He's Not There

I saw him again. Last night. Not in my dreams now, but real. He stands in the courtyard between my block of flats and the next. He stands still, arms limp at his sides, head upturned towards my window and his face as white and round as the moon. I see him, then the next minute he’s gone.

And every time I see him it’s the same, a strange smell, that cold smell. Like moss, like the grave yard, it makes me feel cold, like a damp wind on bare skin, old like the smell that comes up from the cellar, a lonely place. But worst of all, that smell’s now inside the flat. I smell it in the kitchen, I hear him, his feet on the bottom stair. I know that creek, I wouldn’t hear it if someone’s foot wasn’t placed there.

He’s getting closer, he’s coming here. He’s coming for me. Now he’s inside the house.

Dad said it was rubbish. He doesn’t remember me asking him though. Drunk and cheerful, he couldn’t focus on the screen when I showed him the video on Youtube. He laughed too, they say that’s the worst thing you can do, that if you laugh it makes it worse, it brings him quicker, faster.

It was Liv who told me about the clip. She put a link on facebook and asked me if I’d seen it.

‘Why would I want to watch that?’ I said. It was as we were walking to school. It was autumn, leaves heaped against the old stone wall on Richmond Road, puddles in the road, brown leaves turned to mush., cars coughing smoke, belching fumes into the misty wet air.

‘It’s just for fun. I’ve seen it. Nothing’s happened.’

I shouldn’t have believed her. I should have known she was lying.

‘It’s just some creepy weird clip someone’s put up there, something about a man and he’s in the woods and he’s looking over his shoulder at you.’

I shouldn’t have listened.

‘They say if you watch to the end then he comes looking to you.’

I laughed at that, more a snort, a scoff, a bit of spit came from my mouth like splutter from a car exhaust.

‘No, it’s true. It’s fucking crazy. Watch it. I’ll put it on Facebook tonight.’

And I did watch it. I watched it all the way through. Some stupid home-made video. ‘It’s like Slenderman.’ I messaged Liv. The same misty wood. The same creepiness.

‘No, it’s not slenderman.’ She messaged back.

‘I know, I said it’s LIKE Slenderman.’

‘Have you watched it?’

I did what she wanted, I watched it through. I watched the man as he walked across a field with the camera following him. Whoever held the camera follows him and into the woods. He looks across his shoulder as he walks, looks right at you. It’s not scary, it pointless. It’s a little boring, but the wood is dark, even though it must be shot in the daytime, and it’s misty and the trees are bare and the man is carrying a spade and he’s fat and he’s old, although not as old as Granddad. He has no hair, just thin strands across his bald white head and the look on his face, it’s like pain, like he’s about to cry and it ends before anything happens.

‘It just stops.’ I messaged Liv.

‘Did you watch it?’

‘Nothing happens, he just goes into the woods and then it just stops. Why did you tell me to watch that? Nothing happened, he just keeps looking at the camera. Why did you want me to watch it?’

She didn’t answer my question.

But that night I dreamed about it. I dreamt I was following the man into the woods, cold and grey and winter-bleak. My dream was just like the video, dull at first, just strange. It didn’t feel right, like a thought that comes to you unexpectedly, like a snippet of conversation overheard on the bus that’s out of place and out of context and, just, sort of, random.