On The Doorstep
By Andy Morris
He was still there, the figure in black, lurking in the shadows of the high hedgerow opposite the house. Jeremy cast another glance out of the corner of his eye. Whoever it was hadn’t moved. Overhead a bright full moon illuminated the lane but the watcher’s features were still veiled in shadow. Jeremy had no idea who the solitary figure was or how long they’d been standing there for. He’d become aware of him about half an hour and it was nearly midnight now. The armchair creaked as Jeremy self-consciously shifted himself into a more comfortable position. For the tenth time, he debated whether he should close the curtains or not. He could leave them open and pretend he hadn’t seen the figure, but it was getting harder to ignore. On the other hand, if he did close them now he’d look and feel stupid for not doing it earlier. So far, they seemed content to just stay there quietly. They weren’t doing any harm and besides; confronting him wasn’t an option. Jeremy was far from being, even remotely, physically intimidating. He couldn’t call on any neighbours either because his was the only house down this track. His nearest neighbours lived on the farm on the other side of the field. The field that lay behind the hedge, where that anonymous figure stood watching the house.
It was where he always stood.
This wasn’t the first time Jeremy had seen the watcher out there. He always came on the full moon and he’d always find Jeremy sat here by the window. Jeremy liked to have his armchair in this position. Sitting here allowed him to peer outside at people walking past his house while he watched television. Very few people came down the lane, even in the daytime, so it was always interesting when someone did. It was usually hikers, locals from the village walking their dogs, or people going fishing in the river at the bottom of the lane. Whoever was out there tonight was none of those people, and so he needed to do something.
Ignoring him was no longer working and he couldn’t concentrate on his film any more. Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory was one of his favourite movies but he was struggling to get into it. Jeremy loved the secretive half-smile that Gene Wilder gave every time an accident befell one of the naughty, self-centred children. It was a smile he practised every day in front of the mirror.
He rubbed his eyes tiredly. It was now midnight and the bright strobing flashes from the TV were starting to have a hypnotic effect on him. He often fell asleep watching television and, he briefly wondered if he was dreaming now? Dreaming of a phantom shape in the bushes spying on him through the window. He shifted in his seat again, picked up his lemonade shandy and took another self-conscious gulp. He’d heard somewhere that you couldn’t taste things in dreams. Jeremy had never liked the taste of lager. It had always been too bitter, too sour for him. But, since he’d discovered how the addition of lemonade made such a sweet delicious taste, he had fallen in love with it. He took another quick mouthful and concluded that; as it tasted so good he couldn’t be asleep. He leaned forward to place the glass back on the coffee table, consciously averting his gaze from the window. As he settled back into his chair again he couldn’t help but throw a spontaneous glance to his right and saw that the scene outside had changed.
The figure in the hedgerow had moved closer. Jeremy hadn’t seen him cross the road. He’d kept him in his peripheral vision all the time and he hadn’t moved even one foot. Yet here he was, standing on this side of the lane at the edge of his garden. He was just three meters from his window now. Jeremy sat back, pressing himself into his chair, staring straight ahead at the television. The figure, he’d noticed, held the same slightly bent posture and despite the large hump between his shoulder blades the familiar dark raincoat still covered him from head to toe. His face, as always, remained hidden in the gloom of his voluminous hood. The same was true of his companions.
In the time it had taken for Jeremy to put his empty glass on the table four more figures dressed in the same black attire, had joined the first one. They were all stooped, heads facing him in a silent unmoving row, like monks at prayer. Jeremy’s heart was racing in his chest. His throat was dry. He reached out to take another drink of shandy, only to find he’d finished it. His hand hovered next to the empty glass before he quickly sat back again, embarrassed by his awkwardness. The watchers knew he’d seen them but they probably didn’t care. That’s why they were out there in the open now, creeping closer to the house.
On the television Violet Beauregarde was blowing up into a giant blueberry while Willy Wonka stood back calmly observing the chaos, relishing what was to come. This was one of Jeremy’s favourite scenes but it did nothing for him now. His mind was elsewhere. So far the visitors never caused any damage to his home and they hadn’t tried to do anything to him, but would that always be the case? He had given up asking himself why they came. Perhaps, deep down he knew the answer, but there was no point dwelling on that. Beneath those black hoods, their eyes were on him. He could feel them like hot lasers burning his skin. A moment later Jeremy came to a decision.
Stretching his arms up in an exaggerated yawn he got to his feet and, making a point of looking everywhere but the window. He moved around the back of his chair out of sight from those outside. He took hold of one grey curtain and pushed it across the window. Then, ducking down low onto the floor he crawled to the other side of the window and closed the curtain on that side in the same way.
Jeremey returned to his armchair and tried to watch the film as if everything was fine, but he knew it wasn’t. Those watchers outside couldn’t be forgotten so easily. He could hear them now. A low murmuring rose from behind the curtains. Muffled voices, loud whispers, indistinct words. He looked at the heavy grey drapes but he could see nothing through them. He didn’t need to see, to know that more had arrived. They were now in his garden, pressing their faces up to the window, tapping on the glass!
Jeremy sprang to his feet and hurried out to the hallway. His limbs were heavy as he moved through the darkness. It was like he was wading through the chocolate river that Augustus Gloop had almost drowned in. The outside light above his front door had come on and shapes could be seen moving beyond the frosted glass. Dozens of shadows swayed and gathered, stalked closer and then withdrew. The door handle slowly turned as someone tried to open it. Fortunately, it was locked. Jeremey hurried past the door to the stairs with a renewed sense of urgency. The fastest way up was on all fours, so he scrambled to the top as quietly as he could. From there he darted left into his bedroom, which overlooked the tiny garden and front door. Whenever an unexpected visitor came to the house he would dash up here to see who it was before deciding whether or not to answer the door.
The bedroom curtains were closed but the unusually bright moonlight filtered through the dark green material and provided enough illumination to safely creep around his bed to the window.
Downstairs the rattling of the front door handle was getting louder and more forceful.
Jeremy eased back one side of the drapes so he could peek out. He couldn’t see the garden. Instead, something else was there, peering back at him from the other side of the glass. A moment later he realised it was a face or at least a twisted parody of a face. Its shocking appearance caused Jeremy to yelp in surprise. He jumped backwards. His legs hit the side of the bed and sat down upon the crumpled duvet. He’d seen it for only a moment but the ghostly-white image had burned into his brain. It had to be a mask, surely. No living person could look like that! The spaces where its eyes should have been looked like they’d melted, leaving two irregular-shaped cavities holding nothing but blackness. A long crow-like nose was bent and flaccid where it pressed up close against the glass. An impossibly wide mouth was stretched open in an unpleasant grin. Jeremy was rooted to the bed for several moments, breathing hard. He’d never seen their faces before, they’d always been hidden in their hoods.
Downstairs the front door was now shaking in its frame. Whoever was out there desperately wanted to come inside.
How, he wondered; was he outside his bedroom window? They were about ten feet off the ground so how could he be there? It was impossible! Despite his reluctance, he had to see what was going on out there. After a few more moments he caught his breath and returned to the window. He carefully took hold of the edge of the curtain and squeezed it tightly in a vice-like grip. Only now becoming aware of how loud he was breathing, Jeremy pushed out a sigh. His hand was trembling as he eased back the curtain.
This time, there was no one there.
The banging on the front door, he noted, had fallen silent. The only sounds were the muffled voices from the television and his heart thumping wildly in his throat. He leaned in to the window to get a better view. There were about twenty of the figures out there now, creating a sea of black hoods. Somehow they all knew he was there because when they turned their heads to look at him they all moved as one. Twenty phallic beaks rose upwards as twenty pairs of melted eye sockets stared at him in shrieking silence. Seconds stretched into minutes until, then without any obvious signal, the group turned away, again in unison, and began to leave his garden. Jeremy held his breath as the figures slowly drifted away like smoke on the wind. They flowed back across the lane where some melted into the shadows of the towering hedgerow opposite. Others turned left up the lane and dissolved into the night, while the remaining handful headed right in the direction of the river. Before long they had all been claimed by night and Jeremy was alone once more. The eerie stillness of the night was the only thing that remained in the lane. He stayed glued to the window for a while longer until he was sure they had truly gone. The visitors had never returned on previous occasions but saying that, they have never tried to enter his home before either.
Downstairs, the Oompa Lumpas’ sang about claiming another careless child. It sounded like Verruca Salt and her father had come to a nasty end after she tried to grab a squirrel. It was at this moment that Jeremy noticed something on his doorstep. A dark shape, too small to be one of them, had been left by his front door. He made his way downstairs on wobbly legs. Images of those white faces taunted him as he approached the door. He peered very carefully through the spyhole and when he was satisfied there was no one there, he opened the door. There on his doorstep was a pile of blankets; crumpled and damp with dew. The collection of assorted pastel-coloured blankets looked both new and clean in the overhead light. They were also moving.
Something within them writhed and crawled. Jeremy gingerly pulled back the top blanket to reveal a small hand and a little pink arm. It reached upwards grasping experimentally at the air with fingers it had only just learned to move. A high pitched crying emanated from the bundle and Jeremy lifted the yellow blanket on top to reveal a naked baby girl. She could be no more than a few weeks old. She wailed in the chilly night air, flailing her thin arms and legs like a beetle stuck on its back. There was no one around. The lane was still empty and deserted, so Jeremy picked up the baby. He instinctively rocked her as he carried her indoors.
“Well hello, little one” he hushed, touching her gently on the nose. “I wonder where you came from?” He gazed at her, flashing his best secretive-Willy-Wonka-smile. She cried louder as Jeremy brought her into the kitchen, opened the door to the cellar, and put her inside with the others.
It was where he always stood.
This wasn’t the first time Jeremy had seen the watcher out there. He always came on the full moon and he’d always find Jeremy sat here by the window. Jeremy liked to have his armchair in this position. Sitting here allowed him to peer outside at people walking past his house while he watched television. Very few people came down the lane, even in the daytime, so it was always interesting when someone did. It was usually hikers, locals from the village walking their dogs, or people going fishing in the river at the bottom of the lane. Whoever was out there tonight was none of those people, and so he needed to do something.
Ignoring him was no longer working and he couldn’t concentrate on his film any more. Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory was one of his favourite movies but he was struggling to get into it. Jeremy loved the secretive half-smile that Gene Wilder gave every time an accident befell one of the naughty, self-centred children. It was a smile he practised every day in front of the mirror.
He rubbed his eyes tiredly. It was now midnight and the bright strobing flashes from the TV were starting to have a hypnotic effect on him. He often fell asleep watching television and, he briefly wondered if he was dreaming now? Dreaming of a phantom shape in the bushes spying on him through the window. He shifted in his seat again, picked up his lemonade shandy and took another self-conscious gulp. He’d heard somewhere that you couldn’t taste things in dreams. Jeremy had never liked the taste of lager. It had always been too bitter, too sour for him. But, since he’d discovered how the addition of lemonade made such a sweet delicious taste, he had fallen in love with it. He took another quick mouthful and concluded that; as it tasted so good he couldn’t be asleep. He leaned forward to place the glass back on the coffee table, consciously averting his gaze from the window. As he settled back into his chair again he couldn’t help but throw a spontaneous glance to his right and saw that the scene outside had changed.
The figure in the hedgerow had moved closer. Jeremy hadn’t seen him cross the road. He’d kept him in his peripheral vision all the time and he hadn’t moved even one foot. Yet here he was, standing on this side of the lane at the edge of his garden. He was just three meters from his window now. Jeremy sat back, pressing himself into his chair, staring straight ahead at the television. The figure, he’d noticed, held the same slightly bent posture and despite the large hump between his shoulder blades the familiar dark raincoat still covered him from head to toe. His face, as always, remained hidden in the gloom of his voluminous hood. The same was true of his companions.
In the time it had taken for Jeremy to put his empty glass on the table four more figures dressed in the same black attire, had joined the first one. They were all stooped, heads facing him in a silent unmoving row, like monks at prayer. Jeremy’s heart was racing in his chest. His throat was dry. He reached out to take another drink of shandy, only to find he’d finished it. His hand hovered next to the empty glass before he quickly sat back again, embarrassed by his awkwardness. The watchers knew he’d seen them but they probably didn’t care. That’s why they were out there in the open now, creeping closer to the house.
On the television Violet Beauregarde was blowing up into a giant blueberry while Willy Wonka stood back calmly observing the chaos, relishing what was to come. This was one of Jeremy’s favourite scenes but it did nothing for him now. His mind was elsewhere. So far the visitors never caused any damage to his home and they hadn’t tried to do anything to him, but would that always be the case? He had given up asking himself why they came. Perhaps, deep down he knew the answer, but there was no point dwelling on that. Beneath those black hoods, their eyes were on him. He could feel them like hot lasers burning his skin. A moment later Jeremy came to a decision.
Stretching his arms up in an exaggerated yawn he got to his feet and, making a point of looking everywhere but the window. He moved around the back of his chair out of sight from those outside. He took hold of one grey curtain and pushed it across the window. Then, ducking down low onto the floor he crawled to the other side of the window and closed the curtain on that side in the same way.
Jeremey returned to his armchair and tried to watch the film as if everything was fine, but he knew it wasn’t. Those watchers outside couldn’t be forgotten so easily. He could hear them now. A low murmuring rose from behind the curtains. Muffled voices, loud whispers, indistinct words. He looked at the heavy grey drapes but he could see nothing through them. He didn’t need to see, to know that more had arrived. They were now in his garden, pressing their faces up to the window, tapping on the glass!
Jeremy sprang to his feet and hurried out to the hallway. His limbs were heavy as he moved through the darkness. It was like he was wading through the chocolate river that Augustus Gloop had almost drowned in. The outside light above his front door had come on and shapes could be seen moving beyond the frosted glass. Dozens of shadows swayed and gathered, stalked closer and then withdrew. The door handle slowly turned as someone tried to open it. Fortunately, it was locked. Jeremey hurried past the door to the stairs with a renewed sense of urgency. The fastest way up was on all fours, so he scrambled to the top as quietly as he could. From there he darted left into his bedroom, which overlooked the tiny garden and front door. Whenever an unexpected visitor came to the house he would dash up here to see who it was before deciding whether or not to answer the door.
The bedroom curtains were closed but the unusually bright moonlight filtered through the dark green material and provided enough illumination to safely creep around his bed to the window.
Downstairs the rattling of the front door handle was getting louder and more forceful.
Jeremy eased back one side of the drapes so he could peek out. He couldn’t see the garden. Instead, something else was there, peering back at him from the other side of the glass. A moment later he realised it was a face or at least a twisted parody of a face. Its shocking appearance caused Jeremy to yelp in surprise. He jumped backwards. His legs hit the side of the bed and sat down upon the crumpled duvet. He’d seen it for only a moment but the ghostly-white image had burned into his brain. It had to be a mask, surely. No living person could look like that! The spaces where its eyes should have been looked like they’d melted, leaving two irregular-shaped cavities holding nothing but blackness. A long crow-like nose was bent and flaccid where it pressed up close against the glass. An impossibly wide mouth was stretched open in an unpleasant grin. Jeremy was rooted to the bed for several moments, breathing hard. He’d never seen their faces before, they’d always been hidden in their hoods.
Downstairs the front door was now shaking in its frame. Whoever was out there desperately wanted to come inside.
How, he wondered; was he outside his bedroom window? They were about ten feet off the ground so how could he be there? It was impossible! Despite his reluctance, he had to see what was going on out there. After a few more moments he caught his breath and returned to the window. He carefully took hold of the edge of the curtain and squeezed it tightly in a vice-like grip. Only now becoming aware of how loud he was breathing, Jeremy pushed out a sigh. His hand was trembling as he eased back the curtain.
This time, there was no one there.
The banging on the front door, he noted, had fallen silent. The only sounds were the muffled voices from the television and his heart thumping wildly in his throat. He leaned in to the window to get a better view. There were about twenty of the figures out there now, creating a sea of black hoods. Somehow they all knew he was there because when they turned their heads to look at him they all moved as one. Twenty phallic beaks rose upwards as twenty pairs of melted eye sockets stared at him in shrieking silence. Seconds stretched into minutes until, then without any obvious signal, the group turned away, again in unison, and began to leave his garden. Jeremy held his breath as the figures slowly drifted away like smoke on the wind. They flowed back across the lane where some melted into the shadows of the towering hedgerow opposite. Others turned left up the lane and dissolved into the night, while the remaining handful headed right in the direction of the river. Before long they had all been claimed by night and Jeremy was alone once more. The eerie stillness of the night was the only thing that remained in the lane. He stayed glued to the window for a while longer until he was sure they had truly gone. The visitors had never returned on previous occasions but saying that, they have never tried to enter his home before either.
Downstairs, the Oompa Lumpas’ sang about claiming another careless child. It sounded like Verruca Salt and her father had come to a nasty end after she tried to grab a squirrel. It was at this moment that Jeremy noticed something on his doorstep. A dark shape, too small to be one of them, had been left by his front door. He made his way downstairs on wobbly legs. Images of those white faces taunted him as he approached the door. He peered very carefully through the spyhole and when he was satisfied there was no one there, he opened the door. There on his doorstep was a pile of blankets; crumpled and damp with dew. The collection of assorted pastel-coloured blankets looked both new and clean in the overhead light. They were also moving.
Something within them writhed and crawled. Jeremy gingerly pulled back the top blanket to reveal a small hand and a little pink arm. It reached upwards grasping experimentally at the air with fingers it had only just learned to move. A high pitched crying emanated from the bundle and Jeremy lifted the yellow blanket on top to reveal a naked baby girl. She could be no more than a few weeks old. She wailed in the chilly night air, flailing her thin arms and legs like a beetle stuck on its back. There was no one around. The lane was still empty and deserted, so Jeremy picked up the baby. He instinctively rocked her as he carried her indoors.
“Well hello, little one” he hushed, touching her gently on the nose. “I wonder where you came from?” He gazed at her, flashing his best secretive-Willy-Wonka-smile. She cried louder as Jeremy brought her into the kitchen, opened the door to the cellar, and put her inside with the others.