Scribbles and Bits writing Challenge #4′ picture challenge

Scribbles and Bits writing Challenge #4′ picture challenge

This weeks challenge is a picture challenge. A tribute to the dark, if you will. But as well a tribute to a man who has long been considered a literary icon Mr. Clive Barker.

This week I would like Clive to inspire all of you. I want you to use this image as the basis for….. something. Write something that is somehow based around or inspired by this image. Any genre, any length. Then come back and post the link here so that we can all enjoy what Clive has inspired and awakened within yourself. 

Now get scribbling.

and make us proud.. write on!

So this is challenge number 4 set up by the creator of the scribbles and bits challenge… I will do my best…

Asleep

The guttural screams and gnashing of teeth surrounded me… the stench of bile and acidic spittle fills my nostrils as their taunts consumed my thoughts.

“your worthless”

“no one loves you”

 

“she will never care for you”

 

Each demon taking a bite out of my soul with every bullet of hate flying from its forked tongue… one festering mouthful at a time. Each trying to top the last to see who could cut the deepest…

“just die and give up no one cares”

“your never going to be anything special to anyone”

“Your own mother wanted you to be dead”

Slowly they started to fade… the feelings lingered though as they always did, most people dreamed of good places and of loved ones. But as I slept, I wrestled demons. Turning off my alarm… the one sound that always chased them away I walk to my shower feeling as if I had been beaten with a stick as I slept, stopping to look in the mirror expecting to see cuts and bruises I only saw myself looking back at me, for a moment I imagine my reflection looking at me in disgust.

Just another day… each night the teeth seem sharper and much more real, each morning looking for the proof and finding only my own disapproving self staring back at me. If life is only what we make it… I want to know how I made this and how I can unmake it.

Just another day at the office… clock in… check email… set up the day… trudge through the dim lights and fight the urge to just walk out. But walk out to what I always ask myself… what do “you” have to go to? The answer is always the same… nothing. But today was a little different… today I had not know it then, but this day my life would change.

Going to the coffee shop the folks behind the counter start making my drink as I walk through the door, so regular is my life that even strangers can predict what I want. Making small talk and thanking them with an outward smile I make my way to my truck when my life changed… at first I thought it might be a figment of my imagination, the shadow we think we see out of the corner of our eyes but when we look it is never really there. But no… when I looked it was there… it looked as shocked as I did when I looked right at it… one of the demons from my sleep, one of the creatures that waits for me to rob me of my rest and leave me weary each day.

It’s eye blinked twice once top to bottom like ours, then once side to side, then they narrowed and it charged at me. Almost blending in with its surroundings it leaped at me I attempted to duck down then sharply I fell forward, my feet being pulled out from under me, rolling to my back I could see another one under my truck. Clawing at my legs as I kicked to get free… another started to jump from the bed of my truck as I felt the teeth of the first I saw sink into my shoulder… I screamed for help… for anyone… but no car stopped no one seemed to even see me and then they started to fade away.

I jumped up quickly trying to get away but it was dark and with a hard smash I hit my knee on something. I reached out and tuned on the light as I stared back at myself in my own bathroom… I looked at my self in the mirror and saw no outward damage… just myself but this time I could really see the look of contempt as my reflection look back and I heard a whisper… “its only a matter of time…”

 

not the best thing I have written… but just something I threw together for the challenge…

Finding my way out of the dark