Weekly Free Story

Fear

A Short Story By

Terry F. Torrey

For the first time in his life, Harry Briggs was afraid. He had been scared before, sure, but never like this. Being under enemy fire in the war hadn’t caused the icy fingers of fear to clutch his stomach. The unexplained creaks and groans he’d heard a few times during his years as a night watchman for the Lambert Toy Company hadn’t caused cool drops of perspiration to appear on his forehead. Not even working ninety stories up in the top of an unfinished, wind-rocked skyscraper had scared him this much. Right now he was scared silly to walk fifty yards along the dark path to his pickup truck.

Harry ran his fingers through his gray crew cut and reminded himself who he was. He was fifty-two years old, a veteran of the Korean War, and just thirteen years from retiring from the toy company. He weighed two hundred forty pounds and stood six feet two in his socks. He had been an all-star running back at Oklahoma State, and right now he was scared to death to walk to his pickup truck in the dark.

Harry looked at the path. He couldn’t see his truck, the path twisted through the dense woods between the road and his cabin. He listened. He could hear nothing but the usual peepers. It was not surprising, his cabin was more than two miles out along a dead-end road. He looked up at the full moon. The moon looked reassuring as it bathed the landscape in its soft glow. The night was comfortably cool, and the air did not hold the smell of death, just hemlocks.

He looked at the path leading into the dark woods again and knew that nothing was waiting to get him. Not quite confident, but at least steadier than before, Harry turned back to his cabin and locked the door. He turned around, facing the path once again, taking a deep breath and shuddering.

The path was only fifty yards long, and his truck was waiting for him at the end of it. There was no sinister monster waiting to assault him in the darkness. Everything would go smoothly. He would walk quickly and confidently down the path. He would arrive at his truck, climb in and drive off, chuckling at his foolishness.

He took a deep breath and held it as he started walking hastily along the path.

The woods seemed thicker than he remembered, and the undergrowth seemed to grasp at his feet. Harry looked up, but the reassuring moon was lost behind a thick veil of summer leaves. The peepers had stopped peeping, and now the only sound was that of Harry’s heart thumping. It was alarmingly loud, and he tried to quiet it. He breathed uneasily and pressed on.

The sound of Harry’s footsteps pierced the darkness, and he began to wish he were part Indian. The path twisted, and he was completely surrounded by the woods. An animal fled from Harry’s feet, and he scrambled a few feet back up the path, his heart in his throat and beating like bongos. He heard the thing slink back to its lair, and then all was again quiet. He looked up, trying to see the moon, but it was still hidden by a canopy of leaves. Harry lowered his eyes to the path and forced his feet to move along it once more.

At every step, Harry waited for a cold hand to dart from the underbrush and latch onto his ankle. A thousand imaginary eyes peered out of the darkness at him. Illusionary voices whispered his name. Still, he walked on.

He neared the end of the path and quickened his pace to a run. At last, he stood, panting and glancing nervously back over his shoulder, at the door of his truck. He looked in the back. There was nothing there but his fishing gear and the box with his canned goods in it. He unlocked the door to the cab and opened it. The seat was covered with imitation sheepskin, and a bundle of clothes rested on the passenger’s side. Harry slid onto the seat and closed the door, sighing with relief.

He stuck the key in the ignition and turned it. The engine turned over. And over. And over. But it did not start.

Harry was scared for the second time in his life. He opened the door and got out to have a look at the engine.

Yes, once again Harry Briggs was afraid, and the very real creature hiding in the shadows under the front of Harry’s truck held Harry’s distributor cap in one of its icy hands, and knew he was afraid.

THE END