by Ashley Grant

What happened still brings shivers down my spine. They told me I was safe; safe from her. They lied. I will never be safe from her again. Until my dying day, until my last breath – she will follow me.

I feel it as my knees bend to stand. Disassociated. On autopilot, I check the lock to make sure I am still barricaded inside the motel room. Each one of the spare planks I could find or pry away are nailed against the doors and windows.

The sun are starting to fall down and its bleeding, hemorrhaging light pains my eyes with a sense of trepidation and turmoil. It had been the only ally I had throughout my plight. It had been my only shield and, it too, would once again be leaving me to fend for myself. Part of me wanted to cry out. Part of me wanted to feel the warmth of tears as they streamed down my cheek. No!

I can’t allow that. I feel my fingers curl around the iron in my hands and I brace my left shoulder hard against the door. The deadbolt felt almost frozen against my cheek. There was no sound. There was no breeze, no other guests nor housekeepers nor cars. Everything felt disheveled and out of place. Seconds drained, the bizarre dormancy beyond the cheap shredded planks grew in its unnatural aura. The cold metal started to sink into my skin. With no other options, gently, still gripping the iron, I stepped backwards from the door.

“What would your father think of his doughty daughter now?” I berated my own reflection, turning the overhead light on to its lowest possible setting in the motel room.

Beep Beep!

I look down and a sigh escapes me. It was time to turn the light off – my watch had informed me that the sun had vanished until dawn. I turned my phone off. I couldn’t afford to endanger myself or any of my few remaining friends. The light would attract.

I am out of options; in a cheap, ramshackle hotel, on a route I can’t remember. There is no place to run or hide tonight. The night is her domain; her kingdom. A moldy bathtub is as much a sanctuary as anything else is now. It works for tornadoes, right? I can feel the cheap vinyl on my neck. My ponytail shifted to the side. Everything was black. I know that I had left the bathroom door open. Maybe the boards were closer this time than last or maybe this room was smaller.

I need to stop these useless thoughts. Focus! But what can I focus on? The iron in my right hand! I can concentrate on that. The rough half-rusted instrument had stayed with me since I ripped it from my grandmother’s fireplace. The whole house had been soaked in blood.

Was that four years ago or five? I don’t recall. Can’t remember. There was snow on the ground then. That much, I remember. It was –

“Molly’s here!”

That sickeningly sweet voice cut me out of reminiscing. That, thing, that walking nightmare had found me again.

“Molly wants to play. Molly wants to play with all her friends.”

I heard it skip. I heard it hop around on one foot, like a kindergartener playing hopscotch past my hotel room. With both hands, I pressed the iron down against my chest, hoping it wouldn’t stay in front of the door. What would a normal person don? After all the years of being hunted by Molly. I chuckled to myself. It never left any survivors. Briefly, a miniscule remaining glimmer of empathy surged guilt for the employees no doubt scattered in pieces in various rooms of the motel. A torso in the lobby, or if Molly was feeling extra spicey perhaps she would put one of the housekeepers’ heads in the ice machine. That was a slushy flavor to make even me feel nauseated.

Forcing myself not to gag, my ears sharpened. Molly’s steps had stopped.

“Molly wants to play with you. Molly wants to play.”

Shit, no, not the song. Tears slipped down my cheeks as the deceptively childish voice continued her verse.

“Molly wants to play with you then hide away in the day. We’ll play all night and have some fun but best of all my friend, when it’s over And we’re done-“

“I’ll keep you till the end.” I silently mouthed the words that she had uttered a thousand times.

It found me. I know it did.

BANG!

The door to my blackened cell held; at least for the moment. I could hear the demonic presence screech. She shook the frame for all it was worth. Nails, the deadbolt and the cheap dresser all aided me in my attempt to live another night. The banging continued; no human child could have that level of strength.

“Molly wants-“

SMASH!

She had moved to the window; indenting her claw tipped fingers into one of the planks. I could hear the scratching from the narrow bathroom. Tearing away at chunks of wood, Molly’s frustration grew. She realized I had nailed the boards far too close for her to climb through them. With her next words, she lost al decorum and the lies behind her cutesy child-like voice were replaced by a monstrous roar.

“To play with Amanda!”

Over and over, the tearing continued. She kicked; breaking all of the glass. There was a silence for a few minutes. Had she grown tired? No, Molly never gave up. I heard her walking away, gone was the happy skip she always appeared with at sunset.

She walked away from my motel room slowly, almost stomping. I believe she was trying to lure me out. Molly had left, but she wasn’t gone forever. Before I could even open the darkened shower curtain, I heard the hard Mary Janes return.

“Molly brought a gift for Amanda. Molly loves Amanda sooo much.” The childish falsata this creation of terrors used was in full force with her effort to lure me from my hiding place.

A faint squish entered the room. She was throwing anything she could find at the holes in the window. I heard one fall and bounce off the rim off the tub. Covering my mouth, I tried to remain still. The noise came once more bumping directly into the cheap porcelain bathtub. With my left hand still over my lips clenching the iron, the foreign object rolled touching the back of my right hand.

In second grade, I had a teacher who put random food in paper bags and pretended they were gushy body parts. Blueberries were eyes, cooked spagetti for hair, at the time it was hilarious to me.

That had been a large blueberry. What brushed against my hand was a real human eye. The optic nerves wrapped around two of my fingers. When I attempted to quietly pull my hand away, the eyeball collapsed. Some of the nerves remained stuck to the back of my hand. I had little time to mull over my own disgust, Molly’s wicked intrusion continued regardless of my own emotions.

Molly moved quickly between the door and the window, breaking whatever holes she could into both. Her cries increased wildly. She didn’t speak anymore. Only the sound of rage left her mouth as she sought to kill me. Two of the boards snapped. The sounds of the broken wood were so close to one another I couldn’t tell if she had gotten into the motel room or not.

The hinges creaked, my question was answered. Molly finally won; and had opened the door.

“Amanda, let’s play!” Molly called out to me; her voice dripping with joy.

I closed my eyes raising the iron high above my head. She might kill me, but I would put up a fight it will remember.

BEEP BEEP!

The alarm on my watch went off. That means the sun was rising! Relief flooded from my eyes and my breathing slowed back to normal. She can’t do anything now. I’m free. I’m free from Molly for the next twelve and a half hours. My longest night of the year is over.

“Molly has to go away now.” I heard her pout, kicking the side of the bed.

Silence followed her departure. I pulled the curtain back, numb, exhausted and, in pain from sitting the way I had. Two different eyes had been thrown into the bathroom. I rinsed what I could off my face and hands before moving into the main room. Body parts and limbs laid about in all directions. My desire to collapse on the bed was quickly evaporated by pieces of small intestines that were scattered on the comforter. It was best to just move on to the next rest stop. I could always sleep in my car.

I unlocked my SUV, opening the door while trying to ignore the ache in my shoulders. Before I could step into the driver’s seat; I noticed the side mirror was turned down at an odd angle. I stepped back from the car, looking down to the rims. Only then did I see what Molly did when she walked away from my motel room last night. After circling my car, my knees gave out. She had slashed all my tires. The next motel was fifty miles away.