Mansion Hackneyed

Mansion Hackneyed(Kimberley Craigie) Mansion Hackneyed


Craig was woken by the Sunday afternoon sun high in the sky, shining through his thin, partially open curtains. As his eyes adjusted, he began to notice the sound of a TV and food in a frying pan. He rose from the comfort of his sheets instantly feeling the chilled air in his room, dreading laying his bare feet on the cold, wooden floor. His whole body begged him to return to his bed as his feet touched the floor but hunger was a greater force. He unwillingly stood in his shorts, grabbing his house coat off of the nearby computing chair and flung it on in dire need of warmth and comfort from the soft material.

He tip toed in an attempt to keep the ball of his feet from touching the floor till he reached his bedroom door. As he opened the door, Craig could smell the food on the frying pan and his belly rumbled. His father was watching TV. He knew it was his father because his mother and father were the only other people living in the house. It took him a couple of seconds to realize that his bowels craved more attention than his stomach did. In response, he hurried into the nearby bathroom. After relieving himself, he jogged down the stairs and into the living room, the sound of the blaring TV drowning out his thoughts. Of course, his father never noticed his existence until he walked out in front of Sylvester Stallone on the way to the kitchen.

‘Out of the way, yah hooligan!’ his father roared.

Despite his father’s protesting, he continued his way to the unfortunately small kitchen. As he entered, he heard his mother humming “dream a little dream” while making a rather gorgeous smelling fry up. Not willing to miss such an opportunity, he sneaked up behind her and kissed her on the cheek.

‘Ooh, good morning love. Gave me a fright, there you did. Have a lovely sleep?’ she chorused in her high-pitched tone of voice.
‘Yeah, it was ok.’

Craig walked over to the small dining table and two chairs, helping himself to a seat.

‘Your eighteenth birthday isn’t far away.’ His mother stated.
‘I know mother.’ He sighed, knowing where she was going with this.
‘Maybe you could get into college or get a job. It’s been nearly 2 years since you left school and you haven’t done anything since.’ his mother complained, again.
‘I know ma, but you know how it is these days. There’s a recession going on. You get a job and you’re more than likely to lose your job to someone who already has been trained. Not only that, there’s competition. I would go to college but when you only get £30 a week for 5 days, it’s not even worth going.’ he frustrated.
‘Yes, hun, but you get your travel expenses and you could get a part time job.’
‘I get free travel anyway thanks to Uncle Charlie running the only bus that goes into town and the bus not having cameras. As for getting a part-time job, I just explained all that.’ he reminded his mother.

His mother brought over two plates and sat one in front of Craig, the other in front of the empty seat. His mother took a perch and started eating her food like a little sparrow, like she always does. Craig tucked into his favourite meal.

Once breakfast was over, Craig got dressed. He wore his favourite baggy blue jeans which suited him really well due to his 5ft 8 height and his athletes build. His mother recently bought him a new red t-shirt and he put it on just to see her smile. After getting himself dressed, he went back down stairs and told his mother he was going to the library. His mother gave him £10 to get himself something to eat as she didn’t know when he’d be back. Craig kissed his mother on the cheek and said his goodbyes. He only received one and that was from his mother.

Craig went down to the library and used the computer to browse Facebook. There was nothing interesting except some “lol cats” in the recent updates. After using the computer, he looked at some of the sections in the library. He wasn’t a book worm, but he enjoyed a good read every now and again. One book caught his eye. It was called “Mansion Hackneyed”. Without reading what it was about, he borrowed it and left.

Craig went to his favourite pizza place fifteen minutes away from the library and ordered his usual. Taking his pizza, he went and made himself comfortable at a bench outside the pizza place. Sitting down, he remembered about the mysterious book he took out. He had subconsciously put it on top of the pizza box when he took the pizza. Lifting it off the box, he opened the book and began to read while opening the pizza box with his other hand and taking a slice. The book read: “Whoever has found this book is in grave danger. Do not go and find this place. Oh bugger it, you’re bound to anyway. Just don’t say I didn’t warn you. I made this book so that someone would come and save me from this misery. There’s a map at the back of this book…”

‘Shit!’ Craig complained as he let a droplet of tomato puree drop onto the page while he was reading it.

Craig turned to the back of the book and was amazed to see that the “Mansion Hackneyed” was supposedly real and not far from where he was. Just through some woods and bingo. Craig finished his pizza roughly ten minutes later and off he went, leaving the open box on the bench for the pigeons to attack. He walked up to a set of woods. The trees were many feet tall. As he stared into the dull, dank forest, Craig tried to persuade himself to go in. Eventually, he plucked up the courage and started his way through.

‘No going back now.’ Craig admitted to himself out loud.

He found the crunching of the branches on the forest floor to be unsettling along with the additional hoot of some bird flying over every so often. The warm sun broke through the occasional branch and onto his relatively cold skin. Craig was beginning to feel like he had been walking for hours and told himself that he knew he should have gotten a watch with his pocket money. Eventually he broke through some trees and was amazed at what he saw. Staggering out of the woods and into the open, he saw a huge mansion. His mind raced with information over load.

‘One big huge rusted golden gate with a long fence at either side, two cupids at each side of the path leading up to one, big beautiful mansion.’ Craig said in awe out loud to himself.

Craig walked up to the gate and peered in at the beauty through the bars. As he was looking, he began to hear growling from behind. He spun round to see two very large and very real wolves snarling at him. He slowly lowered himself to the ground and sat, waiting for their pounce. He watched them snarl, waiting for the right moment. Suddenly, they threw themselves forward into a run and pounced at him. He watched, dreading the pain. Next thing he knew, he was looking at these dogs in mid-air, frozen. He used the fence to pull himself up and stared into the eyes of one of the wolves. It blinked and he jumped back in fright. Without warning, they started to disintegrate from the tail up. The wolves growled at his face while seemingly being dissolved. The disintegration had worked its way up to the wolves’ neck already. Craig watched as the wolves eyes dissipated into dust. All that was left were two piles of tiny pieces of skin on the dead grass. A light breeze had started and blown the particles slowly away. As he was watching, he heard a murmuring voice in his head. He couldn’t make out what it was saying but it was definitely male. As he turned round in disbelief at the random voice in his head, the padlock unlocked itself, fell to the ground and the chains unravelled, allowing the gates to creakily open seemingly of their own accord.

Craig walked through the gates cautiously; wary of his surroundings, afraid of what he just witnessed, knowing that at any moment it could happen to him. He continued down the path slowly, feeling like he was being watched, unaware of the cupids’ heads moving to watch him. He arrived at the front door of the mansion, his heart pounding in his throat, butterflies trying to escape the pit of his stomach. Forcing himself, Craig shakily put out his left hand and reached slowly for the door knob. He touched it with the tip of his finger, the cold metal sending a shiver down his body. He wrapped his whole hand around it and twisted to the left. Taking his time, he pushed the door open and shuffled forward. He poked his head around the corner of the door looking all over. To his left, he could see a large arch leading to some kind of living room. He could see the beginning of a fire place and felt the heat from the fire that was burning brightly. Looking round the room clockwise, he saw a stair case turning up to the left, covered in spider webs. Continuing to look to his right, he saw a door at the back corner of the room, assuming it lead out back. Deciding it looked safe; he opened the door wide and walked into the middle of the room. Standing in awe, he heard the door creak slowly shut. Craig spun round to watch it close, thinking he’d see someone behind it. To his amazement, no one was to be seen.

The voices started in his head again. He still couldn’t make them out, almost as if they were speaking to him in a different language. Craig felt drawn to the upper level of the mansion and made his way up the stairs. Each step creaked as he laid his weight upon it. His mouth was dry, his heart beating at his throat, the butterflies proving difficult to contain. He came to the top of the stairs and rounded the corner with caution.

‘Hello?’ Craig asked, not expecting an answer.

His expectations were met with a silence. Not even a single voice in his head. In a way, he felt relieved. Where he was drawn to was right in front of him. It appeared to be a bedroom. He could see a double bed, nicely made with curtains closed. As Craig stared, he heard the front door open followed by a 'hello'. He jogged back down the stairs and stopped dead on the 7th step from the bottom.

‘Dad?’ Craig was shocked to see his father now standing in front of the open door. ‘How did you find me?’
‘You said you were going to the library. It’s nearly 10pm. Your mother got worried and so I came looking for you. First place I looked was the library and they said you came in and removed a book called “Mansion Hackneyed”. I knew where this was so I came here in hope that I would find you. Come home. Your mother’s worried about you.’

Craig heard the voice in his head again, this time it was as clear as his own voice. Craig’s face went from a confused look to a solemn, angry look. Fire raged in his eyes.

‘Craig, are you ok?’ his father asked.
‘You, you killed my real father!’ Craig accused ferociously.
‘What? Where did you hear that? This is madness. I didn’t even…’ his father began to protest.
‘Don’t lie to me, John!’ Craig roared. ‘You shot my father!’
‘How did you find out?’ John sighed.
‘That’s not important. What is important is that you killed an innocent man!’
‘No, Craig. I didn’t. He was a murderer. He deserved to die.’
‘No he didn’t! The real murderer was found and prosecuted! You murdered the wrong man!’
‘Look, I was young and angry at the world. I just…’ John tried to lie his way out.
‘You knew what you were doing! You knew!’ Craig screamed at him and John was lifted into the air.
‘Craig, what are you doing? Craig, put me down! Now!’ John screeched in fear.
‘You killed him! And now, you will have a worse fate than my father.’

John was thrown to the right of the room, smashing off the wall and falling hard to the floor. John began to splutter blood. Craig walked down the stairs and into the middle of the floor and faced his enemy. John lifted himself painfully to his feet. Johns face went from overwhelmed to terrified within a split second. He stared above Craig. John tried to warn Craig but he was too shocked to speak. A black shape much bigger than Craig had formed behind him. It had the shape of a head and two thick arms stretched out to the side. There was a low growl seemingly coming from the beast. All of a sudden it screeched, seemed to dive over Craig’s head and land flat on the floor. It glided like a shadow across the floor towards John who backed up against the wall staring at what he thought was a demon coming towards him. The thing glided across until it reached John, stood up in front of him looking like a black, transparent blob with a head and stared him in the face. It had no eyes, but John imagined where they would be and stared. It swayed gently from side to side, almost as if it was contemplating what it was going to do with him. John couldn’t help imagining a cruel smile on its face and sharp teeth with angry, dark eyes staring at his face, waiting for the most indulging thought to cross its mind. Without warning, the shadow disappeared into his body. John screamed in fear. After a few seconds when nothing happened, John moved forward towards Craig with anger in his eyes. Before he could speak, John was down on his knees, head bowed and screaming in agony. Johns face turned red, fists were clenched so tight he made his hands bleed. Suddenly, John threw his head back, arms out to the side and continued to scream. Blood came out on his navy blue shirt, tucked into his black trousers. Then, he exploded from the chest. Body parts and blood flying out of his body. His body sat for a few moments, lifeless. A huge hole was in his chest with everything missing. All that was left was his jagged, blown ribs and blood. His body fell backwards, legs still in the kneeling position, hitting the floor with a thud.

‘My mansion’ Craig smirked.



THE END