Here Comes Mr Rabbit
By Andy Morris
Something kept disturbing Luc Martell's sleep. It had happened most nights over the last few weeks, ever since he'd moved into his new flat. The flat was just outside Beaulieu in the New Forest and it had been a great find. It was part of an old converted manor house, known as The Rabbit Hole. The house had been owned by Raymond Button, who had written many popular fairy tales until his mysterious disappearance in the 1950s. Following this, the house had fallen into disrepair before being renovated into cheap flats. The rent was surprisingly affordable for a Film and Drama Studies student, such as Luc, and the owners even allowed pets, so it had been perfect. It was only after Luc moved in that he started having problems.
His main complaint was his bad dreams, the cause of which, he still didn’t know.
Luc hoped he would sleep better tonight as he pulled off his beanie hat and ran a hand over his smooth shaved head. Before retiring to his bed he said goodnight to Lady, his little Yorkshire terrier who was curled up on the sofa. She raised her head, snuffled quietly and went back to sleep.
Lady had been acting strangely since they moved in. She used to sleep on his bed every night and snuggle up to him but now she rarely went in there. It was the wardrobe that she didn’t like. She’d often growl at it for no apparent reason and when she did go into his room she never walked past the big old closet, she ran past.
Luc opened the door to the antique wardrobe and stuck a sticky note on the inside, reminding him to take his laptop into university tomorrow. Closing the heavy door, however, sent fragments of last night’s dream flashing into his mind.
He tried to recall the details but, as always, they slipped away. There had been a small boy and… something else… but the details remained elusive; just echoes receding into the back of his mind. There was one thing he was certain of though, the dream had definitely involved the wardrobe.
The grand and rather imposing piece of antique furniture had come with the flat. Apparently, since the renovations to the old house, the old wardrobe was now too big to get out of the doorway so it was stuck in here. Its' dark-stained wooden exterior was carved in an ornate and elegant design. It had obviously been hand-made and designed to last a lifetime. Its solid double doors reached from the floor to the ceiling like the entrance to some grand cathedral, or a tomb. The doors were closed; he made sure of that every night. Yet in the morning he'd often find them open again.
Luc eyed the wardrobe for several moments before settling down to read another chapter of his autobiography of Claude Chabrol, the famous French film director, but it wasn’t long before the pull of sleep became too much.
Luc must have been asleep because, when he was awoken by the metallic creak of old hinges, the flat was cloaked in darkness. The sudden noise had sent a spike of adrenalin, startling Luc into full wakefulness. He lay still, listening and watching the inky blackness ooze through the bedroom. Shades of tepid grey light filtered in from behind the curtains, illuminating the imposing wardrobe in the corner of the room. Everything was still and silent but one of the doors now stood half open. Luc sighed and cursed the thing under his breath.
Every night!He flung back the covers and crept out of bed, tip-toeing across the room so as not to wake Lady, but a low growl told him Lady was also awake. She was out in the hallway, slowly backing away from the bedroom door. He hissed at her to be quiet but she ignored him. Luc pushed the wardrobe door closed and was about to turn to Lady but, to his surprise, the door didn’t close. He tried it again, a little harder and it reluctantly moved a few inches but then it refused to budge. He tried a third time, with both hands and the door gave a little but it felt as if there was someone on the inside trying to keep it open. Then there came a voice, a tiny quivering cry.
“No, Mummy! Please, don’t close the door.” Luc snatched his hand away and stood in the doorway, perfectly still as if an electrical current were passing through him. His heart pounded in his chest.
“Please” wailed the voice. It sounded like a little boy. “Mr Rabbit is real and he’s coming!”
The temperature in the room had plummeted. There was no doubt the voice was coming from inside the wardrobe, which was impossible because there was no one in there. No one else had even been in his flat recently, either. Luc shivered, feeling his scalp prickle as if a hundred spiders were running across it.
Lady yapped. It was a high-pitched squeak that Luc had never heard before. She did it again before scrabbling away to the kitchen. Luc was still frozen on the spot. He looked from the wardrobe out into the hallway where Lady had suddenly fled to. From inside the closet there came a swish of clothes, a scraping of hangers being slid to one end of the rail. Luc couldn’t breathe. The door still wouldn’t close. Worse, it began to open. Luc stepped back into the bedroom. Too late, he realised he was now cornered. The wooden door creaked fully open. Inside, something stirred.
Luc woke up, breathing heavily. Momentarily paralysed, he could do nothing but stare at the ceiling as reality slowly took shape. It was 06:45 and his alarm was playing Holst’s: ‘The Planets’. Luc remained still for several long moments before switching off the alarm and then plucking up the courage to look in the corner of his room. The wardrobe door was open, just a few inches, but it was open. Everything else seemed in order. Luc rubbed his face and slowly rolled out of the bed.
He took a quick peek inside the wardrobe to confirm there was nothing out of place. His shirts and tops all hung from their hangers, evenly spaced out. Satisfied, Luc pushed the door which closed without resistance and then he stumbled into the shower to try and wake himself up. After the shower, he shaved his head again and spent time trimming and sculpting his stubble. Breakfast was instant coffee. He had neither time nor stomach for anything else this morning. As always, specific details of the dream eluded him but he still held the feelings and sensations that accompanied the nightmare. Unpleasant and disturbing, they lingered with him as he pulled on his beanie hat, grabbed his laptop and went to catch the bus.
He lit a cigarette and watched the smoke rising in the cool morning air but his thoughts kept pulling him back to his bedroom. There was something about that wardrobe, and these dreams he kept having weren’t normal. Luc was curious by nature and he had always loved film so, as the bus pulled up, he was busy formulating a plan.
That night Luc returned to his flat with a mission.
He had a fair collection of cameras and camcorders. He selected a camera he'd received for his last birthday. It had a good night vision mode as well as a function that made it record whenever something moved in front of the lens. He set it up on a bookshelf, where it would cover most of the bedroom including his bed and the wardrobe. He’d checked earlier and the opening of the wardrobe door was enough to trigger the record function.
With his room set up, Luc went to bed early. Lady stayed in the kitchenette area and refused to venture any closer to his room. That reminded him he needed to pick up some more dog food, so he quickly wrote a note and stuck it on the inside of the wardrobe door before settling down to finish reading his book. He had another autobiography to read, about a different French director but he chose not to start that one tonight. Instead, he turned off his lamp and lay down hoping to learn something in the morning.
The following day Luc awoke with the now-familiar heavy fatigue clinging to his tired body. He yawned loudly and stretched. He couldn't recall any dreams but experience taught him that sometimes the recall came later in the day. Lady wasn't in the bedroom and the wardrobe door was open slightly, again. On the other side of the room, his camera was flashing on the bookcase, indicating it had been recording. Luc cast a furtive glance at the wardrobe before closing its door and examining the footage on his camera.
Four video files appeared in the display. Intrigued, Luc played the first one. The image showed a dark bedroom. In the right-hand corner of the room, the wardrobe door was creaking open. A moment later he sees himself, just a lump stirring on the bed. He had no memory of this and it felt strange watching himself sleepily climb out of bed and wander across the room. As he gets closer, both wardrobe doors open wider. He pauses at the open doors, head on one side as if listening to something which the audio didn’t pick up. Then he steps inside the wardrobe and the doors swing closed behind him.
The recording stops.
Luc quickly plays the second file. Lady must have triggered the sensor this time as she gingerly walks into the room. She hesitantly sniffs the air and turns to the wardrobe, growling. Her ears are flat against her head and her tail is out straight behind her. She steps closer to the antique closet. Then she seems to relax. Her little tail begins wagging as the doors open. The camera angle doesn't pick up anything inside the wardrobe but a hand reaches out and grabs Lady by the collar. She yelps and struggles as she's lifted up and snatched inside before the doors slam close again.
The recording stops.
What is going on here? With growing confusion and mounting unease, Luc plays the third clip and see's the wardrobe door open again. He sees himself stepping out into the bedroom, but something isn't right. The image is dark and shadowy but Luc soon sees what's wrong.
Is that me?He's making his way back to bed. He doesn't look at the camera but as he passes it Luc sees himself clearly enough. Only, it's not him! It's his body and his t-shirt but that isn't Luc's head. Instead, the figure has the head of a giant white rabbit. Long ears point skywards and a pair of teeth poke out beneath its twitching nose. The rabbit climbed into bed and lay down under the covers, seemingly asleep.
The recording stops.
The final recording shows Luc waking up in bed and switching his camera off.
What had he just watched? Luc looked up as he became aware of how still and quiet the flat was this morning.
Where’s Lady?She hadn't come in to say hello. His dog hadn't been in the last two recordings. Was she still in the wardrobe? A cold chill, almost a premonition swept over Luc. Hesitantly opening the wardrobe doors, Luc was confronted by a ghastly scene. His shirts and hoodies were all splashed with red. Chunks of fur and pink gore were splattered throughout the space inside. On the floor, Luc saw two tiny furry legs. They were twisted and broken as if they’d been torn off the body. The majority of Lady's torso was laying a little further back in the darkness and despite the shadows, it was clear that her head was missing. Luc stumbled back onto the bed and vomited on the floor. As he looked up, wiping his mouth he saw a note stuck to the inside of the door. It wasn't one he'd put there himself. It read simply: ‘Here comes Mr Rabbit.'
His main complaint was his bad dreams, the cause of which, he still didn’t know.
Luc hoped he would sleep better tonight as he pulled off his beanie hat and ran a hand over his smooth shaved head. Before retiring to his bed he said goodnight to Lady, his little Yorkshire terrier who was curled up on the sofa. She raised her head, snuffled quietly and went back to sleep.
Lady had been acting strangely since they moved in. She used to sleep on his bed every night and snuggle up to him but now she rarely went in there. It was the wardrobe that she didn’t like. She’d often growl at it for no apparent reason and when she did go into his room she never walked past the big old closet, she ran past.
Luc opened the door to the antique wardrobe and stuck a sticky note on the inside, reminding him to take his laptop into university tomorrow. Closing the heavy door, however, sent fragments of last night’s dream flashing into his mind.
He tried to recall the details but, as always, they slipped away. There had been a small boy and… something else… but the details remained elusive; just echoes receding into the back of his mind. There was one thing he was certain of though, the dream had definitely involved the wardrobe.
The grand and rather imposing piece of antique furniture had come with the flat. Apparently, since the renovations to the old house, the old wardrobe was now too big to get out of the doorway so it was stuck in here. Its' dark-stained wooden exterior was carved in an ornate and elegant design. It had obviously been hand-made and designed to last a lifetime. Its solid double doors reached from the floor to the ceiling like the entrance to some grand cathedral, or a tomb. The doors were closed; he made sure of that every night. Yet in the morning he'd often find them open again.
Luc eyed the wardrobe for several moments before settling down to read another chapter of his autobiography of Claude Chabrol, the famous French film director, but it wasn’t long before the pull of sleep became too much.
Luc must have been asleep because, when he was awoken by the metallic creak of old hinges, the flat was cloaked in darkness. The sudden noise had sent a spike of adrenalin, startling Luc into full wakefulness. He lay still, listening and watching the inky blackness ooze through the bedroom. Shades of tepid grey light filtered in from behind the curtains, illuminating the imposing wardrobe in the corner of the room. Everything was still and silent but one of the doors now stood half open. Luc sighed and cursed the thing under his breath.
Every night!He flung back the covers and crept out of bed, tip-toeing across the room so as not to wake Lady, but a low growl told him Lady was also awake. She was out in the hallway, slowly backing away from the bedroom door. He hissed at her to be quiet but she ignored him. Luc pushed the wardrobe door closed and was about to turn to Lady but, to his surprise, the door didn’t close. He tried it again, a little harder and it reluctantly moved a few inches but then it refused to budge. He tried a third time, with both hands and the door gave a little but it felt as if there was someone on the inside trying to keep it open. Then there came a voice, a tiny quivering cry.
“No, Mummy! Please, don’t close the door.” Luc snatched his hand away and stood in the doorway, perfectly still as if an electrical current were passing through him. His heart pounded in his chest.
“Please” wailed the voice. It sounded like a little boy. “Mr Rabbit is real and he’s coming!”
The temperature in the room had plummeted. There was no doubt the voice was coming from inside the wardrobe, which was impossible because there was no one in there. No one else had even been in his flat recently, either. Luc shivered, feeling his scalp prickle as if a hundred spiders were running across it.
Lady yapped. It was a high-pitched squeak that Luc had never heard before. She did it again before scrabbling away to the kitchen. Luc was still frozen on the spot. He looked from the wardrobe out into the hallway where Lady had suddenly fled to. From inside the closet there came a swish of clothes, a scraping of hangers being slid to one end of the rail. Luc couldn’t breathe. The door still wouldn’t close. Worse, it began to open. Luc stepped back into the bedroom. Too late, he realised he was now cornered. The wooden door creaked fully open. Inside, something stirred.
Luc woke up, breathing heavily. Momentarily paralysed, he could do nothing but stare at the ceiling as reality slowly took shape. It was 06:45 and his alarm was playing Holst’s: ‘The Planets’. Luc remained still for several long moments before switching off the alarm and then plucking up the courage to look in the corner of his room. The wardrobe door was open, just a few inches, but it was open. Everything else seemed in order. Luc rubbed his face and slowly rolled out of the bed.
He took a quick peek inside the wardrobe to confirm there was nothing out of place. His shirts and tops all hung from their hangers, evenly spaced out. Satisfied, Luc pushed the door which closed without resistance and then he stumbled into the shower to try and wake himself up. After the shower, he shaved his head again and spent time trimming and sculpting his stubble. Breakfast was instant coffee. He had neither time nor stomach for anything else this morning. As always, specific details of the dream eluded him but he still held the feelings and sensations that accompanied the nightmare. Unpleasant and disturbing, they lingered with him as he pulled on his beanie hat, grabbed his laptop and went to catch the bus.
He lit a cigarette and watched the smoke rising in the cool morning air but his thoughts kept pulling him back to his bedroom. There was something about that wardrobe, and these dreams he kept having weren’t normal. Luc was curious by nature and he had always loved film so, as the bus pulled up, he was busy formulating a plan.
That night Luc returned to his flat with a mission.
He had a fair collection of cameras and camcorders. He selected a camera he'd received for his last birthday. It had a good night vision mode as well as a function that made it record whenever something moved in front of the lens. He set it up on a bookshelf, where it would cover most of the bedroom including his bed and the wardrobe. He’d checked earlier and the opening of the wardrobe door was enough to trigger the record function.
With his room set up, Luc went to bed early. Lady stayed in the kitchenette area and refused to venture any closer to his room. That reminded him he needed to pick up some more dog food, so he quickly wrote a note and stuck it on the inside of the wardrobe door before settling down to finish reading his book. He had another autobiography to read, about a different French director but he chose not to start that one tonight. Instead, he turned off his lamp and lay down hoping to learn something in the morning.
The following day Luc awoke with the now-familiar heavy fatigue clinging to his tired body. He yawned loudly and stretched. He couldn't recall any dreams but experience taught him that sometimes the recall came later in the day. Lady wasn't in the bedroom and the wardrobe door was open slightly, again. On the other side of the room, his camera was flashing on the bookcase, indicating it had been recording. Luc cast a furtive glance at the wardrobe before closing its door and examining the footage on his camera.
Four video files appeared in the display. Intrigued, Luc played the first one. The image showed a dark bedroom. In the right-hand corner of the room, the wardrobe door was creaking open. A moment later he sees himself, just a lump stirring on the bed. He had no memory of this and it felt strange watching himself sleepily climb out of bed and wander across the room. As he gets closer, both wardrobe doors open wider. He pauses at the open doors, head on one side as if listening to something which the audio didn’t pick up. Then he steps inside the wardrobe and the doors swing closed behind him.
The recording stops.
Luc quickly plays the second file. Lady must have triggered the sensor this time as she gingerly walks into the room. She hesitantly sniffs the air and turns to the wardrobe, growling. Her ears are flat against her head and her tail is out straight behind her. She steps closer to the antique closet. Then she seems to relax. Her little tail begins wagging as the doors open. The camera angle doesn't pick up anything inside the wardrobe but a hand reaches out and grabs Lady by the collar. She yelps and struggles as she's lifted up and snatched inside before the doors slam close again.
The recording stops.
What is going on here? With growing confusion and mounting unease, Luc plays the third clip and see's the wardrobe door open again. He sees himself stepping out into the bedroom, but something isn't right. The image is dark and shadowy but Luc soon sees what's wrong.
Is that me?He's making his way back to bed. He doesn't look at the camera but as he passes it Luc sees himself clearly enough. Only, it's not him! It's his body and his t-shirt but that isn't Luc's head. Instead, the figure has the head of a giant white rabbit. Long ears point skywards and a pair of teeth poke out beneath its twitching nose. The rabbit climbed into bed and lay down under the covers, seemingly asleep.
The recording stops.
The final recording shows Luc waking up in bed and switching his camera off.
What had he just watched? Luc looked up as he became aware of how still and quiet the flat was this morning.
Where’s Lady?She hadn't come in to say hello. His dog hadn't been in the last two recordings. Was she still in the wardrobe? A cold chill, almost a premonition swept over Luc. Hesitantly opening the wardrobe doors, Luc was confronted by a ghastly scene. His shirts and hoodies were all splashed with red. Chunks of fur and pink gore were splattered throughout the space inside. On the floor, Luc saw two tiny furry legs. They were twisted and broken as if they’d been torn off the body. The majority of Lady's torso was laying a little further back in the darkness and despite the shadows, it was clear that her head was missing. Luc stumbled back onto the bed and vomited on the floor. As he looked up, wiping his mouth he saw a note stuck to the inside of the door. It wasn't one he'd put there himself. It read simply: ‘Here comes Mr Rabbit.'