lining the walls—their smiling faces and frozen moments of joy—felt alien under the dimming light, their eyes following me with silent accusations. My own face stared back from the glass, distorted and pale.

"Sam—" My voice faltered as I reached Sammy’s door, the words catching in my throat. Something was wrong. I could feel it in my bones. My hand hovered over the doorknob, trembling, before I pushed it open.

The sight inside hit me like a physical blow.

Sammy’s bed was empty. The blankets were tangled in a chaotic heap at the foot of the mattress, as if he had left in a hurry. A single sock lay abandoned on the floor, a small, innocent detail that made my stomach lurch.

Time froze.

The air seemed to leave the room, every sound vanishing into a deafening void. My son, my sweet, precious Sammy, wasn’t there. The stillness was unbearable, like a held breath that refused to release.

"Sammy!" I screamed, the sound tearing from my throat, raw and jagged. I spun around, clutching the doorframe for support as my knees threatened to give way. My mind raced, fragments of thoughts crashing into one another, impossible to organise. Where was he? How could this be happening?

I stumbled into the hallway, the familiar path now fraught with terror. My legs felt like lead, sluggish and uncooperative, but I forced them forward. A few desperate strides later, my foot caught on the uneven floorboards, sending me careening into the wall.

Pain exploded in my knees as they slammed into the wood. The sharp sting jolted me, pulling a gasp from my lips. For a fleeting moment, the physical pain was almost grounding, an anchor in the sea of panic threatening to drag me under.

Propped against the wall, I raised my head, my gaze darting wildly down the hallway. There, through the open laundry door, I saw it: the back door.

It was ajar, standing barely open, hinting at the deepening twilight outside.

A gust of cool evening air swept in, brushing against my skin and carrying with it the scent of damp eucalyptus and freshly disturbed earth. The faint laughter of kookaburras drifted from the distance, a cruel contrast to the chaos within me—a reminder that the world outside continued, oblivious to my nightmare.

"Sammy!" I screamed again, the name ripping through the house, raw with desperation. It echoed back at me, bouncing off the walls in mockery. My voice didn’t sound like my own, filled with a panic so consuming it felt like a living thing, clawing at my throat.

I pushed myself upright, my knees shaking, my breaths coming in sharp, shallow gasps. The open door loomed before me, a silent taunt, daring me to step into the unknown. My mind raced with possibilities, each one more horrifying than the last. Where had he gone? Or worse—who had taken him?

Terror clawed at my chest, cold and relentless, as I stumbled forward. The normal world outside—the dusk, the birdsong, the scent of rain on the wind—felt like an insult, its tranquillity mocking the storm raging inside me.

“Sammy!” I called again, my voice cracking under the weight of my fear. The silence that followed was unbearable, the emptiness of it consuming me whole.

Ignoring the throbbing ache in my bruised knees, I bolted into the backyard, my heart pounding as though it might burst from my chest. The evening air hit me like a wall of ice, sharp and biting, raising goosebumps along my arms despite my jumper. Overhead, the sky had shifted into a bruised tapestry of purples and oranges, the last remnants of daylight sinking below the horizon and leaving the world cloaked in shadows.

"Sammy!" I called, my voice breaking with desperation. My eyes darted across the yard, sweeping over every familiar landmark now rendered strange and menacing in the encroaching dark. The towering gum tree, its gnarled branches reaching skyward, looked skeletal and forbidding. The rusted swing set creaked faintly in the evening breeze, its once-cheerful red paint peeling away to reveal the raw metal beneath. Even the vegetable patch, its once-tidy rows overrun with weeds, seemed alien, every shadow a potential hiding place.

“Where are you?” My voice cracked under the weight of my panic, tears threatening to blur my vision.

Then, from the edge of the sandpit, a small figure turned toward me, illuminated faintly by the dusky light. “I’m here, Mummy,” Sammy’s calm, sing-song voice carried across the yard, slicing through my fear like a blade.

My knees nearly gave way as relief crashed over me, leaving me weak and shaky. I staggered forward, my breath coming in shallow, unsteady gasps. He’s safe. The words echoed in my mind like a mantra, soothing but incomplete. There was no reprieve yet, no true comfort. Too many questions loomed, their answers tantalisingly out of reach.

Sammy sat in the sandpit, his hands busy scooping and patting the grains into a castle, his focus entirely on his creation. The innocence of the scene struck me like a blow, so at odds with the storm raging inside me. The fine grains of sand clung to his clothes and curly hair, a quiet testament to how long he must have been sitting out here while I dozed inside.

I reached him with unsteady steps, dropping to my knees in the sand beside him. The grit pressed into my jeans, the chill of the ground soaking through the fabric, but I barely noticed. My hands found his small shoulders, gripping them firmly as I turned him to face me. His bright blue eyes, so much like Nial’s, blinked up at me, wide and untroubled.

“Sammy,” I said, my voice low and tight, laced with an urgency I couldn’t suppress. “How did you get outside? Did you open the door?”

He stared at me blankly for a moment, his little face a picture of innocent confusion. Then he shook his head vigorously, his curls bouncing with the motion. “Uh-uh,” he said, the sound soft but resolute.

The pit in my stomach deepened. I struggled to keep my voice calm, even as my grip on his shoulders tightened. “Are you sure? Sammy, you have to tell me the truth. Did you open the door?”

His expression didn’t change, and he shook his head again, slower this time, as if sensing the weight of my question. “It was open,” he whispered, his voice barely audible but cutting through the cool evening air like a knife.

The world around me seemed to tilt. The faint rustle of leaves and the distant call of kookaburras melted into a muffled hum, the enormity of his words crashing down like a wave. If Sammy hadn’t opened the door, and I knew I hadn’t either, then...

The conclusion was inescapable and horrifying. Someone else had opened it.

My gaze darted toward the back door, its edges now lost in shadow. The thought of an intruder—a stranger moving through the intimate spaces of our home, unseen, unnoticed—was almost too much to bear. Every fibre of my being screamed to gather Sammy in my arms, to run inside and lock every door, every window. But my limbs felt paralysed, rooted to the spot by a mixture of fear and disbelief.

I turned my attention back to Sammy, his small, delicate features bathed in the fading light. He continued to play with the sand, unbothered, his little fingers carefully shaping the corners of his castle. It was as if he were untouched by the same darkness that now gripped me so tightly.

"Are you sure, darling?" I asked again, my voice trembling. He nodded without hesitation, his focus still on the sandpit, as though the answer were so obvious it didn’t warrant further discussion.

I swallowed hard, pulling him closer until his warmth pressed against me, a faint shield against the icy dread curling around my heart.

"Mummy. Did I do bad?" Sammy's words quivered, laden with a worry far too heavy for his young shoulders. His small face crumpled as he looked up at me, the tension radiating from me unmistakable despite my attempts to mask it.

My chest tightened, the fragility of this moment nearly breaking me. Emotion glistened behind my eyes as I pulled him into my arms, holding him close. His warmth was a balm, a fleeting respite from the storm raging inside me. "No, Sammy," I whispered, my voice trembling but resolute. "You did nothing wrong." My fingers combed gently through his curls, the familiar scent of his shampoo grounding me in the here and now.

The wind picked up, rustling the leaves of the old gum tree, its usually comforting whispers now laden with a strange foreboding. It sounded almost alive, the breeze twisting through its branches as if carrying secrets it couldn’t quite articulate. I shivered involuntarily and held Sammy tighter, trying to shield him from the invisible menace pressing in on us.

"Did you see Daddy inside?" I asked, my words muffled as I pressed my lips to his soft hair.

Sammy shook his head against my chest, the motion small and silent but heavy with meaning. My heart sank further, the ache inside me spreading like ice. With one arm still wrapped protectively around my son, I fumbled in my pocket for my phone. My fingers felt clumsy as I dialled Nial’s number, the screen’s glow a harsh contrast against the dimming twilight.

The call went straight to voicemail again.

"Hi. This is Nial Triffett. I’m busy at the moment, but if you—"

I ended the call abruptly, the cheery tone of his recorded message striking me like a slap. It was a cruel echo of the man who should have been here, whose absence now felt like a gaping void.

As the screen dimmed, a flicker of movement at the far edge of the yard caught my attention. My head snapped up, my pulse spiking. My eyes scanned the darkening landscape, the trees standing like silent sentinels in the encroaching gloom. Was that a shadow moving between the trunks? Or had my mind conjured it, a phantom birthed from my growing paranoia?

"Mummy?" Sammy’s small voice pulled me back, grounding me in his presence.

"Yes, sweetheart?" I murmured, pulling back just enough to meet his eyes. I searched his face, desperate for reassurance, for something to anchor me. His expression was innocent but shadowed with something deeper, something that didn’t belong on the face of a child.

"Why did the man take Buffy away?"

Sammy's words struck like a thunderclap, tearing through the fragile remnants of calm I had been desperately clinging to. My breath caught, my grip tightening on his small shoulders as though I could anchor us both against the storm of fear swelling around us.

I pulled him closer, my eyes scanning the yard with frantic urgency. The gum trees loomed tall and menacing, their shadows stretching out like grasping fingers in the fading light. The rustle of leaves and the faint hum of distant traffic felt suddenly oppressive, as though the world itself conspired to keep me on edge.

Could Sammy be right? Could someone have taken Buffy?

The thought coiled tightly in my chest, squeezing the air from my lungs. I gently nudged Sammy back, needing to see his face, to search his wide blue eyes for answers. Those eyes, so much like Nial’s, gazed back at me with a blend of innocence and something darker – a shadow that no child so young should carry.

"What man?" I asked, my voice trembling despite my efforts to keep it steady. My heart was racing, each beat loud and jarring, but I forced myself to focus on Sammy. I needed answers, but more than that, I needed to protect him, to shield him from the growing darkness that seemed intent on consuming our lives.

Sammy’s bottom lip quivered, his small shoulders lifting in a shrug that conveyed both uncertainty and fear. "The man with the funny colours," he said at last, his words barely audible over the whisper of the wind through the gum leaves.

The funny colours?

The phrase was innocent enough, yet it sent a chill down my spine. My thoughts raced, piecing together fragments of an increasingly nightmarish puzzle. A stranger had been here, taken our dog, and now this – Nial’s ransacked office, his missing laptop, the open back door. Everything felt connected, threads weaving into a picture I couldn’t yet see, but whose outline was already too terrifying to contemplate.

"What do you mean by funny colours, sweetheart?" I asked softly, smoothing his hair with a trembling hand. My voice was calm, soothing even, but inside I was unravelling. I clung to Sammy’s words like a lifeline, desperate for anything that might make sense of the impossible.

Sammy furrowed his brow, his face scrunching in concentration. Under different circumstances, the expression might have been adorable, but now it only heightened the tension clawing at my chest. "Like... like the rainbow, Mummy," he said after a moment. "They came from his hands, just like Spiderman."

A shiver ran down my spine, icy and relentless, as his words sank in. Colours from his hands? Like Spiderman? My rational mind recoiled, struggling to process what he was saying. Was he describing some kind of light? A trick of his imagination, perhaps? Or – and this thought was the most unsettling of all – had Sammy seen something beyond my ability to comprehend?

"Sammy," I said gently, my voice betraying the tight coil of dread building inside me. "Can you tell me more? What happened after the colours came from his hands?"

His eyes lit up, a mix of fear and excitement swirling in their depths. "It was so pretty, Mummy!" he exclaimed, his voice tinged with awe. "The colours made a big circle, like a door. And then..." His voice faltered, his brow knitting tightly as he struggled to find the words.

"And then what, sweetheart?" I prompted, my heart pounding so fiercely it felt as though it might burst from my chest.

"Then the man and Buffy went through the circle," Sammy whispered. His voice had dropped to a near-silent tremor. "And then they were gone."

Gone.

The word echoed in my mind, stark and final. My knees threatened to buckle beneath me as I knelt there, staring into Sammy’s earnest face. A circle of light? A door? People disappearing into thin air? It was impossible. Unreal. Yet every fibre of my being told me Sammy was telling the truth.

The gravity of what he’d witnessed – what we might now be caught in – settled over me like a leaden cloak. This wasn’t just a break-in or a missing dog. It wasn’t even about Nial anymore, at least not in the way I’d thought.

This was something else.

Something otherworldly.

A chill rippled down my spine as my thoughts raced back to Sammy's nightmares—the ones that had robbed us both of sleep for months. His frightened whispers, the chilling descriptions of shadows lurking in corners, the voices he said came from the dark—all of it seemed to converge in this moment. Could it all be connected?

Dr Carmichael’s face resurfaced in my mind, his brow furrowed, his words careful and measured. "Unprecedented," he’d said. "Unconventional approaches." Had he known more than he let on? Had he suspected that Sammy’s nightmares were more than the usual terrors of childhood? The thought turned my stomach, my breath catching as I struggled to make sense of it all.

"Mummy," Sammy’s small, uncertain voice broke through the storm of my thoughts. "The colours were like in my dreams. But not scary this time. Pretty."

My heart ached at the contrast in his words—so innocent, yet so laden with implications that I couldn’t comprehend. Sammy’s dreams, the ones that had stolen our peace and driven us to seek help, were no longer just figments of his imagination. They were spilling over into our waking world, intertwining with events that defied logic or reason.

How was I supposed to protect him from something I couldn’t name, couldn’t understand? How could I fight against shadows and colours, against a force that seemed to slip through the cracks of reality itself?

"Sammy, sweetie," I said, forcing a steady calm into my voice, though inside I was trembling. "We’re going to go inside now, okay? It’s getting cold out here."

He nodded, his trust in me absolute, even as I faltered under its weight. I scooped him into my arms, his small body pressing against mine. His warmth should have been a comfort, but instead, it only magnified the cold dread settling in my chest. He felt heavier than usual, though I knew it wasn’t him. It was the crushing weight of my fears, of the unknowable threat that loomed ever closer.

As I turned toward the house, movement at the edge of the yard snagged my attention. My heart stuttered, my breath catching as my eyes locked onto a shadow—darker than the fading light of dusk—slipping between the trees at the property’s edge. It was too fluid, too deliberate to be the wind.

My arms tightened protectively around Sammy.

"What is it, Mummy?" he asked, his voice small but laced with curiosity and concern.

I forced a smile, praying it didn’t betray the fear coiling in my stomach. "Nothing, darling. Just the wind in the trees," I lied, my voice calm but brittle.

Even as the words left my mouth, I knew they were hollow. It wasn’t the wind. Something—or someone—was out there, watching. The weight of its gaze pressed against me, intangible but undeniable, setting every nerve on edge.

I moved toward the house with measured steps, fighting the overwhelming urge to run. Every instinct screamed at me to flee, but I couldn’t risk panicking Sammy—or drawing the attention of whatever was out there.

The back door loomed ahead, still yawning wide open, an unguarded portal that now felt like an accusation. How had I let this happen? How had I failed to notice the danger creeping into the very heart of our home?

Crossing the threshold, I kicked the door shut with more force than I intended. I twisted the deadbolt firmly into place, the sharp click momentarily satisfying.

But it wasn’t enough.

I stood there, staring at the locked door, my hand still gripping the cold metal. The familiar contours of our home, the place that had always been our sanctuary, now felt violated and exposed. The danger wasn’t just out there—it had already been here. It had crossed the line between the world outside and the one I thought I could control.

And I had no idea how to stop it.